Retail is Returning to Crypto—With Altcoins Gaining Strength, Here’s When Altseason May Get Started

The Bitcoin price has recently climbed to new highs above $122,000, which shook not only the crypto markets but also the institutions. Although the Ethereum price maintained a sluggish trend before, it gained huge bullish momentum and broke above the local threshold of $3800. This seems to have attracted the retailers who were offshore till now, as institutions constantly accumulated Bitcoin, which kept up the bullish momentum. Now that the BTC price rally seems to have cooled a bit, altcoins have gained traction, igniting a strong Altseason.

Retailers Returning to the Market

Bitcoin has manifested significant strength after undergoing a breakout during Q4, 2024. The dominance surged, which hinted towards a massive influx of liquidity to the star token. Meanwhile, the trend changed as the BTC price marked new highs as the liquidity flow seemed to have started from Bitcoin to Ethereum. As a result, the ETH price has started to rise, which has attracted significant attention from the retailers. 

The above chart shows the search trend of the term ‘Altcoins’ which has risen significantly since the start of the month. The queries related to Altseason, memecoins, and tokens like Solana, XRP, Binance Coin, Avalanche and Uniswap have been on a constant rise. This u-shaped recovery suggests the retailers are gaining huge interest in the altcoins, and hence the altcoin season or the AltSeason, could be nearby. 

When Will the Altseason Begin? Which Altcoins Should You Stack?

The momentum is slowly shifting hard towards altcoins, but the full-blown altseason signal isn’t confirmed just yet. The indices and BTC dominance are close but not quite at the textbook trigger levels. Google searches for ‘altcoins’ are spiking alongside retail FOMO, and the Altcoin Season Index’s jump to 51 reflects a real uptick in speculative appetite. 

The historical numbers suggest the Altseason get intensified when the altcoin season index reaches 71 and sustains above 75. This suggests the altcoins are yet to rise; however, the altcoin market cap reclaimed key trendlines, and Glassnode data is flashing early rotation. Moreover, social feeds are buzzing with memecoins and narrative trades, which may also end up with a sharp correction. 

Google trends usually reflect the investors mindset, which is very important to determine whether Bitcoin or the other sectors of the crypto market are gaining traction. Now, when ‘altcoins’ are gaining attention, it indicates that the retail is waking up and FOMO is brewing. However, a strong Altseason may get in place once the Ethereum price could rise and sustain above $4000 which has been a huge milestone. 

With this, the ETH price rally to a new ATH could be imminent, which could further push the altcoin season index above 75, kick-starting a strong AltSeason 2025.