On-chain analytics firm Santiment has revealed that altcoins have been making a difference in network growth recently.
Altcoins are observing polarization regarding network growth
new post In The metric of interest here is “network growth,” which tracks the number of new addresses joining a cryptocurrency network.
The new address is defined as the address that comes online for the first time on the blockchain (i.e. the address that makes the first transaction). New addresses may appear on the network for several reasons.
Some cryptocurrency users like to create a new address every time they want to engage in a new transaction to protect their privacy. These users will naturally contribute to the growth of this indicator.
This new address type is not suitable for more comprehensive networks. On the other hand, what can be very relevant (and in fact is often the main driver of network growth) is adoption.
New users joining the blockchain generate new addresses, increasing network growth metrics. Adoption is generally a positive development for any asset, as it provides a more solid foundation for sustainable movements in the future.
Now, a chart shared by Santiment shows the network growth trends of six different altcoins and shows two different aspects of recent altcoin splits.
Looks like half of these coins have seen the metric shoot up, while the other half have observed a decline | Source: Santiment on X
As can be seen in the graph above, Ethereum (ETH), Ethereum Name Service (ENS), and Threshold (T) have recently seen a surge in their respective network growth.
The latter two assets have seen indicative increases of around 124% and 195% respectively, which is much larger than ETH’s 6% rise. However, these differences are limited to the growth of the indicator and not its pure value.
ENS and T are much smaller altcoins than ETH, the second largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, and therefore require fewer new addresses in absolute terms.
Looking at the situation a little more closely, Ethereum is currently observing over 631,850 new addresses appearing on the network, while the measurements for two smaller alternative addresses are only 1,947 and 344 respectively.
On the opposite end of the spectrum are ApeCoin (APE), Basic Attention Token (BAT), and Enjin Coin (ENJ), which saw network growth declines of 23%, 42%, and 32% respectively.
According to Santiment, altcoins have become this polarized across sectors. This gap has been building for some time, but has deepened since the approval of the Bitcoin spot ETF.
Alts that are seeing more adoption will naturally be better positioned for long-term growth than the others, but whether they will be able to fulfill this potential is yet to be seen.
ETH price
While Bitcoin has been struggling recently, Ethereum has had a bit of a shine as its price was able to surpass the $2,500 level.
ETH has gone through some rise in the last ten days or so | Source: ETHUSD on TradingView
Featured image by Traxer on Unsplash.com, chart by TradingView.com, Santiment.net