OVERVIEW

This Is What Altseason Should Look Like 👀

Before we dive in, here’s today’s crypto market heatmap:

And here’s a look at crypto’s total market and altcoin market cap charts:

TECHNICAL ANALYSIS
This Is What Altseason Should Look Like 👀 

The total market cap is back above $4T. And the altcoin market cap is on the cusp of making a new all-time high. But if you look closer, Altseason hasn’t even heated up yet.🤯 

Everywhere you look today, you’ll see variations of “BTC BACK TO $120K!”

That’s awesome. It’s (BTC) up +1.3% (as of 1430 EST), total market cap nearing $4.1T. But if you’re looking for an answer to ‘wen altseason?’, you need to look at the other market cap charts:

The four tickers above are some of TradingView’s various crypto market cap charts.

1. TOTAL is the just what it is, the entire crypto market cap.

2. TOTAL2 is the crypto market cap excluding Bitcoin - often called the Altcoin Market Cap chart.

3. TOTAL3 is the crypto market cap excluding Bitcoin and Ethereum.

4. TOTAL3ES is the crypto market cap excluding Bitcoin, Ethereum, and stablecoins. Personally, I consider this to be the ‘real’ altcoin market cap chart.

Now, just looking at the raw stats in the screen shot, it’s easy to see that altcoins, as an aggregate, are outperforming the big boys. 

Altcoins are outperforming Bitcoin even though BTC itself is up. 💪 

And BTC’s Dominance chart continues to drop:

BTC’s Dominance dropping is a huge frigging deal for Altseason. But when I say that Altseason hasn’t even heated up, I mean altcoins haven’t even done anything major yet, as a group:

The last time the TOTAL3ES chart made a new all-time high was almost exactly three years ago - $1.02T on November 10, 2021. Terra and FTX were still alive and kicking back then.

When you consider the TOTAL, TOTAL2, and TOTAL3 market cap charts have all made new all-time highs within the last 60 days… ya, altcoins haven’t done shite yet.

When they do, get ready for the boom. 🚀 

TECHNICAL ANALYSIS
Well, That Looks Bullish AF 🐂 

If you’ve been a reader of this newsletter for a while, then you’re maybe familiar with two of the tools I use in my own analysis and trading: the Detrended Price Oscillator and Connie Brown’s Composite Index. 💹 

And if you’re new or you don’t remember, no worries, I’ll make this is as painless as possible. 🤕 

From an Ichimoku perspective, $BTC.X ( ▲ 3.0% )’s weekly chart is in prime re-entry mode for bulls - but only if it closes the weekly candle at/above $118,500. Currently, Bitcoin’s sitting at $120,222.

If that happens, awesome. But the real triggers for me (after price action confirms the weekly close is good to go), is when the Composite Index (red) crosses and closes above one or both of its moving averages (green is fast, yellow/orange is slow) and the DPO closes above the zero line..

Currently, the Composite Index has crossed above both of its moving averages, something I call ‘The Pinch’. Why? Well, when your ass gets pinched you usually get moving pretty damn fast - it’s been my experience that the same thing happens with price.

The final trigger for me is the DPO (Detrended Price Oscillator) closing above the zero line - which it currently is parked above.

If today was Sunday evening and we were just a few hours from the weekly closing, this would be pretty damn exciting. But because it’s only Thursday and a lot of shenanigans can happen between now and Sunday evening - it’s just very exciting.

TL;DR Version

There’s a high probability for BTC to go bawls to the wall when:

1. The weekly close is at/above $118,500.

2. The Composite Index closes above its moving averages.

3. The Detrended Price Oscillator closes above the zero line.

For now, the plan is to park and bark. 🐶 

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NEWS
Perp DEX Volume Breaks $1 Trillion - Hyperliquid, Aster, and Lighter Duke It Out

Those fine folks over at The Block reported that perpetual DEXs just printed their first trillion-dollar month. September volume hit $1.05 trillion, up 48% from August’s $707.6 billion. 🎰

Who’s on Top?

• Aster $ASTER.X ( ▲ 8.88% ) : Came from nowhere, pulled in $420B on BNB Chain, and grabbed the crown. Planning its own ZK Layer 1. Token is $1.75 after doing a 10x in four days off a CZ shoutout.

• Hyperliquid $HYPE.X ( ▲ 6.78% ) : The old champ slipped. $282.5B in September, down 29% from August. Still rocking a $49.5B FDV, but Aster is eating its lunch.

• Lighter: Ethereum L2 contender still in beta pulled $164.4B. Now its public mainnet is live. 188k accounts, 50k DAUs, and it hasn’t even rolled out a token yet.

We could very easily see this turning into a three hourse race for leading per DEX volume, hell, it was just a one horse race a couple weeks ago. Aster already flipped Hyperliquid on daily fee revenue ($25M vs $3.2M on Sept. 28).

This space is about to get bloody. Aster’s rise shows how fast narrative + token + feature edge can bulldoze incumbents. Hyperliquid needs to wake up, because nothing burns faster than market share in DeFi. 🔥 

NEWS IN THREE SENTENCES
AI, Stablecoins, & Privacy News 🕵️

✅ Civic Bags SOC 2 Compliance to Flex Security Cred

For AI-heavy projects this is the reassurance that Civic won’t leak your crown jewels. Civic earned SOC 2 Type 1 certification, proving its security controls meet AICPA’s standards across security, availability, and confidentiality. The audit covered access controls, monitoring, and incident response - basically all the boring but vital stuff enterprises demand. Civic.

💳 Alchemy Pay Adds Fiat Ramp for Plasma’s $XPL and USD₮0

Alchemy Pay now lets users buy and sell Plasma’s native token $XPL and USD₮0 with fiat in 173 countries via cards, Apple/Google Pay, and bank transfers. Plasma’s zero-fee stablecoin rails plus Alchemy’s regulatory licenses bring stablecoin payments closer to mainstream checkout. Alchemy Pay.

NEWS IN THREE SENTENCES
Metaverse, NFT, & Gaming News 🎮️

🎮 OVERTAKE Marketplace Goes Live on Sui

OVERTAKE launched its gaming asset marketplace on Sui, cutting fees by 50% and adding AI agents for smoother trading. Players get fiat checkout via Apple/Google Pay, escrow on-chain, and customizable shops for Path of Exile, Last Epoch, and MapleLand. Web3 gaming marketplaces might finally stop feeling like Craigslist with gas fees. Sui.

🎮 Immutable + Polygon Launch “Gaming on Polygon” Hub

Immutable and Polygon rolled out a gaming hub inside Immutable Play, debuting multiple Polygon titles with quests, leaderboards, and a $100K prize pool. With Agglayer integration coming, assets and rewards will soon flow across chains seamlessly. Web3 gaming just got its Steam moment - minus the loot boxes. Immutable.

NEWS IN THREE SENTENCES
DeFi, DEX, & Lending News 🏦

🚀 Spark Roadmap Shows $3.15B Liquidity Layer and New Products

Spark detailed the next six months: SparkLend scaling USDT/PYUSD markets, Savings V2 for ETH and USDT, institutional fixed-rate loans with Morpho V2, and Spark Mobile for retail. Its Liquidity Layer already allocates $3.15B and throws off $26M ARR, with $5.9M paid to treasury so far. Spark Network.

🦄 1inch Gets a Facelift

1inch rolled out a new home and cleaner design to match its pitch: DeFi integration should be as seamless as Amazon checkout. The aggregator-turned-ecosystem now pushes simplicity and compliance as it courts TradFi and mainstream users. Same unicorn energy, just grown-up enough for regulators to stop clutching pearls. 1inch.

₿ Starknet Launches BTCFi Season With 100M STRK

The Starknet Foundation kicked off BTCFi Season, a six-month incentive blitz to make Starknet the cheapest place to borrow stables against BTC. With 100M STRK in rewards and protocols like Re7’s BTC Yield Fund onboard, the goal is to spin up a sustainable BTC-centric DeFi flywheel. TL;DR: turn hodled Bitcoin into productive collateral, finally. Starknet.

⚡ Reactive Hooks Into Abstract for Cross-Chain Muscle

Reactive integrated with Abstract chain, enabling cross-chain triggers and messaging for DeFi, games, and social apps. With Abstract’s account abstraction and chain abstraction UX, users won’t juggle gas tokens or bridges. It’s “build once, react everywhere” - now with Abstract’s zk-rollup scale. Reactive Network.

NEWS IN THREE SENTENCES
Protocol News 🏦

👛 Litecoin’s Nexus Wallet Adds Tor and Coin Selection

Nexus Wallet v1.1 lets users pick which coins to spend and route all connections through Tor, boosting privacy with a tap. The redesign also simplifies buying/selling LTC and speeds up wallet sync. Litecoin.

🔒 Secret Network Patches Intel SGX Mess Before It Spreads

Funds safe, data safe - but Intel might want to fix its toys. Academic white-hats showed off Wiretap.fail and Battering Ram, attacks that can spoof Intel SGX enclaves if you’ve got physical access and lab gear. Secret Network wasn’t the problem, but it still locked things down in its 1.22 upgrade with node access controls, allowlists, and seed rotations. Secret Network.

📡 Chainlink DataLink Puts Deutsche Börse on Chain

Chainlink launched DataLink, letting institutions publish real-time data straight to blockchains, with Deutsche Börse’s Eurex, Xetra, 360T, and Tradegate as the first firehose. That’s trillions in equities, FX, and derivatives data now streaming to 40+ chains, accessible to 2,400+ DeFi protocols. Chainlink.

LINKS
Links That Don’t Suck 🔗

🗓️ CME Group to launch 24/7 crypto futures and options trading in early 2026

🧪 Plasma CEO refutes XPL token sale rumors confirms 3-year lockup

🤖 OpenAI’s New Sora app makes account deletion permanent, including for ChatGPT

😷 BNB Chain hacker’s meme coin “4” surges 400% after rug pull — Community turns the tables

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