Litecoin was created in 2011 by Google engineer Charlie Lee just two years after Bitcoin pioneered the blockchain technology. Lee referred to the cryptocurrency as “the lite version of Bitcoin”. Hence, it bears a lot of similarities to Bitcoin but at the same time also targets the shortcomings of the king of the market and offers a better proposition. Litecoin was one of the market leaders immediately after its inception. It stayed on top of the market for a while – being in the top three – but in recent years the cryptocurrency market has exploded with altcoins employing newer and better technologies. This has resulted in Litecoin taking a backseat and its popularity waning.
How does Litecoin differ from Bitcoin?
The basic offering of both the cryptocurrencies is same. They both facilitates payments in a decentralized manner with all the perks of decentralization. The major difference between the networks is the algorithms they employ. Litecoin’s algorithm, scrypt, is newer and advanced than the SHA-256 of Bitcoin.
Litecoin was also created with keeping in mind the lack of scalability of Bitcoin; hence, it pays more focus to the transaction speed. Where Bitcoin’s network takes 9 minutes on average to validate a transaction, Litecoin only takes 2.5 minutes. Litecoin has better scalability and is much faster than Bitcoin.
Does LTC still have potential?
Litecoin peaked during the bull run at around $390 starting the year with a price level of just $130. The growth of 200% was not regarded as something extraordinary in a market where cryptocurrencies accumulated growths of even 1,000%. LTC was also slow to pick up the bullish momentum during the bull run and questions about the viability of the cryptocurrency’s future rose.
The performance in the bull run of 2021 also gave LTC coin a reputation as one of the stable cryptocurrencies. This made the cryptocurrency a safe haven for investors that were not willing to take the risk that the crypto market usually requires. Although, Litecoin is still not a stable asset when compared with the traditional standards, it can be regarded as somewhat stable in the cryptocurrency market.
The long-term market outlook for LTC is still bullish. Various estimates place the cryptocurrency at a good price level. According to the estimates of Wallet Investor, the one-year price of LTC is expected to be at $225 while the five-year projection is at $543. Digital Coin Price suggests the cryptocurrency will end the year with a price of $264 and reach towards $615 by 2026. If Litecoin is able to cross $600 by 2026, an investment of $1000 would be equal to $3,333 by then which is still a good return of more than 200%.
