Altcoins were hot this week as investors poured back into the crypto market after a major sell-off early in April.
The biggest move came from Sui (SUI 1.13%), which has been gaining momentum from users this year, and jumped 68.4% this week. Solana (SOL 1.91%) was up 13% on the week, Cardano (ADA 2.38%) was up 14.8%, and Avalanche (AVAX 1.80%) popped 17.6%.
CRYPTO: SUI
Key Data Points
The macro picture
It's hard to discuss crypto trading without acknowledging the impact that market dynamics and trade volatility are having on the value of assets. When President Donald Trump announced tariffs earlier this month the market tanked because of the negative impact they could have on global trade and economies all around the world.
This week's move higher has been in large part because the White House is trying to soften its tariff rhetoric. Some exemptions have been given and talks are reportedly ongoing with some countries. And investors took that as a positive enough sign to buy growth and tech stocks, which are also correlated with cryptocurrencies in the market.
Sui's hot hand
Investors often view network activity as a sign of a healthy blockchain and valuable token and Sui is one of the hottest networks today. In March, decentralized exchange volume jumped to 3.2 billion SUI and total value locked in exchanges hit 2.5 billion SUI.
Stablecoins have also hit new highs of $879 million, an 82% increase from a year earlier. As the most common form of currency on the blockchain, stablecoins on-chain are a good way to gauge how much people are using a blockchain.
Solana's mobile phone disruption
Solana continues to be one of the most active blockchains for developers and this week the Solana project Helium signed a deal with AT&T. Helium is a community-led distribution network for wireless service. Originally, Helium was a series of hotspots around the world that gave users access to the network they were running on. That could have been a home network or cellular network like AT&T's.
This deal gives a business like this more viability to expand and gives AT&T another distribution path. It's this kind of experimentation that ultimately drives innovation on the blockchain.
The altcoin bump
Avalanche and Cardano are two other altcoins based on differentiated blockchains that should bring high utility long-term. To that end, Avalanche project Axiym surpassed $132 million in volume on its cross-border payment platform.
Cardano's founder also recently said the Lace wallet would support the popular token XRP.
These may not be groundbreaking news items, but they're steps in the right direction for blockchains built for utility. Ultimately, that could drive value to their tokens.
Volatility will continue
The altcoin market was driven by an overall move to riskier assets this week. If that continues, the market can move higher, but the more important metrics to watch will be the users on-chain and how many businesses are being built on these platforms. Without that, the value will fade over time.
