Altcoin market cap still below 2021 market top as BTC tests late-cycle window.
Cover art/illustration via CryptoSlate. Image includes combined content which may include AI-generated content.
Bitcoin set an all-time high near $126,000 in early October while the altcoin market (excluding stablecoins), measured by TradingView’s TOTAL2ES index, remains below its November 2021 top, around $1.6 trillion, keeping the cycle confirmation test open for rotation beyond BTC.
TOTAL2ES continues to trade under that band into mid-October, which means altcoins have not printed a new high this cycle, even as Bitcoin has.
It managed to reach $1.48 trillion the same day Bitcoin printed its last all-time high, leaving it $120 billion behind 2021’s high, while Bitcoin smashed its 2021 high by 84%.
The near-term tape is being shaped by three forces that matter for whether this is the top or a staging area for a marginal new high.
First, the flow of capital through U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs remains the clearest read on marginal demand. Farside’s consolidated table shows net creations and redemptions day by day, allowing a simple confirmation check for sustained inflow streaks that have historically lined up with upside attempts. Digital-asset ETPs recorded a weekly record of about $5.95 billion in early October, providing a one-week snapshot of large demand that needs to persist to carry higher prices.
Second, liquidity and policy expectations are interacting with the crypto tape. The White House’s plan to impose 100% tariffs on imports from China beginning November 1 has added macro uncertainty that spilled over into risk assets and crypto, with trade headlines arriving in the same window that saw Bitcoin’s peak and pullback.
Retailers and supply chains are bracing for the new levy, and the timing near the holiday season has complicated inventory and pricing decisions. At the same time, Federal Reserve officials are openly discussing another October rate cut, and futures-implied probabilities can be tracked on CME FedWatch. A softer dollar on dovish guidance would typically support risk, while renewed tightening would do the opposite.
Third, dollar funding stress remains a practical constraint. The Financial Times reported a multi-day jump in usage of the Fed’s Standing Repo Facility, a standing backstop that banks tap when short-term funding tightens. Elevated SRF take-up is a straightforward tell that dollar liquidity is constrained, which tends to cap speculative flows until it abates.
With those drivers in mind, the market is toggling between three forward paths that depend on ETF flows, options positioning, and USD liquidity.
The scenarios below frame what would need to happen next for either a top, a marginal extension, or more time spent building a top.
The drawdown stress-test band reflects cycle history. NYDIG’s cycle work shows deeper retracements in past bears, including about 57% after the 2017 peak and about 76% after the 2013-14 peak. The ETF wrapper and deeper spot liquidity argue for a potentially milder, though still severe, range for risk management.
In prior bulls, altcoin market cap eventually exceeded the prior cycle’s high as risk rotated down the curve. Today, TOTAL2 remains below that $1.63 trillion to $1.7 trillion band even after Bitcoin’s early-October ATH.
That gap implies either that ETF-driven inflows are concentrating in BTC for longer than in past cycles, or that macro liquidity is capping capital rotation and leaving high beta underperforming. The clean, objective rotation trigger is a weekly close for TOTAL2ES above that band.
Flows and derivatives positioning add texture to the rotation test. The early October spike in ETP subscriptions came alongside broad interest in BTC and ETH, with Solana and XRP also logging large prints.
If those inflows persist across multiple sessions on the daily ETF tape, the odds of a late marginal high rise. If creations stall or reverse, the distribution case strengthens.
On the options side, 25-delta skew on Deribit, tracked by Laevitas, remains the simplest gauge for whether downside insurance retains a premium after the macro shock. A shift toward call premium tends to precede follow-through on upside breaks, while persistent put demand often caps rallies.
On the supply side, miners face tighter operating margins. Hashprice, a measure of miner revenue per PH per day, fell below roughly $50 to $53 in October as hashrate pressed past about 1 ZH per second, pressuring older fleets. Luxor’s Hashrate Index shows the trend in real time, further price weakness, elevated energy costs, or both can force periodic miner selling into thin books, which can amplify downside in a falling tape.
Peaks in the last two cycles arrived about 526 days after the 2016 halving and about 546 days after the 2020 halving. Translating that to the April 20, 2024 halving places mid-October through late November in the historical peak window. The clock does not determine the outcome, it anchors the timeframe in which the flow and liquidity signals tend to matter most for risk.
The story’s fulcrum is whether ETF-era demand broadens and whether liquidity conditions relax enough to let that demand stick.
If multi-session creations return, options skew turns toward calls, and SRF usage calms, a marginal new BTC high into the $135,000 to $155,000 band is plausible before distribution. If flows remain mixed or negative and the put bid persists, the distribution path carries more weight, and the stress-test drawdown band becomes the relevant risk management frame.
Until TOTAL2ES clears the 2021 high on a weekly close, the cycle lacks the classic altcoin confirmation, and the tape trades that way.
One interesting point to note is that TOTAL2 which includes stablecoins did break its 2021 all-time high by $20 billion on Oct. 7, reaching $1.77 trillion.
However, we’ve not used this composite for our analysis as stablecoins sitting on the sidelines is not indicative of an altcoin bull run. In fact, a high value of parked stablecoins often arise from rotations out of risk assets.
Also known as “Akiba,” Liam Wright is a reporter, podcast producer, and Editor-in-Chief at CryptoSlate. He believes that decentralized technology has the potential to make widespread positive change.
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Bitcoin, a decentralized currency that defies the sway of central banks or administrators, transacts electronically, circumventing intermediaries via a peer-to-peer network.
Ethereum is a decentralized, open-source blockchain platform that enables the creation of smart contracts and decentralized applications (DApps).
BNB, or Binance Coin, is a cryptocurrency created by Binance.
Solana is a high-performance blockchain platform that utilizes a unique consensus algorithm called “Proof of History” to achieve fast transaction speeds and low fees.
The XRP Ledger is a decentralized cryptographic ledger powered by a network of peer-to-peer servers.
Farside Investors, founded in 2023 and based in London, is an investment management company that specializes in global equities and cryptocurrency.
Luxor is a US-based compute power company focused on Proof-of-Work Bitcoin mining and compute.
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