The global crypto market is showing modest signs of improvement after a volatile phase amid rising tensions between the US and Iran. With the weekend almost coming to an end, Santiment presented a list of trending coins, including top coins and a few altcoins in the space.


Ethereum and Bitcoin steal the spotlight
Starting with the largest altcoin, Ethereum [ETH]who performed better than others. This surge comes as there were several Ethereum accounts being investigated for ‘quantum computer risks to ECDSA signatures’.
In addition, because the Ethereum Foundation invested thousands of dollars in ETH, the community paid attention to the creation of Vitalik Buterin.
Moreover, Santiment also emphasized:
Charles Schwab’s announcement to offer instant spot trading in Bitcoin and Ethereum to its large customer base.
Needless to say: Bitcoin [BTC] was also trending, thanks to the “Google Quantum AI whitepaper and widespread media attention,” which fueled debate about “Bitcoin’s long-term exposure to quantum attacks.”
Thanks to Bitcoin’s long-term health, the current price action due to tensions in the Middle East has also contributed to BTC’s growing chatter.
Other altcoins that are trending and why
Adding to the list is Chainlink [LINK]which, due to several major moves in the chain and a recent “quarterly unlock of about 19 million”, is catching people’s attention.
However, the active address allocation of BTC, LINK and ETH shows a large drop in retail activity. This shows that despite an upward trend, the numbers are not favorable and investors are still cautious.


That said, Solana [SOL]was also trending, but somehow for the wrong reasons. The recent Drift Protocol exploit, which drained around $270-286 million and affected more than two dozen Solana projects, was the main reason behind the increased attention.
On the other hand, mentions of Pepijn [PIPPIN] are on the rise, but if you look deeper, this memecoin is only popular because of ‘community hype rather than traditional fundamentals’.
This sentiment was confirmed by both tokens’ social volume metric, which was declining.


Who rules the stablecoin market?
Finally, Circle’s USDC was trending in the stablecoin market, but again the plot twist was that there were about 15 incidents of large USDC transfers being linked to hacks/exploits.
However, USDC’s transaction volume shows that it is still larger than Tether’s USDT and others.


All this together paints a confusing picture of the crypto market, where neither the sentiments nor the statistics are consistent.
In conclusion, adding to the excitement, Coinbase analysts recently flagged an upcoming risk to the crypto market ahead of US President Donald Trump’s April deadline on the Iran deal.
Final summary
- A list of coins is popular on Santiment, yet the statistics on the chain draw a different conclusion.
- Some coins are popular for good reasons, while some of the coins have to do with exploits and hacks.
