Here Are Bitcoin’s Six Closest Rivals
Although there is growing number of warnings about investing in digital money, Bitcoin mania keeps rising and its competitors also gaining interest. Bitcoin jumped more than 1,700 per cent last December, testing the mark of $20,000.
Many finacial experts say cryptocurrencies provide a digital alternative to government-issued fiat currencies and can be used in online marketplaces to buy everything from a pizza to plane tickets to cyber pets.
The 6 closest rivals of Bitcoin
At present, there are many crypto-currencies which are still not as popular and can be bought owing to their affordability.
1) Ripple (XRP)
Ripple was created in 2013 and has surged more than 53% surpassing Ethereum. According to a Bloomberg report it took the title of the world’s second-most valuable digital coin by market cap. The market value of digital asset rocketed to 86 $ billion leaving the Ether to 3rd place by 73 $ billion.
Currently, Bitcoin’s market cap is about USD 250 billion.
Ripple is officially known as XRP. It has far outpaced the gains of both Ether and Bitcoin, which have raised respectively 9,000 % and 1,400 % .
2) Ethereum
Currently, Ether is the 3-rd largest cryptocurrency by market cap with over 73 $ billion. The virtual coin was launched in 2014 with the goal of creating smarter blockchain system. Its price is over $700.
Both Ethereum and Ripple have seen stunning rallies this year, but both are in the early stages of their experiments, many analysts said.
The difference between Ethereum and Bitcoin is in application: Ether is an open, decentralized platform, which is used to pay services and transaction fees.
3) Litecoin (LTC)
Litecoin is another digital coin, known as an alternative to Bitcoin.
Litecoin has been called the silver to Bitcoin’s gold, that is, a slightly cheaper, more readily available option.
Litecoin’s market capitalization rose to $4,6 billion from $1 billion in November 2013. Despite Bitcoin, which creator is an unknown person Satoshi Nakamoto, the creator of Litecoin is a popular on social media called Charles Lee.
4) Verge (XVG)
Verge uses multiple anonymity-centric networks such as Tor and 12P. The IP addresses of the users are obfuscated and the transactions are completely untraceable. Price of one Verge is around $0.1583 on Saturday while the total market cap is over $2.2 billion.
5) Zcash (ZEC)
Zcash is the first open cryptocurrency without permission, which supports the privacy of transactions using zero-knowledge cryptography. The price of Zcash is nearly $520.
Recently, Zcash became the third digital currency to receive the backing of the Bitcoin Investment Trust and the Ethereum Classic Investment Trust.
6) Dash
Another cryptocurrency, that is designed to make transactions fast, cheap and private is Dash. The digital coin is up 8,000% since January of 2017, approximately six times the rise of Bitcoin.
