More than a third of tracked altcoins are now near lows despite broader market stabilization.
Conclusion
- CryptoQuant data shows that 38% of altcoins are trading near all-time lows, a deeper decline than the post-FTX recovery phase.
- Analyst Darkfost describes this as “the biggest altcoin regression seen in this period” and highlights the sustained structural pressure on non-BTC assets.
- While BTC is holding near highs, the dispersion between fundamentals and smaller lows has widened, and the altcoin’s underperformance points to weak liquidity and selective risk appetite.
Chain analysis firm CryptoQuant reports that 38% of altcoins are currently trading at their all-time lows, marking a sharper pullback than the period following the FTX collapse. The metric, highlighted by analyst Darkfost, is designed to identify a few alternative tokens that remain under sustained selling pressure, even as the broader market shows signs of stabilization.
In a note shared on social media, Darkfost describes this as the biggest altcoin regression seen so far in the current cycle, highlighting how uneven the recovery has been between blue chip assets and the long tail of speculative tokens.
Market participants commenting on the data noted that unlike the post-FTX phase — when forced liquidations and distressed sales drove prices down — the current environment has relatively few forced sellers. Instead, altcoin weakness has been driven by a combination of low liquidity, tighter risk budgets, and a shift to established names like BTC and ETH, which have taken the bulk of inflows into the spot markets and regulated products. One observer noted that post-FTX, many assets made at least a reflexive bounce after the major overshoot, while a large number of altcoins are now holding near their lows despite the occasional rally in the majors.investing+2.
Dispersion and liquidity stress
The difference described by CryptoQuant has important implications for portfolio construction and risk management in digital assets. An increase in variance – where some segments of the market tend to be higher while others tend to be lower – tends to increase both opportunity and risk, especially for funds that try to rotate between themes or capture relative value. With a large share of altcoins near ATL, liquidity in many order books has decreased, increasing the cost of exposure to entering or exiting positions and the potential for extreme “Barth-style” moves that traders have noted.
At the same time, the data shows a growing concentration of market interest in a smaller set of high-quality or more narrative-based assets, including BTC, ETH, and ecosystems like SOL, which continue to see relatively stronger developer and user activity. Centralized venues like Coinbase have also moved more volume to a limited basket of listed tokens, boosting the relatively low performance of smaller caps that lack deep markets or institutional reach. In Europe, evolving regulatory frameworks like MiCA could reinforce this concentration by encouraging platforms to prioritize assets with more compliant profiles and disclosures, potentially leaving many fringe altcoins structurally vulnerable, even if broader crypto sentiment improves.
