Altcoins Hit $1.05T Market Cap: The Case for an Imminent Alt Season

With altcoin collective valuation punching through $1.05 trillion, traders are eyeing historical patterns that suggest a major altcoin cycle is brewing—just as Bitcoin dominance shows cracks.

Key drivers: Ethereum’s Dencun upgrade slashing L2 fees, Solana’s NFT volumes hitting ATH, and BNB Chain’s meme coin frenzy. Meanwhile, TradFi investors still can’t tell the difference between a blockchain and a Excel spreadsheet.

The smart money? Rotating into high-beta alts before the herd arrives—because nothing pumps a market like FOMO chasing last week’s 100x moonshot.

The new crypto reality

To understand where altcoins stand, we first need to check out Bitcoin’s market dominance.

Bitcoin’s leap to six figures wasn’t just a lucky streak – it had some serious political and economic backing.

The Donald Trump administration “knowingly” caught the crypto wave, while BTC solidified its status as a “store of value” for investors big and small.

In fact, even with the usual market ups and downs, Bitcoin’s dominance has shot up nearly 14%, and we’re not even halfway through 2025 –  a clear sign that confidence in Bitcoin remains rock-solid.

Sure, altcoins still make up around 30% of the market, but that’s a far cry from when they once stood neck-to-neck with Bitcoin in the 2018-19 cycle. 

Thus, it’s SAFE to say an all-out “altcoin season” isn’t on the horizon anytime soon. Instead, what we’re seeing is the rise of altcoin cycles, where strategic capital inflows are the new normal.

Calculated moves in altcoin investing

In Q4 2024, the TOTAL2 (crypto market cap excluding Bitcoin) surged to a three-year high of $1.64 trillion. Hence, indicating that in a bullish cycle, capital rotates into alternative assets as investors adjust their risk profiles.

More crucially, during the subsequent bear market, TOTAL2 never dipped below the $800 billion floor, signaling that investors were actively buying the dip and keeping the altcoin market from capitulating.

In fact, as TOTAL2 tested pre-election support, it sparked a solid rebound. Fast forward to now, and the altcoin market cap is sitting pretty at $1.05 trillion.

Source: TradingView (TOTAL2)

This price action suggests the onset of an altcoin cycle, characterized by strategic accumulation. 

Simply put, investors are now laser-focused on the technicals. The RSI (Relative Strength Index) nearing overbought levels suggests that the market may be approaching a saturation point.

This means altcoin cycles are becoming more methodical, with capital flows being driven by market conditions rather than speculative, high-risk behavior often seen in “altcoin seasons.”