Why Your Bitcoin and Ether Are Holding Up While Altcoins Slide
Traders are piling into bitcoin and ether for safety as altcoins like XRP and SOL lose steam — here's what that split means for your portfolio.
If you’ve been watching your altcoin bag lag behind bitcoin and ether this week, you’re not imagining it. Data from CoinDesk’s market tracker shows bitcoin and ether were the only two tokens in the CoinDesk 20 index sitting in the green on Thursday, while everything else in that basket of top cryptocurrencies slipped into the red.
Bitcoin climbed roughly 0.9% over 24 hours to around $64,700, and ether pushed up to about $1,903. The broader CoinDesk 20 index, which tracks a wide mix of major tokens, managed just a 0.16% gain — meaning bitcoin and ether were doing almost all the heavy lifting.
Why money is fleeing to the “big two”
Zaheer Ebtikar, chief strategy officer at crypto neobank Plasma, told CoinDesk that altcoins are struggling “without aggressive support from bitcoin momentum.” In plain terms: when bitcoin isn’t on a tear, smaller coins tend to get left behind, because many of them still don’t have a clear, simple story for why holding them should pay off during a downturn.
The numbers back that up. Open interest — a measure of how much money is tied up in futures bets — on altcoins has dropped about 15% over the past month, while bitcoin’s open interest has actually grown by roughly 8% in that same window. CoinMarketCap’s Altcoin Season Index, which gauges whether smaller coins or bitcoin are driving the market, slipped to 42 out of 100, another sign bitcoin is back in the driver’s seat.
Ebtikar’s explanation is that bitcoin has increasingly become part of “capital markets plumbing” — used in ETFs, institutional hedging and as collateral — so it doesn’t need a price rally to keep attracting flows. Most altcoins haven’t reached that stage yet, which leaves them more exposed when sentiment turns cautious.
XRP and SOL feel the squeeze
XRP is a clear example of the pain. Its price fell to $1.04, its lowest level since early July, even as open interest on XRP futures rose about 5% to 2.23 billion tokens. That combination — falling price, rising bets — usually signals traders positioning for further downside rather than a bounce.
Solana’s SOL token is seeing the opposite pattern: leveraged positions are unwinding. Open interest in SOL futures dropped to 60.81 million tokens, down sharply from a peak above 76.5 million tokens back on June 24 — a sign traders are pulling risk off the table rather than doubling down.
Bitcoin’s own futures market, meanwhile, is showing tentative confidence. Open interest ticked up to 770,000 BTC, though CoinDesk noted similar spikes have fizzled out before. Still, funding rates and trading-flow data are leaning positive for bitcoin right now, and options traders on Deribit have been buying upside bets — including calls at $80,000 and $96,000 for bitcoin, and $2,000 for ether — suggesting some traders expect further gains.
What’s dragging the wider market
Crypto’s rotation toward bitcoin and ether is happening against a shaky backdrop in tech stocks. The Nasdaq 100 fell on Thursday even as the S&P 500 and Dow Jones hit record highs, after Elon Musk’s SpaceX posted its first results since going public in June. Investors punished the stock over ballooning AI-related spending, sending shares down 13% before the close — a reminder that the “AI trade” wobble has been partly blamed for capital leaving crypto in recent weeks.
For everyday holders, the takeaway is fairly simple: right now, the market is treating bitcoin and ether as the safer harbor, while smaller tokens need their own reasons to attract buyers rather than just riding bitcoin’s coattails. If you’re holding altcoins like XRP or SOL, it’s worth watching whether bitcoin’s momentum returns — because history suggests that’s usually what altcoins need to catch a bid again.
Read more: Big Wallets Are Buying This Dip — But One Coin Says the Pain Isn’t Over Yet
