Bitcoin performed well in 2021, but altcoins dominated the market. Even if the market mover Bitcoin still stagnates at times, the arrival of this year’s altcoin season has seen multiple altcoins rebound to new highs. This move, coupled with the growth and adoption that rocked the cryptocurrency sector this year, has proven that altcoins dominate the market on a large scale.

Altcoin Rules 2021

Many new things have appeared in the altcoin industry this year, and they have also been successful. Basically, when we look at the performance of some of these assets, 2021 is a long replacement season.

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This growth is largely driven by Decentralized Finance (DeFi), NFTs, and the recent Meta Festival, which has become more and more popular among investors. These have brought some interesting projects to the forefront, and the tokens of these projects have rebounded as a result. Most of the time, they follow the growth of Bitcoin. At other times, these assets will break through and rise on their own.

Altcoins market cap at $1.32 trillion | Source: Altcoins Total Market Cap on TradingView.com

This led to Bitcoin’s market dominance being replaced by altcoins.Since the beginning of the year, it has occupied about 75% of the total market dominance, and now it has Down to 38% Altcoins continue to erode Pioneer’s market share of cryptocurrencies. Ethereum continues to lead as it has the largest market share.

Memecoins are also favored by the market this year. Coins like Dogecoin and Shiba Inu have grown to tens of millions of percent, and “ETH killers” are also playing a role in the market.

Mid-cap stocks lead

Altcoins always show triple-digit gains in this year’s index. Bitcoin, which has performed strongly this year, still recorded the lowest gains and is the only index to return double-digit gains. All other indexes, small-cap stocks, mid-cap stocks and large-cap stocks index rose among the top.

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Bitcoin’s return this year is only 73%. Although this is still far ahead of top investment instruments such as gold, Standard & Poor’s and Nasdaq, it still performs poorly compared to other indexes.

Mid Cap Index records highest returns of 2021 | Source: Arcane Research

The large-cap stock index ranked second with a return rate of 179%, but even so, its return rate is more than 100% higher than that of Bitcoin. The small-cap index caused a sensation, with an annual return rate of 485%.

In the end, the mid-cap index became the winner in 2021, with a return of 830%. The index is mainly composed of Layer 1 tokens, which have achieved some of the biggest gains this year. Although the return rate this year is as high as 485%, its performance even surpasses Ethereum.

Featured image from Investment U, charts from Arcane Research and TradingView.com