Alternative digital currencies are outperforming Bitcoin amid a broad-based market rally as signs of more targeted U.S. tariffs reduces demand for haven assets.
Solana, the blockchain favored by issuers of memecoins, saw its token jump as much as 11%, while Dogecoin climbed around 8% and Avalanche increased about 8%.
Bitcoin rose as much as 4.3% to US$88,786, the highest price for the crypto bellwether in about two weeks. Altcoins can sometimes outperform the original token during risk-on stretches, though they can also be much more volatile on the way down — they tend to suffer greater losses during tougher times.
Even with the rally, some market participants remain cautious with Bitcoin down about 20% from an all-time high reached the day Donald Trump was inaugurated as US president for a second time.
“While markets are flashing green today -especially led by altcoins - there’s little beneath the surface to support a real shift in momentum,” said Kirill Kretov, trading automation expert at crypto trading platform CoinPanel. “From a broader view, this looks more like a short-term relief bounce than the start of something meaningful.”
A notable bright spot was the inflows into Bitcoin exchange traded funds after five consecutive weeks of withdrawals, crypto asset trading company QCP Capital wrote in a note on Monday.
At the same time, US ETFs investing directly in Ether have been hit by their longest run of daily withdrawals since launching in July 2024, underscoring shaky demand for the second-largest cryptocurrency.
The group of nine ETFs have shed about US$415 million across 13 straight days of net outflows, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Bitcoin ETFs in the US, by contrast, have rebounded from a period of waning investor demand to post six consecutive days of net inflows up until March 21.
Ether is the native token of the Ethereum blockchain, which underpins some of the most commercially significant decentralized finance tools in the digital-assets industry. Dogged by concerns over Ethereum’s leadership and strategy, the token is down about 40% over the past year. A broader cryptocurrency index posted a modest 10% gain during the same period.
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Sidhartha Shukla, Bloomberg News
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