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The bull run has arrived. Where will the alts go? Reconstructing mechanisms may be the key to breaking through.
The bull run is back, where will the alts go?
The crypto market reignites expectations of a bull run, with BTC reaching a historic high and ETH rising over 40% this month. On-chain capital activity is recovering, exchange activity is clearly on the rise, and macro signals are showing a positive trend. However, many investors find that the alts they hold are still stagnant. Is this still the bull run we are familiar with?
Did alts really miss the bull run?
As of May 22, 2025, the price of BTC has broken through the $110,000 mark, setting a new historical high; ETH has risen over 45% in the past month. In this round of sentiment recovery, capital and flow are concentrated in mainstream assets. On the macroeconomic front, the easing of global trade relations and the rising risk appetite of capital have provided a favorable upward channel for the crypto market.
However, against this backdrop of positive news, the altcoin sector is overall sluggish. Most alts have not only failed to rise but have even continued to correct. The enthusiasm for BTC and ETH has masked a certain directional shift occurring in the market: altcoins are not without market activity, but are being consciously "excluded" by funds and users.
Why does this bull run seem to favor only mainstream coins? Has the value logic of altcoins collapsed? Or do they need a new survival strategy? This article will analyze the challenges and pathways faced by altcoins behind this structural bull run from several dimensions, including the macro environment, funding preferences, user mindset, and mechanism innovation.
Macroeconomic Analysis: Is the Bull Run Really Here?
easing trade relations and rising risk appetite
By mid-May 2025, the overall tone of the macro market has undergone a significant change.
The trade relations of major global economies are easing. After the trade talks in Geneva, a joint statement was issued stating that tariffs will be reduced from a peak of 125% to 10%. This move not only sparked optimism in the market but also released a positive signal against inflation.
As a result, the US stock market has entered a structurally upward channel. The S&P 500 index has risen from 4,800 points at the beginning of the year to 5,940 points as of May 20, 2025, approaching a historical high. The risk appetite for funds has clearly increased, with the Nasdaq and large tech stocks rising, while there are signs of capital outflows from gold and government bonds.
At the same time, the crypto market has also benefited significantly. Since March, the overall net inflow of funds into crypto assets, primarily BTC, has reached $9.3 billion, with most of it concentrated in the spot market. In particular, trading activity during Eastern Time has significantly increased, indicating a trend of substantial capital entering the market.
( The rally of mainstream coins continues.
BTC broke through $110,707 during trading on May 22, 2025, reaching a historic high; ETH has seen strong momentum since April, rising to around $2,629 as of May 22, entering the "critical zone" for breaking $3,000.
) Do mainstream coins become a "safe haven" for funds?
What this reflects is "preference for certainty":
This has caused mainstream coins to gain excess premiums in the new round of market trends, while alts have fallen into the marginal zone of funding.
the overall trend of alts is flat
In contrast, the performance of the altcoin sector is clearly inferior. Except for a few narrative hotspot projects like AVAX and NEAR which saw slight increases, most alts did not rebound along with the mainstream coins and even experienced pullbacks, with funds further concentrating on mainstream coins.
The market is not "out of money", but rather "unwilling to take risks"?
On-chain interaction data shows that the entire market is not lacking in liquidity, but rather that liquidity is extremely skewed. Buying pressure is concentrated on BTC and some high-profile projects, while the trading depth of alts continues to decline. The search volume for BTC and ETFs has surged.
The bull run in the market has indeed returned, but it seems to only belong to Bitcoin, not to alts.
![Bull run "returns", why haven't alts kept up?]###https://img-cdn.gateio.im/webp-social/moments-bb42f4bb4b3ac3f7401104ad90c768ac.webp###
Why haven't alts kept up?
( User mentality maturity: The cycle of chasing highs and panic selling is over.
During the bull run of 2021, a large number of retail investors entered the market due to FOMO emotions, blindly chasing various new coin projects, with most ultimately being deeply trapped during the periodic collapse of alts. According to analysis reports, by the end of 2022, over 73% of non-mainstream coin investors were in a state of loss after holding their positions for 6 months.
After the market rotation, by 2025, investors generally adopt a more cautious trading mentality:
On-chain interaction data shows that the median participation in Altcoin projects after launch has decreased from over 13,000 in 2021 to currently less than 2,800 active addresses in the last 7 days, and the community enthusiasm is visibly cooling.
Users are not avoiding the market, but rather choosing to wait "smarter".
) KOL behavior transformation: from "shouting long" to "arbitrage"
In the past, alts projects heavily relied on KOLs and community dissemination. KOLs converted traffic into price through early accumulation, live calls, and video content. However, in 2025, with various tracks, Meme trends becoming popular, and changes in project airdrop strategies, KOLs began to shift more from "content distributors" to "manipulators."
By observing the KOLs active on social platforms, it is not difficult to find that: before promoting a project, KOLs already have a proportion of tokens pre-allocated; after the community release, they gradually sell off on exchanges/DEX to profit; and there are obvious "pump & dump" behavior records.
Especially in recent "hot projects" of a certain public chain ecosystem, KOLs frequently engage in the "airdrop farming + group pulling attention" strategy, resulting in an increased probability of ordinary users losing money.
In the long term, this behavior is accelerating the destruction of the trust foundation of alts.
Sector heat transfer: narratives can't compete with BTCFi, AI, Restaking
The current crypto narrative focuses on the following three tracks: BTCFi, AI, Restaking.
Traditional altcoin projects lack a connection with mainstream narratives, have thin storytelling, no technological breakthroughs, and scarce ecological cooperation, making it difficult to attract new traffic attention.
The hot topic is no longer "every coin can rise", but rather the concentration of capital and users in "investing in the right story".
( Market trust and liquidity structure have been rewritten.
The trust mechanism of alts is collapsing:
The more serious problem is that the lack of consensus has led to the "hollowing out" of the community: project parties only have operational accounts and no real community; retail investors have flowed into points systems, airdrop hunter channels, and even AI mining.
This has also led to a new phenomenon - altcoins are no longer about "foolish gambling", but rather about "quick gains": no one believes in the long term, everyone is scrambling for short-term liquidity.
The altcoin is not rising, not because no one is paying attention to it, but because there is no longer a reason to believe in it.
When the incentive design of the project party is no longer sustainable, the credibility of KOLs cannot be established, and the users' game only has the "rush mechanism," the entire altcoin ecosystem loses its basic trust and liquidity support structure.
The next step is to redesign this system, rather than repeating old routines.
The Rise of New "Alts" Play
) Exchange-driven airdrop and points mechanism
Against the backdrop of declining user enthusiasm, some exchanges have introduced task systems, points redemption, and airdrop activities to reignite user participation. In addition, some projects have begun to implement point multiplier mechanisms in an effort to incentivize users' long-term participation and enhance community activity. The core of these mechanisms lies in:
Is the peak reached upon launch? The sustainability of Meme coins is questioned.
Meme coins exhibit stronger community-driven characteristics in 2025. The project team quickly gathers popularity through social media, community activities, and viral content dissemination. Before listing on exchanges, they typically attract market attention rapidly through social media within a short period; after the coin is listed, the price rises quickly and then swiftly retraces. Its sustainability is under scrutiny, and the market is calling for the project team to continually optimize aspects such as security, governance structure, and community building.
Future Outlook: The Breakthrough Path of Alts
Alts need to change skin vs change soul: repackage old projects or reconstruct mechanisms?
Whether alts still have a chance does not depend on the market conditions, but on whether they can "self-update".
In the past, many projects disappeared during the bear market and then "revived with a new skin" at the beginning of the bull run: changing a logo, updating a roadmap, adding some AI keywords, and then starting to tell the story again. However, users in 2025 are no longer easily deceived by "new wine in old bottles".
Compared to "skin swapping", truly competitive projects have chosen "soul swapping": reconstructing the token economic model, introducing a fairer airdrop mechanism, and even guiding community co-governance through DAO, transforming users from speculators into ecosystem builders, while relying on an extremely simple user experience and deeply binding on-chain native traffic to gain sustained activity and liquidity.
The key to breaking through is not how trendy the packaging is, but how new the mechanism is, how genuine the emotions are, and how steady the rhythm is.
What do retail investors really need? Narrative? Utility? Or pure speculation?
In 2021, retail investors chased narratives and imagined possibilities.
Retail investors in 2025 will pay more attention to "Can I try and error at a low cost?", "Can I sell at any time?", "Am I being treated as a counterparty by the project team or KOLs?"
They do not need a "grand vision"; what they need is clear expectation management and quick feedback.
This also means that the project team must redesign the user participation path:
How can project parties, platform parties, and communities rebuild user trust?
There are two growth engines in the current market:
Exchange/platform-driven traffic system: Exchange platforms are reconstructing the "task → incentive → airdrop → coin listing" user acquisition path. This is not only a cold start tool for projects but also a "sandbox" for controlling traffic risks.
Community-driven new narrative system: social group fission, creator DAO, and low-threshold KOL incubation tools have become the infrastructure for the autonomy of alts traffic.
If the previous traffic strategy was "overwhelming", the current strategy is more like "igniting a spark": allowing early believers to engage, earn money, and generate real transactions and content is the only way to achieve viral growth and organic spread.
Summary: Alts have reached a time for reshuffling.
Alts have not disappeared; they have simply arrived at the doorstep of a reshuffle.
Projects that lack mechanisms for innovation, have insufficient community participation, and fantasize about a tenfold increase through mere hype are destined to sink in this cycle.
However, projects that truly understand changes in user behavior, restructure incentive structures, and can coexist and win-win with the community still have a chance to break through in a "local bull run."
This bull run does not belong to all alts, but to those players who are serious about their work.
It’s not "whoever makes the loudest noise wins", but "whoever can stabilize people's hearts will live longer".
![bull run "returns", why haven't the alts followed?]###