Many individuals may need assumed that the crypto bear market is one thing that began in February. Nevertheless, a evaluate of the charts reveals an extended historical past of sobering statistics.

The truth is, altcoins have been on the decline since December 8.

Proof of a bear market is all over the place this week. CoinMarketCap’s Worry and Greed index is at a decisively bearish 26, whereas different indices, reminiscent of crypto market sentiment and “Altcoin Season” sit at equally dismal 27 and 24 ranges, respectively.

Not solely that, on Tuesday, spot bitcoin (BTC) ETFs skilled their worst single day of outflows in historical past.

Rewind to January, nonetheless, and barely anybody predicted such a downturn. Certainly, the market capitalization of crypto property typically remained inside 3% of its all-time excessive throughout Donald Trump’s January 20, 2025 inauguration.

Nevertheless, a more in-depth take a look at this obvious resilience reveals that BTC did many of the heavy lifting, marking its all-time excessive close to $108,800 on that specific day.

All different crypto property, in distinction, had already been in a bear marketplace for six weeks by the day Trump took workplace. Certainly, the market cap of altcoins peaked at $1.9 trillion on December 8, 2024, and has by no means regained that stage.

By early Wednesday morning, altcoins had declined greater than one-third and had been value lower than $1.2 trillion.

Three months of decline in altcoins

The roots of this newest bear market stretch a lot additional than February 2025. The truth is, it’s practically a fiscal quarter in length.

Learn extra: Technique trades at nine-month low a number of to its bitcoin holdings

Though bitcoin’s outperformance briefly hid the market’s downturn in early December, the day of Trump’s inauguration was clearly the day when traders had absolutely priced of their bullish expectations by way of BTC.

With few extra catalysts on the horizon and an avalanche of unfavorable information such because the world’s largest alternate hack and a halving of the share price of Michael Saylor’s firm, the practically three-month bear market is a mathematical reminder of crypto’s cyclical volatility.

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