Altcoins got termed as an alternate, and here ethereum seems to be the leader.
I agree with that but the competition is tight, unlike bitcoin vs altcoins where bitcoin clearly dominated.
The growth of rest of the altcoins always have dependence over the growth of ethereum. When it comes to ethereum it depends over the growth of bitcoin. Though it has got its own platform the dependence over bitcoin still exists.
Also this one I will not agree, if you remember, XRP were able to take the number 2 spot and it stayed their for awhile, so it really beat ETH that time period. Maybe its safe to say that altcoins can influence the big number of ETH tokens but not the entire altcoins market.