Cryptocurrency analyst Benjamin Cowen has one of the largest YouTube followings as well, with 894,000 subscribers. He sees a dark future for altcoins in every cycle as Bitcoin dominance is reestablished. Cowen uses an external social risk metric to measure the public sentiment and trends around the cryptocurrency market as a whole. Like many crypto enthusiasts, he’s hoping a change in U.S. monetary policy might make altcoins a more appealing long-term bet.
Cowen, and you can keep up with his thoughts and analysis on his highly-informative YouTube channel. Market structure, dominance, how altcoins do in bull and bear markets against Bitcoin and more. He’s talked up the odds of an “altcoin season,” a time when altcoins, or cryptocurrencies that aren’t bitcoin, start to outperform bitcoin.
Cowen uses Ethereum as a barometer for the rest of the altcoin space. During bull markets, Paul thinks Ethereum is a good bellwether for the overall health and interest in altcoins.
"I have often said Ethereum is sort of like the index of the altcoin market. If it’s doing poorly, interest in crypto is not that high and altcoins aren’t really doing that great. And you can see that as Ethereum has collapsed, so too did the social risk. So when we talk about the social interest in crypto and it being low, what it means is that altcoins will likely keep bleeding to Bitcoin." - Benjamin Cowen/YouTube
Cowen’s take is interesting and points to an important thing. If social sentiment towards crypto doesn’t pick up, altcoins will almost certainly continue to underperform Bitcoin. This last point is supported by prevailing macroeconomic conditions, as broader tightening of monetary policy has historically benefited established assets such as Bitcoin.
The financial analyst has always encouraged thorough research before making risky investments and the digital currency market is no different. In short, Cowen is cautioning investors to pump the brakes and consider their individual risk tolerance before investing capital in altcoins.
