Seeing red? FUD that! Here's what you should have bought instead of Bitcoin last week

Where Bitcoin leads, altcoins usually follow — but the smartest crypto traders manage to turn BTC dips into buying opportunities.

We’ve argued many times in the past that the correlation between Bitcoin’s price and the market capitalization of hundreds of altcoins makes very little sense.

Whether you buy into the idea that Bitcoin is digital gold, or a payment mechanism, or both, it doesn’t have a whole lot in common with Ethereum, Shiba Inu, or FTX’s native exchange token.

Well, whether we like it or not, big moves in the price of Bitcoin define crypto markets.

Before Bitcoin slid from the latest all-time high above $68,000 back to the region of $55,000 last week, dragging most altcoins down with it, the crypto market had seen six straight weeks of virtually uninterrupted growth.

But as soon as the market turns red, as it did last week, many traders tend to succumb to three old enemies: Fear, uncertainty, and doubt (FUD).

Which is why we say: FUD that. Experienced crypto traders know that periods of correction can also present profit opportunities. And Cointelegraph Markets Pro’s own VORTECS™ Score found six of the ten best-performing altcoins last week, even as the market took a dive.

Unparalleled bull runs, lookalike corrections?

The VORTECS™ Score is a machine learning-powered trading algorithm that compares historic and current market conditions in digital asset markets to aid crypto traders’ decision-making.

The model takes in a host of quantitative indicators — including price movement, social sentiment, and trading activity — to arrive at a score that assesses whether the present conditions are historically bullish, neutral, or bearish for over 200 cryptocurrencies.

A VORTECS™ Score of 80 or above is considered confidently bullish for the next 12-72 hours. Assets that achieve such scores exhibit arrangements of key trading and social variables that in the past came before significant price increases.

The table below shows ten altcoins that delivered significant return on investment between Nov. 11 and 18 — the week that saw Bitcoin plunge from $68,000 to $58,000.

In bold are those tokens that hit a VORTECS™ Score of 80 or higher before reaching their peak price of the week.

Source: Cointelegraph Markets Pro

Six of the best crypto trading opportunities

Six out of ten of the week’s top performing assets exhibited patterns of trading and social behavior that closely resembled historically bullish combinations before they rallied.

• The Sandbox (SAND)
• Crypto.com coin (CRO)
• Voyager (VGX)
• Koinos Network (KOIN)
• TomoChain (TOMO)
• AirSwap (AST)

Six out of ten is significant, given that the overall number of tokens that yielded any gains has been very modest.

What does it say about the nature of the crypto market? When things are bullish, altcoins can rally for an infinite number of reasons, oftentimes simply due to a favorable macro context and exuberance taking over the market.

But when much of the market is going south, analysis suggests that tokens supported by robust trading activity and high social sentiment are most likely to buck the trend.

These are also the times when traders need reliable data analytics to inform their strategies the most. When the floor is lava, it helps to have an extra pair of algorithmic eyes sifting through millions of data points to identify potential safe havens.

This is exactly what the VORTECS™ Score is trained to do.

Cointelegraph is a publisher of financial information, not an investment adviser. We do not provide personalized or individualized investment advice. Cryptocurrencies are volatile investments and carry significant risk including the risk of permanent and total loss. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Figures and charts are correct at the time of writing or as otherwise specified. Live-tested strategies are not recommendations. Consult your financial advisor before making financial decisions.