Citigroup raised its 12-month Bitcoin price target from $82,000 to $113,000 and its Ethereum target from $2,240 to $3,028, citing stronger crypto market activity, a supportive macro backdrop, and the return of ETF inflows. The note, dated September 30 and reported by Reuters on October 1, reverses two cuts Citi made earlier in 2026. Meanwhile, Gareth Soloway, chief market strategist at VerifiedInvesting.com, is warning that altcoins could lose 30% to 50% of their value if Bitcoin dominance keeps climbing. Both can't be right - or maybe they both are, which is the part that should make you uncomfortable.

Citi's Case: ETF Flows and Macro Tailwinds

Citi analyst Alex Saunders built the revised targets on three pillars: activity, macro, and ETF flows. The bank now expects $5 billion in inflows into crypto investment products over the next 12 months, replacing its previous assumption of flat net buying. The logic is that financial advisers and brokerages will gradually increase Bitcoin allocations through ETFs, creating a slower but steadier demand floor than the speculative waves of 2025.

The flow data backs that up. U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs pulled in $2.39 billion during the week ending September 25 - the largest weekly inflow since October 2025 - extending a nine-session streak that totaled about $3.08 billion. Ether products received $689.88 million that same week. The streak broke on September 30 with $148.7 million in net outflows, led by Fidelity's Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund pulling $125.6 million. Over the preceding three months, Bitcoin gained nearly 40% and Ethereum 68%, though both remain down roughly 3% and 9% year-to-date. Citi's $113,000 target sits about 10% below Bitcoin's October 2025 record of roughly $126,200.

Saunders also pointed to SEC rulemaking as a factor. The Senate's failure to advance the Clarity Act in September had "narrowed the path to a market-structure bill," but subsequent SEC regulatory proposals - including new rules on crypto custody and a nationwide preemption framework - took the edge off the negative sentiment. Citi even acknowledged that a 2028 administration change could reverse agency rules, though it placed that risk outside its forecast horizon.

The Altcoin Warning: Dominance Is the Kill Switch

While Citi paints a rosy picture for the majors, Soloway is looking at the same market and seeing trouble for everything else. His argument hinges on Bitcoin dominance, which he says broke above a long-running downward trend line and then retested it - a pattern that has preceded major market turns before. If dominance keeps climbing, the math gets ugly fast.

A 10% Bitcoin decline could push BTC back to the mid-$70,000 range and drag altcoins down 30% to 40%. A deeper 20% correction could mean a 50% altcoin wipeout. Soloway's key level to watch is $81,000 - a daily close below that would break Bitcoin's current bull flag pattern and open the path toward $70,000. He still believes the cycle low is in, but his short-term view is that sideways or slightly down Bitcoin action could still crush altcoins.

Bitcoin dominance sat around 58-60% entering October, with the altcoin season index near 30, meaning most altcoins are already underperforming Bitcoin. The divergence is widening: institutional money is flowing into Bitcoin ETFs and Ethereum ETFs, while altcoins are left fighting for scraps.

Two Exploits, One Bad Week for Altcoins

The altcoin space didn't exactly help its own case. NEAR Protocol's cross-chain swap system, NEAR Intents, lost about $3.8 million to an exploit on October 1. The bug sat in the interaction between NEAR Intents' Omni deposit-and-withdrawal infrastructure and its smart contract. Blockchain investigator ZachXBT traced the stolen funds to KuCoin, where they were bridged into Bitcoin. PeckShield flagged that the attacker's address had interacted with a wallet linked to North Korea's Lazarus Group, though no official attribution has been made.

The irony is thick. NEAR Intents had blocked more than $50 million tied to the Bitget hack from being laundered through its solver network just two days earlier. It fended off one attack and then got hit through a different door. The NEAR token fell as much as 8.6% intraday to around $4.92, giving back gains from a September where it had roughly doubled. The exploit also came two days after Bitwise's NEAR ETF began trading in the U.S. - a brutal juxtaposition of progress and setback.

Stacks Bucks the Trend

One altcoin that refused to die was Stacks (STX), which surged 20% to 28% after founder Muneeb Ali was named CEO of Stacks Labs, replacing interim CEO Alex Miller. The rally coincided with the network's Bitcoin staking program entering its expansion phase. Stacks launched its Genesis Bond on September 10, letting institutions lock BTC on Bitcoin L1 alongside an STX position and earn BTC-denominated rewards. By September 24, participants had bonded 230 BTC alongside 310,000 STX, earning 0.28 BTC in weekly rewards. The next bonding period opens October 10 with 500 BTC of capacity - more than double the initial round.

Ali's priorities include bringing more Bitcoin capital onto Stacks, expanding institutional adoption, and pushing toward a 100x throughput increase. Anchorage Digital is building custody infrastructure for institutional participants. The roadmap also lists privacy tools and post-quantum security. Whether any of that justifies a 28% price move in a day is a separate question, but at least Stacks is building something while the rest of the altcoin market waits to see if dominance kills them.

The market right now is split between two stories that don't reconcile neatly. Wall Street sees Bitcoin heading to $113,000 on the back of ETF flows and macro support. Technical analysts see altcoins heading for a 30-50% haircut if Bitcoin dominance keeps rising. Both can be true if the money flowing into ETFs stays concentrated in Bitcoin and Ethereum while the long tail of altcoins bleeds out. The Citi target is a directional signal, not a timing tool. The altcoin warning is a risk model, not a prophecy. Trade accordingly, and maybe keep some dry powder for when one of them is proven wrong.

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Author: Cedric Holloway
New York Newsroom
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