The best cryptocurrency for you will depend on your circumstances. There is no universal answer that suits everyone, so we have created a list of cryptocurrencies based on their usage.
It also depends on how much experience you have with cryptocurrency in general. While buying cryptocurrencies from companies’ mobile apps, you can transfer funds from a bank account or another cryptocurrency wallet. The following is a list of the top cryptocurrencies for beginners to invest in:
Bitcoin (BTC)
Bitcoin is the most widely used crypto in the world, with the biggest market cap. The price of Bitcoin peaked at over $20,000 in late 2017 and has since gone down to around $8,000. Bitcoin is a peer-to-peer currency — it does not exist physically, but it is still a tangible asset. Satoshi Nakamoto invented Bitcoin in 2009 as an open-source project.
Of course, Bitcoin isn’t perfect. Its most significant issue is its scalability or lack thereof; transaction processing times have become slower as demand for Bitcoin has increased over the years. This is one reason why Bitcoin Cash was created; it is meant to be an improved version of Bitcoin. If you are looking for a cryptocurrency with a first-mover advantage with a well-established network and decent liquidity, Bitcoin could be a good choice for you as a beginner investor.
Ethereum (ETH)
The second most popular cryptocurrency is Ethereum, which has a market cap of over $22 billion. Ethereum was introduced in 2013 and is based on blockchain technology. They can be used to represent shares or assets within a decentralized system, such as crowdfunding projects or membership programs. Ethereum uses Ether (ETH) as its currency, but other cryptocurrencies can be created on top of this network.
It is unique in that it was created as a platform for smart contracts and decentralized applications (Dapps), with users being able to generate their own tokens. The idea was to offer an alternative to centralized cloud computing services like Amazon Web Services. However, it has since morphed into much more than that — today, Dapps of all kinds are built on Ethereum.
Bitcoin Cash (BCH)
Bitcoin Cash, which is similar to Bitcoin but has an increased capacity for processing transactions, is another cryptocurrency that’s gained traction with investors over recent years. Bitcoin Cash was created in August 2017 following a hard fork of the original Bitcoin blockchain and now has a market cap of more than $4 billion across exchanges worldwide.
Litecoin (LTC)
In many aspects, Litecoin is similar to Bitcoin, although it is faster and less expensive. The key distinction is that Litecoin generates a block in 2.5 minutes as opposed to Bitcoin’s 10 minutes.
Litecoin was developed to be the ‘silver’ to bitcoin’s ‘gold,’ but recently, it has grown to be a significant player in its own right, and some analysts predict that it will be worth $1,000 per coin by the end of 2018 and could even hit $10,000 per coin in the next decade.