NEAR and BCH Surge 34% as Altcoins Outpace Bitcoin
NEAR Protocol (NEAR)
Editor:
Eugene Serbin
The cryptocurrency market closed the week with a 4% gain in total market capitalization, briefly surpassing $3 trillion as altcoins like Bitcoin Cash and NEAR Protocol surged, according to cvj.ai. Capital rotation into altcoins drove significant gains, with BCH and NEAR each rising 34% on major news events. Bitcoin cash led the charge, surging nearly 30% after CME announced plans to launch a BCH perpetual futures contract in October.
After topping out at $360 on Sept. 23, BCH consolidated above $330 to seal a 34% weekly gain. Matching BCH’s weekly performance, near protocol (NEAR) rose from $4.16 at the start of the week to a peak of $5.48. The gain coincided with reports that Bitwise’s spot NEAR exchange-traded fund (ETF) cleared key regulatory hurdles, potentially opening the asset to brokerage-account and institutional buyers.
The ETF is expected to launch around Sept. 29. Together with forced buybacks, the news pushed NEAR’s weekly and year-to-date gains past 31% and 250%, respectively. The total market cap’s brief breach of $3 trillion indicates strong momentum, though volatility remains a risk. Experts expect another leg up that could erase bitcoin’s year-to-date losses and push altcoins to record highs.
How the market reacted
Whalio's own Binance spot order flow for NEAR, measured when this story was written up on 28 September 2026. Not the outlet's figures.
NEAR Protocol is currently trading at $5.39, with a 24-hour buy ratio of 51.5% indicating a slight majority of buy-side volume over the full day. However, shorter-term pressure shows signs of fading, as the 1-hour buy ratio dropped to 48.6% and the 4-hour ratio fell further to 45.8%. This shift is reflected in negative volume deltas of -$154,795 for the hour and -$2,421,002 for the four-hour period, suggesting recent selling pressure is outweighing buying. Volume delta measures the net value of market orders, where a negative figure means sellers are more aggressive than buyers in that timeframe. Despite the short-term dip, the 24-hour volume delta remains positive at +$6,056,017, showing that buying dominated earlier in the session.
The latest daily buy ratio of 50.8% sits at the 68th percentile of the last 323 days, against a median of 49.7% - ordinary for this coin.
Was that an ordinary day?
The same Binance spot measurements for NEAR, averaged over the days leading up to the story.
Over the preceding week, NEAR experienced a robust 29.3% price increase, driven by a total volume delta of +$52,501,295. The weekly average buy ratio stood at 51.1%, with net buying occurring on five of the seven days. Comparing the current 24-hour buy ratio of 51.5% to the weekly average of 51.1% reveals a nearly identical level of buying interest, differing by just 0.4 percentage points. This consistency suggests that today’s trading activity is ordinary relative to the week’s trend, rather than an unusual spike. However, today’s spot volume of $209,530,185 is notably lower, trading at only 0.70 times the weekly average volume.