Latest news about Bitcoin and all cryptocurrencies. Your daily crypto news habit.
Bitcoin was first introduced in 2009. Since then, it has gained popularity and has become the de facto standard for cryptocurrency, inspiring the invention of many other cryptocurrencies.
Over 2950 cryptocurrencies being traded today with a market cap of about $278bn. These cryptocurrencies are used in several ways, including making P2P payments.
More businesses are now accepting cryptocurrencies as a mode of payment. The online Casino Industry, for instance, is one area where cryptocurrency has gained traction.
There are now online casinos where you can gamble strictly with cryptocurrencies. This has benefited many gamblers, especially those from countries that have strict gambling laws.
While cryptocurrencies have brought immense benefits to users, theyâve also brought challenges. Cryptocurrencies are unregulated, and there are so many of them coming up.
Discovering legitimate cryptocurrencies and those that have not become a significant challenge. To assist you in addressing this challenge, here are five other popular currencies besides Bitcoin.
NEO
This is another notable cryptocurrency that was launched in 2014. This platform is also known as the âEthereum of China.â As the name suggests, NEO originated from china and has a strong association with the Chinese government.
Developers and investors like NEO because it uses blockchain technology to create decentralized apps as well as smart contracts. Some business people also use it to pay dividends.
NEO protects its users using a digital identity. NEO users, whether individuals or institutions, can acquire a digital identity, which acts as a form of verification. To stay protected from scammers, you should only trade with users who have confirmed their identity.
Just like most cryptocurrencies, NEO faces its fair share of challenges. The platform is not divisible, as such, you can only own a full coin and not otherwise. Also, given NEO is strongly associated with the Chinese government, it can be tough to predict where this cryptocurrency is headed.
Ethereum
Ethereum is the second most popular cryptocurrency after Bitcoin. This platform was released in 2015. Since then, its market cap has been lagging behind Bitcoinâs market cap by a significant margin despite its high sophistication and varied uses.
This cryptocurrency uses a smart contract that helps to codify and secure anything. Developers use it to advance and run decentralized applications without downtime and interference from another person. According to The Washington Post, Ethereum users have a broad spectrum of applications compared to Bitcoin.
Litecoin
Litecoin was created by Charlie Lee and launched in 2011. Just like Bitcoin, this platform was popular for making decentralized P2P payments. This platform is an open-source global payment network that uses âscryptâ as its proof of work.
Having come second after Bitcoin, Litecoin has been used to gamble in many online casinos. Ignition Casino is one of the online casinos where you can gamble with cryptocurrencies. You can check out this review from OnlineCasinoGems to learn more.
Litecoin offers one of the fastest transactions with an average processing speed of about 2.5 minutes compared to Bitcoinâs average rate of 10 minutes. It also has a simpler underlying code and therefore doesnât require a lot of energy and time to mine. Currently, Litecoin has a market cap of around $3.0 billion, making it one of the largest cryptocurrency in the market.
Ripple
While still less known, Ripple is the fourth largest cryptocurrency with a more significant potential for growth. According to Forbes, Ripple has a fast speed transaction and lower fees compared to Bitcoin that makes it highly likely to be embraced by financial systems.
Ripple has some regulatory oversight and works similar to a centralized system. Its transactions are usually verified. Thatâs why it has support from banks who use it as a form of settlement network. However, this means that there is no anonymity, which can be a concern for most users.
Since it is regulated, Ripple is not suited for making day-to-day transactions. Instead, it is more suitable for trading assets. What limits its daily use further is that there are very few platforms that accept the direct exchange of Ripple for fiat currency. Most times, youâll have to exchange your Ripple to Bitcoin then convert the Bitcoin to money.
Peercoin
This platform is also called PPCoin or Peer-to-Peer Coin. Peercoin was developed by Sunny King. The platform is based on Bitcoinâs framework and shares most of its source code.
Peercoin is a green cryptocurrency created to address insecurity making it less prone to attacks. This platform also requires less energy to mine compared to other currencies. According to the New York Times, the ease of mining with minimal energy has made the currency to be closer to money than Bitcoin.
Peercoin is similar to Bitcoin because it uses Blockchain technology to support all transactions. The platform also targets the issue of Bitcoin's high-energy consumption and aims to provide increased security as well as energy efficiency.
This is the first digital currency to use both proof-of-work and proof-of-stake. According to this system, the coins are mined using the proof-of-work hashing process, and as the method becomes harder with time, the system rewards users with coins through proof-of-stake.
Based on the hybrid of proof-of-stake and proof-of-work system, a user who owns 1% of Peercoin is awarded 1% of proof-of-stake coins. This process is referred to as âminting.â Peercoin is working towards making this energy-efficient method its primary way through which coins can be created.
Transact with Popular Cryptocurrencies
The popular cryptocurrencies above make the bigger part of the total market cap. They are also legitimate, therefore trading with these cryptocurrencies is more secure compared to the smaller, less known cryptocurrencies. And if thatâs not enough, they are more acceptable by many merchants.
The five popular cryptocurrencies should help you make most if not all transactions you desire safely and less expensively.
Disclaimer
The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not reflect the views of Bitcoin Insider. Every investment and trading move involves risk - this is especially true for cryptocurrencies given their volatility. We strongly advise our readers to conduct their own research when making a decision.