Total market capitalization returned to $4.06 trillion during the Thursday morning Asian trading session. It is the highest the digital asset market has been since late August as fears over a ‘Septembear’ slump diminish.

Bitcoin reclaimed $114,000 for the first time in almost three weeks, but the big move has largely been driven by altcoins.

Altcoin market capitalization is close to 2025 highs and almost at the same level as it was during the 2021 bull market, when it reached $1.7 trillion.

“I’m stunned by the fact that people claim that the bull market is almost over. It hasn’t even begun,” said MN Fund founder Michaël van de Poppe before adding, “Most altcoins have been downtrending for 1.5 to 3 years.”

Altcoins Leading The Charge

Altseason indicators have all surged this week, hitting their highest levels this year. CoinGlass and the Blockchain Center’s altcoin season indexes have reached 76, which is an indication that altseason is underway.

The metrics are derived from the performance of leading altcoins compared to Bitcoin over the past three months. The indicator is in “altseason territory” and is at its highest level since December, said Coin Bureau founder Nic Puckrin.

Welcome to #Altseason.

It’s time for massive wealth creation. pic.twitter.com/wbjiL7hy3f

However, not all were convinced that altseason is upon us.

“Amid a fragile US economic outlook marked by slowing growth and persistent inflation, altcoins continue facing headwinds as institutional capital remains heavily concentrated in Bitcoin,” Nassar Achkar, Chief Strategy Officer at the CoinW exchange, told CryptoPotato.

“While capital rotations persist in crypto, BTC’s dominance continues to reign, forcing altcoins to demonstrate real utility and adoption to be considered for portfolio allocations.”

Bitcoin dominance is currently at 58% (on TradingView), down 12% from 66% in June, primarily due to the rise of Ethereum, which has seen its market share double since April.

$BTC.D continues to go down. Now rejected by the HTF trend line. #Altcoins season is about to begin shortly. pic.twitter.com/7jxRM8Dee5

Crypto Market Outlook

Bitcoin has gained 2% on the day to reclaim $114,000 while Ether was up almost 3% to reach $4,435 at the time of writing. However, altcoins were leading the charge, and the top high-cap performer was Avalanche (AVAX), which has surged almost 8% to reach $29, its highest level since January. Dogecoin, Stellar, Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin, and Toncoin were also performing well today.

The altcoin long-term chart is very bullish, said analyst Ted Pillows, who added that it was consolidating below the previous peaks while holding above its multi-year uptrend.

“In the short term, altcoins could get rejected from their resistance level, which will provide better entries. But in the longer term, altcoins are going way higher.”