Altcoins are starting 2022 stronger than Bitcoin. Mid-cap coins appear to have the highest gains out of all the different indexes.
Bitcoin starts the year underperforming altcoins
As per the latest weekly report from Arcane Research, Bitcoin’s 2022 has started with the coin underperforming in front of various altcoins.
In terms of gains overall, the majority of altcoins beat BTC through 2021. And it looks like this year also hasn’t been any different so far.
This chart shows the relationship between Bitcoin and altcoins since January 1.
All the other indexes seem to have beat BTC thus far this year. Source: Arcane Research Weekly Report Week 52| Source: The Arcane Research Weekly Update - Week 52
In the above graph, all the altcoins have been separated into different “indexes” based on their market capitalization.
There are three main categories: the large-cap and mid-cap. These are the different coins that fall under each division. Their gains in totality and market caps will be shown in the chart.
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The graph shows that Bitcoin appears to be behind other indexes. Since the beginning of this year, the crypto has fallen 3% in losses.
Mid-cap altcoins are the most profitable, with profits of approximately 8% from January to date. The great performance of layer-1 tokens such as Cosmos is the key to their success.
Large- and smallcap indexes also remain in green. They have seen a 3% increase and 4% respectively since January.
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A consequence of Bitcoin’s underperformance has been that the cryptocurrency’s dominance has been dropping recently.
This table illustrates how the market share for the most popular coins has fluctuated over the past week.
USDT has gained market share the most in the past 7 days. Source: Arcane Research Weekly Report Week 52| Source: The Arcane Research Weekly Update - Week 52
Bitcoin’s market share is now around 39.5%, which is the lowest it has been in almost three years. It now remains to be seen whether the crypto’s underperformance will come to an end soon, or if 2022 is going to be like 2021 all over again, with altcoins thriving.
BTC Prices
At the time of writing, Bitcoin’s price floats around $46.2k, down 3% in the last seven days. The crypto’s value has dropped 6% over the last month.
This chart shows how the cryptocurrency price has changed over the last five business days.
Source: BTCUSD on TradingView| Source: BTCUSD on TradingView
Unsplash.com's featured image. Charts by TradingView.com. Arcane Research: