The cryptocurrency markets had a rough run in August, with only a handful of projects making it into the green.

Major names such as ethereum, bitcoin and XRP all dropped on the month, down 35.45, 9.44, and 27.93 percent, respectively.

Adding pressure to the situation, bitcoin's dominance rate rose substantially, up 6 points from July's period of 48.34 to 54.58 percent on Aug. 15 – levels not seen since December last year.

The high rate was a telling sign that traders were uncertain about price direction, utilizing bitcoin to exit the market through a transfer of crypto to fiat.

One name, however, made a substantial case against broader bearish market conditions to reach the top spot of August's best-performing crypto assets.

Nano delivered exceptional gains during the second half of the month despite falling to a yearly low of $0.74 on Aug. 14.

After fighting off the worst day in its two-year history, nano rose 73.85 percent over the August period and outperformed the top 30 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization to finish ahead by a margin of 50 percent against the other big names according to CoinMarketCap data.

The token's overall market cap also rose more than $160 million on the month, almost doubling from $260 million to $420 million, and pushing its ranking briefly from 27th to 24th on Aug. 30 before it slipped back to 28th spot on the final day of the month.

Monthly performance: +73.85 percent

All-time high: $34.43

Closing price on August 31: 3.01

Current market price: $2.92

Rank as per market capitalization: 28

Nano began its climb on Aug. 15 after the bears were finally exhausted at the yearly low of $0.74.

Savvy investors immediately snapped up discounted prices, leaving a long tail wick from the bottom on Aug. 14's candle (a sign of a bullish reversal). By the end of the month, it had managed to close above $3.00 after defying a last minute sell-off on Aug. 30.

Nano's all-time high was $34.43 back in December last year. At time of writing, the cryptocurrency is changing hands at $2.92, 89 percent down from that peak.

Nano was supported by the 8-day exponential moving average (EMA) over the second half of August, which had acted as the resistance level during most of the month of July.

As Nano closed convincingly above on Aug. 16, a bearish-to-bullish trend change occurred.

More importantly, total volume also picked up, with Aug. 26 seeing the most volume traded on record at $25.05 million during a single daily period, validating the rally to the monthly high of $3.79.

Looking ahead, prices could defy expectations in September, albeit after a retracement to the lower end of the 8-day EMA at $2.80 in the coming days – that's because the relative strength index, used to judge the momentum and trend of a particular asset, is showing overbought conditions.

Correction (09:45 UTC, Sept. 3, 2018): This article has been amended to correct an error that said nano had hit an all-time low in August. In fact, it was a yearly low.

Disclosure: The author holds USDT at the time of writing.

Climbing image via Shutterstock