The Crypto Fear and Greed Index, one of the most widely used indicators of cryptocurrency investor sentiment, dropped again to the “extreme fear” level after a brief recovery on Wednesday.
At the time of writing, the Crypto Fear and Greed Index is at 18, up from 20 recorded on Friday. CoinMarketCap. 20 signals “fear”, an atmosphere of caution among investors, but an improvement from the lowest market sentiment.
Sentiment briefly rose to 25 on Wednesday but declined as geopolitical tensions between the U.S., Israel and Iran continue to curb risk appetite and escalate macroeconomic uncertainty among market participants.
The index hit a yearly low of 5 in February amid a deterioration in the cryptocurrency market and several headwinds, including renewed geopolitical tensions and macroeconomic concerns such as uncertainty over interest rate policy, liquidity levels and rising U.S. government debt.
Crypto assets have been in a bear market since the October 2025 crash, which reduced the price of Bitcoin (BTC) by more than 50% from its all-time high before BTC saw a constrained recovery and wiped hundreds of billions of dollars in value from the altcoin market.
Related: Bitcoin sentiment hits record low as contrarian investors claim 60K dollars is the lowest level of BTC
Alts suffer most as sentiment craters
According to CryptoQuant analyst Darkfost, 38% of altcoins are hovering near all-time low prices, which is more sedate than the fallout from the FTX crash.
The price collapse was accompanied by an approximately 50% reduction in cryptocurrency trading volume, Darkfost told Cointelegraph.
“Altcoins remain the last sector of the cryptocurrency market where liquidity tends to flow, so this situation is not surprising given the deterioration of the geopolitical and macroeconomic situation observed over the last few months,” he said.
According to cryptocurrency market sentiment analysis platform Santiment, mentions of altcoins on social media platforms have dropped to a two-year low.
In February 2026, global searches for “Bitcoin will fall to zero” also reached its highest level since 2022, according to Google data. data from Google Trends, which confirms low investor confidence measured by other sentiment indicators.
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