Unlike previous cycles, where capital typically flowed into the top 200 altcoins, this cycle is seeing it concentrated in low-cap projects.
This time around, the majority of investors are pouring their funds into newly launched meme coins with illusory liquidity, where prices can plummet 70-80% in a short period.
OTHERS/BTC has reached a new low this week, and Pump Fun is turning crypto into nothing more than a casino.
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The sharp decline in the altcoin market over the past few days has raised concerns that the altseason has completely vanished. And it seems that Pump Fun is the main culprit behind this chaos.
The Difference Between Altcoin Cycles
In a recent tweet on X by user Miles Deutscher, reported by BeInCrypto, he gave his opinion on why we haven’t seen the expected altseason. The evidence he presented is that unlike previous cycles, where capital typically flowed into the top 200 altcoins, this cycle is seeing it concentrated in low-cap projects.
Miles acknowledges that this investment strategy has been truly effective for quick-witted investors. They’ve made a lot of money, with the official TRUMP coin being a prime example. Conversely, those who suffer losses are retail investors and latecomers, a common scenario in most altcoin cycles. The official TRUMP coin is also an example that BeInCrypto previously highlighted, where over 40% of holders were first-time retail investors.
The difference this time is that in previous cycles, investors incurred losses with altcoins that had high liquidity and were listed on various centralized exchanges (CEXs). This cycle, however, sees the majority of investors pouring their funds into newly launched meme coins with illusory liquidity, where prices can plummet 70-80% in a short period

Has Pump Fun Redefined the Game?
When it comes to meme coins, the past year has seen platforms that mass-produce them, like Pump Fun, become a hot topic of discussion. And according to Miles, he believes that Pump Fun is contributing to the changing landscape of the current crypto market, for the worse, of course. Notably, he likens Pump Fun to turning crypto into nothing more than a casino.
See more: Are Pump.fun and SunPump Creating Too Much “Garbage” for the Market?

Miles presented a chart showing that since the launch of Pump Fun, while the Total Value Locked (TVL) in the Solana (SOL) network has been continuously growing, OTHERS/BTC has shown a certain decline. As of the time of writing, OTHERS/BTC has reached a new low for the week. OTHERS represents the total market capitalization excluding the top 10 coins. So, OTHERS/BTC is taking the market cap of those altcoins and dividing it by Bitcoin’s market cap.

Analyst Benjamin Cowen shared his view that many have been misled into thinking this is a meme coin super cycle. Every week, a new batch of meme coins is launched, and the KOLs behind them relentlessly shill them. In the short term, these memes temporarily outperform BTC, but over time they go to zero, and a new batch of meme coin projects is created.
Cowen stated that in the previous cycle, OTHERS/BTC bottomed when quantitative tightening (QT) ended. However, that has not yet happened in this market cycle. And it seems many have yet to recognize these irregularities, so Cowen believes the altcoin casino will continue until investors run out of money.
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