The Top 6 Leading Cryptocurrencies (Altcoins) to Buy in 2018 & Beyond

Best Altcoin Cryptocurrencies to Buy

The future of digital currencies looks bright as it can be seen by the increasing popularity and acceptance. Most people only know of bitcoins, yet we have more than 5,000 digital currencies is use at the moment. Investing in cryptocurrencies is just like investing in any other asset.

The increased demand for bitcoins by investors saw its price increase by more than 20 times in 2017 alone. Apart from bitcoins, there are plenty of other digital currencies that analysts say will increase in value in 2018. Discussed in the article are the top 6 most promising cryptocurrencies that any investor should buy in 2018 and beyond.

1. Bitcoins

This is the most popular and the most expensive digital currency in the world. Introduced to the world in 2009 by Satoshi Nakamoto, this currency utilizes a peer-to-peer decentralized technology of making payments. All the transactions are recorded in a ledger known as blockchain that can be publicly accessed.

You can trade bitcoins for services and goods by merchandisers that accept payments in bitcoins. According to financial analysts, the price of one bitcoin might hit $60,000 in 2018. In 2017 alone, the value increased from $1,000 in January to about $20,000 in December. To buy bitcoins, you must first download a wallet and sign up. Once you have done this, you can buy bitcoins on exchanges via PayPal, bank transfers, credit or debit cards.

This digital currency is based on anonymity as none of the transacting parties gets to reveal his or her identity. Considering the many advantages of transacting using bitcoins, this currency will continue growing big in 2018.

2. Ethereum

This currency was created in 2015 by a 19-year old boy. It is the second most popular cryptcourrency in the world. In 2017 it posted very impressive growth rates. Between 2016 and 2017, the price of ethereum rose by more than 8,000%. This trend is expected to continue rising in 2018 and beyond. Ethereum allows Distributed Applications and smart contracts to be managed with no chances of fraud, interference, downtime or control by a third party.

Bitcoin blockchains record contracts that show how funds were moved from one wallet address to the other. Ethereum, on the other hand, expanded the concept by using scripting languages that are more complex. The smart contracts allow for the formation of complex applications with multiple uses. These features recently caught the attention of Toyota, Cisco, Samsung, and Microsoft.

3. Bitcoin Cash (BCH)

Based on market capping, this is the third largest digital currency in the world. This currency was launched in July 2017 so as to reduce the transaction time of bitcoins. There were so many bitcoin transactions at any given moment that resulted in delays.

In the 6 months following its launch, its price steadily rose and closed the year about 450% higher. Bitcoin Cash helped solve the scalability problem that existed with bitcoins. With a market capping of about $12,000,000, this is currency worth watching out for in 2018 and beyond.

4. Ripple (XRP)

Even though some people say that Ripple is not a digital currency, some view it as a cryptocurrency. This is the fourth largest digital currency in terms of market capping. What Ripple does is that it helps organizations, individuals and banks to send money across borders at a very small fee.

Ripple is set to grow bigger in 2018 following the adoption of its technology by Japanese banks, Bank of England, SBI Holdings and American Express. Ripple operates based on an Internet Protocol and an open source consensus ledger. The future prospects for Ripple are high as leading financial institutions have already implemented Ripple technology into their systems. As of December 2017, Ripple was selling at $0.9.

5. LiteCoin

Around 2011, a former Google employee, invented this digital currency. His main intention when he created this currency was to reduce the amount of time that was required when confirming transactions. He also intended to modify how bitcoins were being mined such that any interested person could participate. Unlike bitcoins which have a 21 million mining limit, 84 million LiteCoins will be created.

As of December 2017, about 55 million coins were already in circulation. In May 2017, Coin Base started using LiteCoins. Since then, the price of LiteCoins has continued to soar higher. In websites that accept payments through digital currencies, this is the second most acceptable option, and this makes it a very good asset to buy in 2018 and beyond.

6. Monero (XMR)

The creator of Monero remains anonymous to date, just like Satoshi Nakamoto. In 2017 alone, Monero experienced an increase in its price by more than 2,500%. When transacting with Monero, the details of the transactions are recorded on a ledger that can be accessed publicly. However, this information is obfuscated so as to ensure that it is not traceable.

This means that no one is able to connect the dots between the amount being transacted, the receiver or the sender. Anonymity is the key selling point for this cryptocurrency. As of December 2017, there were more than 20 million Monero in circulation. Unlike most digital currencies, its coin supply is not fixed. Monero stated recently that some famous stars including Dolly Parton and Lana Del Ray will be accepting Monero in 2018.