Wintermute Says Next Altcoin Season May Be More Selective as Institutions Focus on Fewer Tokens

Wintermute, the crypto market maker, said the next altcoin season may benefit far fewer tokens than in past cycles as institutional money concentrates in a small group of assets.

Cointelegraph reported on July 31 that Wintermute, in its "H1 2026 OTC Flow Report," said institutional counterparties accounted for 72% of total token spot trading volume, a record high. That share rose steadily from 59% in the first half of 2025 to 61% in the second half.

Wintermute also found that institutions trade a narrower set of tokens than retail investors. The number of tokens traded by institutions rose 24% from the first half of 2024, compared with a 76% increase for retail investors over the same period. Institutions also tended to lose interest in a token about a day after its price and trading volume surged, while retail investors kept trading for about three days on average.

The firm said the shift increases the odds of a more selective market rather than the type of altcoin season seen in the past, when capital spread broadly across the market. Instead, funds may concentrate in only a handful of promising assets.

Market data supports that view. CryptoQuant Chief Executive Officer Ki Young Ju said in June that the traditional pattern of Bitcoin gains rotating into small- and mid-cap altcoins has effectively disappeared. According to CryptoQuant, trading volume in altcoin pairs denominated in Bitcoin is near its lowest level since 2021, while the top 10 non-stablecoin altcoins now account for about 80.5% of total altcoin market capitalization excluding Bitcoin and stablecoins.

Kaiko also said in a report last year that the top 10 altcoins made up 63% of total altcoin trading volume, up sharply from about 50% a few months earlier. DWF Labs Managing Partner Andrei Grachev said institutional investors are focusing on Bitcoin, Ether and assets tied to real-world asset tokenization, or RWA. That suggests gains are more likely to be concentrated in specific sectors than spread across the broader altcoin market.