Historical replay · AXS/USD

Axie Infinity's January Spike Unwinds (2026)

AXS more than tripled in eleven days to $2.997 on January 24, 2026. Two weeks later it was at $1.165, down 61%, as a broad crypto sell-off landed on top of its own reversal.

Sep 29, 2026

Axie Infinity is a blockchain game built around collectible creatures, and AXS is its governance token. In 2021 it was one of the most talked-about tokens in crypto; by the start of 2026 it had long been trading below $1, with a 2026 low of $0.793 on January 1. Then, in mid-January, it came back to life. From $0.904 on January 13, AXS reached $1.98 by the close of January 17, a day on which it gained 49% on $100 million of trading, compared with well under $1 million a day the week before.

This replay picks up the story on January 20, with the rally in full swing. That day showed what it was capable of: AXS dipped to $1.651, then gained 14.6% in the single hour from 12:00 UTC and closed at $2.104. It kept going, to $2.37 on January 21, $2.68 on January 22 and $2.94 on January 23, and set its high of $2.997 at the very start of January 24. From the January 13 low, that was a gain of 231%.

The first crack came quickly. AXS closed January 24 down 10%, and on January 25 it fell 22% to $2.05, with the opening hour alone down 8.1%. Buyers who had missed the run saw a dip: on January 26 a 14.4% hour at 06:00 UTC helped lift it back to $2.50, and it reached $2.76 on January 27. That bounce made a lower high, and it turned out to be the last one.

What followed was a market-wide turn. Between January 28 and February 6, Bitcoin fell from about $90,600 to $60,000, and most large coins lost 35-50%. For a token that had just tripled, the timing was brutal. AXS closed lower on nine of the ten days from January 28 to February 6 and bottomed at $1.165 on February 6, 61% below its peak.

The replay ends on February 7 with AXS near $1.33. It has not been back near January's highs since: for the rest of 2026 it has traded between about $0.80 and $1.79, mostly below $1.45. The shape is a familiar one in crypto. A long-dormant token wakes up, daily volume jumps more than a hundredfold, the final week goes parabolic, and the reversal coincides with a broader sell-off that leaves little room for a recovery.