Bitcoin has sunk to a record low in terms of its share of the cryptocurrencies market, sitting at just 70.5 percent as of March 17. It happens amid a booming altcoin scene.

The exponential rise in altcoin trading activity in the first three months of 2017 has seen Bitcoin’s share of the cryptocurrency market nosedive. At the start of the year, the figure stood at 87 percent.

While Bitcoin also enjoyed new levels of success, its price remaining about $1000 for several months, continued infighting and increasingly harsh rhetoric regarding the future of its network is feared by many to be leading to stagnation.

Transaction waiting times and fees have both risen dramatically, as solution trends come and go without gaining wide-reaching consensus.

Fears of stagnation

“I don't really care who wins the Segwit vs BU thing, but something needs to give,” the top comment in response to the market cap decline on Reddit reads. “Stagnation is death.”

Altcoins meanwhile have expanded in value beyond the expectations even of developers. After Dash went from $23 to over $100 over the course of four weeks, Ethereum today appears to be exhibiting similar behavior.

The largest altcoin in terms of market cap, its value has increased from around $12 to over $50 in an even shorter time than Dash.

Monero, the third largest altcoin, also doubled in value to break $25 per token Friday according to data from CoinMarketCap.