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Crypto Market Hits New Highs Despite Bitcoin’s Sluggish Performance

Crypto Market Hits New Highs Despite Bitcoin’s Sluggish Performance

Published:
2025-09-18 09:53:15
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The crypto market has returned to its highs, despite Bitcoin's sluggishness

Digital assets surge past previous records as altcoins lead the charge—proving once again that crypto's momentum extends far beyond Bitcoin's shadow.

Alt Season in Full Swing

While Bitcoin treads water near $65K, Ethereum, Solana, and BNB smash through resistance levels. DeFi tokens and meme coins join the party, pushing total market cap to unprecedented heights.

Institutional Money Floods In

Wall Street's latest love affair with crypto isn't just Bitcoin-focused. ETF approvals and corporate treasury allocations diversify into altcoin portfolios, creating a rising tide that lifts all boats—except maybe those still waiting for Bitcoin to 'moon'.

Regulatory Clarity Fuels Confidence

Clearer frameworks from major economies remove uncertainty barriers. Suddenly, traditional finance players can't get enough—even if they still don't quite understand what they're buying.

The Future is Multi-Chain

Bitcoin's dominance narrative crumbles as interoperability and layer-2 solutions steal the spotlight. Cross-chain bridges and scaling solutions prove that crypto's value isn't stored in any single chain.

Just don't tell the Bitcoin maximalists—they're still waiting for their 'number go up' technology to actually go up.

Market overview

The crypto market capitalisation gained 1% in 24 hours to $4.10 billion due to a global increase in risk appetite against the backdrop of the Fed's decision to cut rates and plans for further policy easing. The total market capitalisation is close to a record high, having been higher only briefly on 14 August. The market has been driven over the past week by altcoins such as BNB, SOL and DOGE, which have gained over 10% compared to 2.6% for BTC.

Bitcoin is trading above $117K, rising to an intraday high of $117.8K, its highest level in exactly one month. Its dynamics are well within September's upward range, but the last four days have kept it there only thanks to the efforts of the bulls. They are buying the coin at the lower end of the channel. In contrast, many major altcoins are steadily rising. 

Binance Coin has surpassed the $1,000 mark, adding over 5% since the start of the day, accelerating decisively amid the background of rumours of Binance's impending exit from US regulatory oversight. According to Bloomberg, the exchange is in talks with the US Department of Justice, which would allow it to opt out of independent oversight of the company's activities several years ahead of schedule. As an exchange coin, BNB is closely correlated with the intensity of cryptocurrency trading, and the current update of historical highs clearly shows the mood of the retail market.

News background

The altcoin season has begun on the crypto market. According to Blockchain Center, 75% of the top 50 cryptocurrencies have outperformed Bitcoin in terms of returns over the past 90 days. The altseason index has reached its highest level since the end of 2024.

President TRUMP has filed a $15 billion defamation lawsuit against the New York Times (NYT), accusing it of damaging the reputation of the TRUMP coin, Truth Social and the Trump Organisation Foundation.

The volume of purchases of the first cryptocurrency by public companies is only 1,428 BTC per day, according to K33 Research. This is the lowest figure in the last four months. Many companies are limited in their ability to raise funds for cryptocurrency purchases through the issuance of shares because they trade at a discount to the value of their crypto reserves.

The co-founder of the ETH Strategy protocol, known by the nickname Clouted, called the growth of cryptocurrencies a logical consequence of the devaluation of the US dollar. In such conditions, cryptocurrencies are the only reasonable choice for protecting savings.

Nasdaq-listed public company Forward Industries announced plans to sell $4 billion worth of shares. The company intends to use the proceeds from the sale of securities to replenish its solana cryptocurrency reserves, among other things.

|Square

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