📌 Is a Q1 2026 altcoin season still on the cards?
The prevailing negative market sentiment is hurting altcoin holders the most. Unfortunately, market relief for the segment isn’t likely in the near term either.
According to the analytics firm Swissblock, the sector is still struggling under firm bearish momentum. However, the pressure might be easing, with the firm citing its high-precision, proprietary Alts impulse signal.
Mapping the altcoin market’s distress
As BTC’s price fell below $95k from mid-January, the altcoin sell-off also intensified on Binance, as indicated by rising altcoin inflows.
Since the metric hadn’t eased as of press time, the pressure could cap a strong relief for the sector.
AI leads altcoin market’s sell-off
From a market category perspective, AI was the hardest hit over the past month of trading, according to Arkham data. The sub-sector was down 57% on average, nearly matching DeFi’s losses.
Real-world assets (RWA), on the other hand, declined by only 10% on average and were the best-performing segment during the early 2026 risk-off environment. These were on-chain stocks and ETFs tracking . equity markets – A sign that TradFi outperformed crypto assets.
