After two years of waiting for the "altcoin season," which never came, retail crypto traders missed out on about $800 billion in potential profits by betting against bitcoin's dominance.
According to a 10x Research report, altcoins have lagged bitcoin by exactly this amount in this cycle, which is one of the most significant relative lags since 2017.
Traditionally, the altcoin season describes a period when low-cap cryptocurrencies significantly outperform bitcoin in terms of profitability, absorbing capital from the benchmark asset and providing short-term super profits.
In past cycles, especially in 2017 and 2021, profits from bitcoin flowed massively into ethereum, and then into mid-cap tokens and memes. However, since then, liquidity has consolidated around bitcoin.
According to 10x Research, bitcoin's market capitalization exceeded $2.3 trillion in early October, setting a new historical high of about $126,000. At the same time, the total capitalization of the altcoin market (excluding stablecoins) remained below the peak value of November 2021 of $ 1.6 trillion.
By mid-October, TOTAL2ES had reached only $1.48 trillion, about $120 billion less than the previous high, despite bitcoin surpassing its own by 84%. It is this gap that explains the figure identified by 10x Research as "a lost profit of $800 billion."
The Coinperp altcoin season index, which tracks how many of the top 100 tokens outperform bitcoin in 90-day returns, was able to peak above 70 only in early September. This is below the 75 threshold that defines the current altcoin season.
The index of the altcoin season. Source: Coinperps
One of the reasons for the failure of altcoins, according to Galaxy Research, is that the activity of cryptocurrency venture capital has decreased compared to previous bull markets. In fact, the second quarter of 2025 alone accounted for the lion's share of venture capital investments in crypto and blockchain startups from the fourth quarter of 2020.
In addition, the collapse of the crypto market on October 11 deprived holders of credit positions in the cryptocurrency of about $ 20 billion and dealt a crushing blow to altcoins. This is probably the reason why the altcoin season will not take place in 2025 and 2026.