Veteran traders hint at altcoin season as Bitcoin cools down

Bitcoin’s fall below the $100,000 mark shifted the investors’ focus to altcoins, veteran traders say.

Bitcoin (BTC) started its bullish momentum as Donald Trump won the U.S. presidential elections last month — rising to an all-time high of $103,900 on Dec. 5. As profit-taking kicked in, the flagship cryptocurrency fell below the $100,000 mark again.

This brought increased attention to altcoins.

Michaël van de Poppe, veteran crypto investor and trader, expects altcoins “to shine again” as Bitcoin faces correction. 

He pointed out that Bitcoin’s current price movements look similar to December 2023 as the global crypto market cap rose from $1.7 trillion to $2.9 trillion within three months.

Ethereum (ETH), the leading altcoin, reached a local high of $4,070 in mid-March. ETH is trading at $3,700 at the time of writing.

Another crypto analyst, known as Milky Bull with over 81,000 followers on X, expects the incoming “altseason” — a time when altcoins outperform Bitcoin — to last for three months. 

Milky Bull believes the altseason will last until March 2025 before a major correction happens.

According to data provided by Blockchain Center, the altcoin season index is currently hovering at 65. The indicator suggests that investors are currently more interested in altcoins rather than Bitcoin.

Data shows that 64% of the top 50 cryptocurrencies, excluding stablecoins and asset-backed tokens, have outperformed Bitcoin over the last 90 days. Hedera (HBAR) is leading with a 494% rally in the mentioned timeframe. 

For the altseason to fully kick in, over 75% of the leading 50 digital assets would have to outperform Bitcoin.

At this point, Bitcoin has a market dominance of 53.1% with a market cap of $1.94 trillion. The altcoin market cap dropped from $1.89 trillion on Dec. 9 to $1.68 trillion today amid the market-wide correction, according to data from CoinGecko.