There are five cryptocurrencies worth watching in the wake of a bear market in the first quarter of 2019.
When the market is down, bitcoin looks best to many investors. But bitcoin’s price charts are littered with periods of extreme volatility and low activity. Is this one more of those?
The bear market that was triggered by the January 2018 “flash crash” is over. It’s time to buy. There are five cryptocurrencies worth watching in the wake of a bear market.
The first one is Ethereum Classic (ETC). After the flash crash, ETC was hard hit and lost nearly 80% of its value over three months. But even at its worst point, it had still outperformed all its peers.
Since then, it has recovered much of its value; at press time it was trading at $21.65 – a 65% gain from the low in January. Ethereum Classic is a blockchain-based virtual machine that allows developers to write smart contracts and decentralized applications in solidity – a programming language inspired by JavaScript and therefore very similar to it. The ETC community has been active and vocal throughout this bear market, and there is reason to believe that ETC will be best positioned to weather any future downturns in the crypto markets.
It’s hard to keep track of all the cryptocurrencies out there, but here are five that have been making some waves lately–and may hang on in the wake of the market sell-off.
Litecoin ($LTC): Litecoin is a derivative of Bitcoin, and with its similar history, it’s not an obvious choice for the list. But Litecoin has been picking up momentum in recent months; one reason why is because it is the first major fork of Bitcoin code. The main difference between Litecoin and Bitcoin is how the number of coins are produced: Whereas Bitcoin generates each coin by mining when it reaches a certain value (21 million coins), Litecoin is split into four pieces every two years. Each piece then gets produced by mining for four years. As with any cryptocurrency, there isn’t much cause for optimism about Litecoin’s future. But this doesn’t mean you should avoid buying it–it might just be worth having around as a hedge against volatility in other cryptocurrencies.
DigiByte ($DGB): DigiByte is another Bitcoin fork, but unlike Litecoin and Ethereum Classic, it uses proof-of-work rather than proof-of-stake to secure its network. DigiByte also has what is known as a “diff
In the first quarter of 2019, the cryptocurrency market has been hit by a bear market, with a total BTC value drop of $77 billion. This is the second largest drop in market value since 2014.
Bitcoin is currently trading at its lowest value since November 2018. However, it’s still holding above its all-time high from December 2017 ($20,000). Although BTC prices dipped below $8,000 in January (it was briefly under $6,000), there has been no clear support level for this long as it remained below $6,000 until April. It currently sits at around $7,500.
This BTC price drop is not necessarily negative for crypto investors. Many analysts believe that a major breakout of the crypto market is imminent and the current bearish trend will soon be reversed. Some even see a bull run returning to prices within the next few months. In addition to the current bullish signals being observed by traders on a daily basis, other favorable factors are also being considered as these include the upcoming launch of Bakkt’s Bitcoin futures product in July 2019 and an upcoming Paper Wallet app update.
We have seen the beginning of a bear market in cryptocurrencies, which are down more than 30% from their high in January. We believe this is a buying opportunity for many of the coins that have been undervalued for a long time.
The reasons for the crash are obvious. The increased regulatory scrutiny has made it harder for people to buy and sell crypto, and this, coupled with the crypto craze of 2017, has led to a massive increase in the supply of cryptocurrencies on the market.
The downside risk to this current dip is that it may not be short-term. As we saw during the last crash, new regulations can be counterproductive. Governments may simply decide not to bother and take their hands off the reins.
Cryptocurrencies have become too popular for their own good. They’re a good way to make money, but the crash everyone’s talking about is going to happen anyway.
The crashes are coming. With only a few exceptions, cryptocurrency prices have been rising faster than they can increase in use. And there are two reasons for that: people are still trying to believe in them, and they’re using up a lot more resources than they need to.
A cryptocurrency is a digital currency designed to work as a medium of exchange. It uses cryptography to secure and verify transactions as well as to control the creation of new units of a particular cryptocurrency. The most popular software wallets are available on many platforms such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Litecoin.
Cryptocurrencies are not physical assets, but rather virtual instruments that exist entirely on the web and operate independently of any central authority. They are largely unregulated, so anyone can create them (or use an existing one), and it’s also difficult for governments to track their value.
The concept of cryptocurrencies gained popularity in the wake of the financial crisis with Satoshi Nakamoto’s invention of bitcoin in 2008. In the years since, bitcoin has become the world’s most popular cryptocurrency, accounting for roughly 48% of all market cap in April 2018. There is a total supply of 16 million bitcoins, but only 12 million have been mined so far, split between bitcoin core (BTC) and bitcoin cash (BCH).
There are currently over 1,600 cryptocurrencies available today, with new coins being introduced every day. This number is expected to increase as more and more people join the crypto community and blockchain technology becomes increasingly widespread. While some cryptocurrencies have seen tremendous growth and adoption rates over