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Cryptocurrencies

Most Important Cryptocurrencies Apart From Bitcoin

As the most popular and successful cryptocurrency, Bitcoin enjoys most of the spotlight. For this reason, it’s easy for most people to think that cryptocurrency is synonymous with Bitcoin. Indeed, a YouGov study reported 75% of US adults knew about Bitcoin, while other cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin Cash and Ethereum were each known by less than 30% of the population. 

As the most popular and successful cryptocurrency, Bitcoin enjoys most of the spotlight. For this reason, it’s easy for most people to think that cryptocurrency is synonymous with Bitcoin. Indeed, a YouGov study reported 75% of US adults knew about Bitcoin, while other cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin Cash and Ethereum were each known by less than 30% of the population. 

As the most popular and successful cryptocurrency, Bitcoin enjoys most of the spotlight. For this reason, it’s easy for most people to think that cryptocurrency is synonymous with Bitcoin. Indeed, a YouGov study reported 75% of US adults knew about Bitcoin, while other cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin Cash and Ethereum were each known by less than 30% of the population. 

If you’re an aspiring user of cryptocurrencies, or simply interested in that world, it’s important to acquaint yourself with other forces in the space. This article takes a look at other cryptocurrencies that have proved themselves worthy of attention and, of course, investor money. But before we get into that, let’s do a refresher on this new and exciting asset class. 

What are Cryptocurrencies? 

It’s necessary to do a recap of what cryptocurrencies are because many people associate the word cryptocurrency with just Bitcoin. So, when we are talking about cryptocurrencies and altcoins, what do we mean? A cryptocurrency, at its most basic definition, is a purely digital and internet-based currency that’s secured with modern cryptography and utilizes a ledger that is distributed across network participants. The most common type of distributed ledger is a blockchain. The blockchain concept always existed in the computer space but was only actualized in 2009 by the creator of Bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto.

The ‘crypto’ in cryptocurrency refers to the cryptography that is used to encrypt and hence secure cryptocurrencies and transactions. Cryptocurrencies subscribe to the tenet of decentralization, which means free from state manipulation or control and self-issuance. Cryptocurrencies are designed as code – almost always open source, with in-built mechanisms for issuance. These mechanisms vary from one cryptocurrency to another. 

As you probably already know, Bitcoin is the first-ever and most successful of cryptocurrencies. All other cryptocurrencies apart from bitcoin are collectively referred to as altcoins. Currently, there are more than 5,000 altcoins, according to Coinmarketcap. The total market valuation of cryptocurrencies is currently 269 billion, with Bitcoin taking the lion’s share with 62.3 billion in market valuation. Many of these coins have been designed to improve on Bitcoin in one way or another – either on security or speed or ease of storage (e.g., in terms of space). 

With that background, let’s look at some of the most important cryptocurrencies apart from Bitcoin.

1. Ethereum (ETH) 

Ethereum is a cryptocurrency and blockchain launched in 2015. The project is the brainchild of Vitalik Buterin, a Russian-Canadian programmer. Industry experts view Ethereum is the next most important crypto after Bitcoin. Let’s examine why. 

Ethereum is the next cryptocurrency that brought a ground-breaking product into the blockchain space. The project is more than a digital finance platform. Its main objective is to be a decentralized applications and smart contracts platform. Decentralized applications (DApps) are a new kind of application that can run without downtime and are free from control, manipulation, and censorship by a third party.

Smart contracts are a new kind of contract – not unlike the traditional contracts, but this time is purely digital, self-enforcing, unalterable, and completely transparent to all relevant parties. 

Applications on the Ethereum platform are powered by its native token called ether (ETH). Ether is the currency in which people using the Ethereum blockchain pay in transaction fees. As an investor, you can also use Ether as a store of value. Ether is the second most successful cryptocurrency after Bitcoin – even though it trails behind the dominant currency considerably.

In 2014, Ethereum launched a pre-sale (an initial coin offering ICO) to fund the project. The effort was incredibly successful and is credited with helping usher in the age of the ICO. Ethereum has also weathered one of the biggest security breaches in the history of cryptocurrency – the DAO attack in 2016. This attack led to the split of the Ethereum blockchain, birthing Ethereum (ETH) Ethereum Classic (ETC). As of July 18, 2020, ETH has a market capitalization of $26 billion, and one ETH is going for $232.93.

2. Ripple (XRP)

Launched in 2012, Ripple is a cryptocurrency and a real-time digital payments network. The project was created by Chris Larsen and Jed McCaleb.

Ripple’s protocol facilitates the global, peer-to-peer, decentralized, and real-time exchange and transfer of money in any currency, whether it’s the US dollar, Japanese Yen, Bitcoin, Ethereum, and so on. XRP can settle transactions within 3 to 5 seconds. 

XRP is the platform-specific asset of the Ripple network. Individuals can exchange XRP between each other without the need for an intermediary. It’s the go-between currency in any exchange that happens on the Ripple network. 

Ripple’s transaction confirmation mechanism differs from that of Bitcoin in that it does not utilize ‘mining.’ All XRP tokens were ‘pre-mined’ or ‘minted’ before launch, meaning there is no release of new coins over time. Indeed, Ripple ‘burns’ XRP tokens immediately after they facilitate a transaction, in a bid to avoid inflation. Ripple’s no-mining approach is a massive save on power, and it also considerably aids the network to achieve incomparably faster transactions. 

For a long time, XRP occupied the third spot in the crypto market. However, it has been knocked down to the fourth spot. As of July 18, 2020, XRP is trading at $0. 194295, with a market cap of $8.6 billion.

3. Litecoin (LTC)

Litecoin is a cryptocurrency that is modeled after Bitcoin but aims to be more lightweight and scalable. It was launched in 2011 and is a brainchild of former MIT graduate and Google engineer Charlie Lee. 

Litecoin is often called the “silver to bitcoin’s gold.” It’s a “lite” version of Bitcoin only with more coins, faster transactions, and a different hashing algorithm. While Bitcoin uses the SHA-256 algorithm, Litecoin utilizes one known as “Scrypt.” 

Another difference is Bitcoin’s circulation can never exceed 21 million, while Litecoin is designed to help 84 million coins. This might not mean much for either currency in terms of real-world usage since both are divisible to very tiny amounts. Litecoin is also way faster in terms of transaction confirmation time. While Bitcoin’s transactions can take up to 10 minutes, Litecoin takes about 2.5 minutes. Litecoin is also one of the cryptocurrencies that have enjoyed significant merchant adoption. 

So how is Litecoin performing today? Well, as of July 18, 2020, Litecoin traded at $41.95, with a market cap and rank of 2.7 billion and #9 respectively.

4. Chainlink (LINK)

Launched in September 2017, Chainlink, a project by FinTech company SmartContract Chainlink Limited SEZC, has seen the success that few cryptocurrencies do within such a short period. Perhaps this is because of its unique proposition of providing an oracle system that allows on-chain contracts to utilize external data, greatly expanding the capability of smart contracts. 

Courtesy of this feature, Chainlink has deep-running relationships with a lot of other innovative blockchain projects, a factor that’s given it a leg-up in the space. Some of these partnerships include Synthetix, Loopring, Aave, Ampleforth, and Binance. The project has also managed to secure other significant partnerships out of the blockchain space, including Google, Oracle, Gartner, Brave New Coin, and Web3 Foundation. 

Thus far, Chainlink has no competitor, and this has given it the dominance as far as its selling point is concerned. As of July 19, 2018, Chainlink’s price was $7.96, and, with a market cap of 2.8 billion, it was the 8th largest cryptocurrency.

 

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Crypto Videos

Tether Talks About Printing USDT – What Does This Mean?

https://youtu.be/Ef4ggfwBDbM

https://youtu.be/Ef4ggfwBDbM

Tether Talks About “Printing” USDT

The CTO of Tether spoke about the popularity of its Ethereum-based asset and claimed that it was the reason why the company never burned a single USDT token.
The recent report that came from Flipside Crypto concluded that Tether never even tried to practice burning its tokens, additionally saying:
“We can also see that tokens never go to the “burn” category, which means that no USDT supply was destroyed throughout the course of April. Looking at the full USDT history on Ethereum, we found that tokens have never been burned.”

USDT’s side of the story

Paolo Ardoino, the CTO of both Tether and Bitfinex, explained that the company is mindful of how it works, and it does practice burning its tokens, but that it has so far done it only on the Omni and Tron networks. When it comes to the Ethereum network, Ardoino said that the company holds authorized but unissued and unbacked ERC20 tokens in their inventory.
He also stated that Ethereum had been the most popular blockchain in recent months, which caused the demand for ERC20-based USDT to rise exponentially.

Conclusion

While many condone this type of behavior and encourage burning and then reissuing new tokens, Ardoino said that the outcome is the same. However, many people who touched upon this topic believe that burning and reissuing USDT tokens could only help improve transparency and reduce skepticism, even if the outcome is the same in the end.

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Crypto Guides

What Problems Do Stable (cryptocurrency) Coins Solve?

Introduction

Introduction

Introduction

We have learnt a lot about cryptocurrencies and their properties in our previous guides. Even though this financial instrument has gone through a lot of up & down in the last three years of the past decade, many financial experts believe that this asset class can still be considered a potential investment. Some experienced crypto traders believe that Bitcoin, at its peak (~$18,000 in Dec 2017), is still undervalued. This is because of the strong fundaments Bitcoin possesses. Not just Bitcoin, the entire crypto market has enormous investment potential in this decade.

The Need for Stable Coins

But there is one thing that concerns both short-term and long-term crypto investors – which is undoubtfully the volatility. Most of the cryptos currently present in the market possess huge volatility. This is one crucial reason why most of the investors are not confident enough to invest in this space. This volatility is also the reason why cryptos cannot be used as a standard medium of exchange. Hence the need for a Stable Currency or Stable Coin has risen.

A Stable Coin is a currency that has all the critical properties of typical crypto while achieving price stability. This stability in price is achieved by pegging their value to the major fiat currencies like USD & Euro in a 1:1 ratio. One of the very first and famous stable coins is Tether, and its value is pegged to USD. So the value of one Tether (₮) is always equal to one US Dollar ($). The main goal of any stable coin is to achieve maximum decentralization while maintaining price stability. But in the case of Tether, even though it has most of the properties of crypto, it is highly scrutinized ever since it is pegged with the USD.

Significance of Stable Currency

Stable Currency, as the name suggests, provides both short-term & long-term stability for the traders and investors. Short-term stability allows users to make day to day transactions just like fiat currencies. While the long-term stability provides confidence for the investors to include these stable coins in their portfolio. For instance, in the case of extreme bear markets, crypto traders and investors must need some stable storage where they can protect their portfolio from significant losses. The only other way is to convert all these cryptos to desired fiat currencies and convert back to crypto again once the downtrend is over. This sounds redundant. Isn’t it?

But with the help of stable coins in their portfolio, investors can just trade the cryptos that are bleeding for stable coins and hold them without having to worry about the volatility. Apart from the investment point of view, stable coins can also help short-term crypto traders to confidently keep their profits that they have gained within the exchange wallets (in the form of stable coins). But in the absence of stable coins, they will have to continuously worry about them losing their profit value due to the high volatility.

If you are interested in adding stable coins to your portfolio, we have mentioned some of the most promising ones below.

Tether | MakerDAO | True USD | Carbon

Many stable currency projects like these have come to existence after Tether, and some of them showed promising results. However, a completely decentralized stable coin that can be used for day-to-day transactions securely is yet to come.

Categories
Crypto Guides

Learning The Fundamentals Of ‘Tether’ – The Stable Cryptocurrency!

Introduction
Tether is a cryptocurrency founded in 2015, and it was initially known as ‘Realcoin.’ Tether tokens are issued by Tether Limited, a company based in the British Virgin Islands

Introduction
Tether is a cryptocurrency founded in 2015, and it was initially known as ‘Realcoin.’ Tether tokens are issued by Tether Limited, a company based in the British Virgin Islands

Introduction

Tether is a cryptocurrency founded in 2015, and it was initially known as ‘Realcoin.’ Tether tokens are issued by Tether Limited, a company based in the British Virgin Islands as per the New York Times. The official website says the company is incorporated in Hong Kong, with offices in the US. This company is associated with the Bitfinex, a Hong Kong-based cryptocurrency exchange, which is also one of the biggest in the world. Many members who are on the board of Tether Limited are associated with Bitfinex exchange, as well.

Objective

The value of any cryptocurrency is volatile. We can see the steep increases and decreases in the value of any crypto within a matter of days or hours, as well. We know that these Cryptocurrencies offer a wide range of features that fiat currencies don’t assure.  Therefore, Tether was designed as a stable coin promising the stability of fiat currency with the features of a cryptocurrency as well. Tether is meant to be backed one for one by some of the major fiat currencies like USD, Euro, JPY, etc. If we take the example of USD, the value of each Tether is always one dollar (USDT). For every one tether created, one US dollar is stored as a reserve.

Importance of Tether in the crypto world

Many crypto exchanges across the globe find it extremely difficult to work with traditional banks. The exchanges find it challenging to store USD or any conventional fiat currency as reserves for the payments. Hence major crypto exchanges like Bitfinex hold clients balance in Tether rather than in USD. This means, if the clients hold any money in the exchange and don’t have any open positions, that money is held as Tether in the exchange. It is converted into USD only when the client wants to redeem the cash. Hence Tether offers to be a stable alternative for USD for the crypto exchanges across the world.

Market Cap

Tether is in the fifth position in terms of market cap in the crypto world with a value of more than $4 billion. The price of each Tether is stable and is one dollar or Euro, etc. as described above. The average 24-hour trading volume is just above $43 billion, while the circulating supply is around $4.1 billion in the market as on 1st Nov 2019.

Controversies

Tether has a fair share of controversies in its kitty. As the central banks hold the appropriate amount of gold reserves equivalent to the new currency issued in the market, Tether Limited holds the equivalent amount of US Dollars in its reserve for the Tether coins circulated in the market. Lately, there are claims that the company doesn’t hold enough reserves in USD, claiming Tether Ltd haven’t been too transparent with the audits as to where and how much of the reserves have been stored in different places.

The December 2017 Bitcoin price surge is also attributed to be the work of the Tether limited. It is alleged that the company has created Tether coins out of thin air and bought Bitcoin at a lower price, eventually attributing the price surge of the currency. Thus, there are growing fears in the crypto market that if there are no adequate reserves of USD backing the Tether, the value of the coin should be determined by the market rather than maintaining it stable. Despite all these controversies, this cryptocurrency is still one of the most traded ones in the crypto space because of its stability factor.