What is Litecoin (LTC)?

Future of LTC Cryptocurrency and know how to buy LTC

#1 - What is Litecoin?

Litecoin: The Basics

The silver to Bitcoin’s gold, Litecoin is an open-sourced digital currency, blockchain based cryptocurrency, which allows nearly zero-cost payments all over the world.

It is fully decentralized. Litecoin ensures that all transactions not confined to a single server, and are available to everyone. Every information is stored in the ledgers and cannot be deleted or modified.

It was created by a Google employee, Charlie Lee. After a few failed at attempting to create cryptocurrencies, Lee came up with Litecoin, designing it to be a better version of Bitcoin.

It is dubbed the silver cryptocurrency, as compared to Bitcoin being the gold, due to its availability and lower prices.

#2 - What are the Benefits of Litecoin?

Litecoin was created very similar to Bitcoin. Its underlying technology is based on the proof-of-work model. Litecoin mining is the process by which one can obtain Litecoins, using their computers to secure the Litecoin network. Litecoin mining involves the use of adding blocks to its blockchain. The LTC miner who first verifies a block earns a certain number of Litecoins, which is reduced as the mining continues. However, it used the Scrypt algorithm in its Proof-of-Work model, ensuring a quicker and safer transaction. The transactional fee is reduced as well, making transactions cheaper than those using Bitcoin.

Transactional Process:

Litecoin works by peer-to-peer connections. It removes the need of a middleman, and eliminates the transactional costs. As compared to Bitcoin, its transactions take lesser time, and are safer. Since the transaction fee is much reduced, they are also cheaper.

Since the transaction fee is much reduced, they are also cheaper. As it is based on the decentralized blockchain technology, it ensures that the information is distributed to all, and not confined to singular database. It also records every information, storing it permanently.

Litecoin Value Proposition:

Litecoin, as compared to Bitcoin, offers a faster and safer method for transactions, which is as quick as sending a text message.

Since the transaction fees is much less as compared to other major cryptocurrencies, transactions using Litecoin are much cheaper.

#3 - How to Buy and Store Litecoin?

How to buy Litecoin/How to purchase LTC

Other than mining, Litecoin can be bought using fiat currency on exchanges like Binance. It is most often exchanged with other cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, etc, on exchanges such as Bittrex, Cryptopia, OKEx, and more. You can buy Litecoin with Bitcoin from CoinSwitch at the best rate. CoinSwitch, best cryptocurrency trading platform is one of the ideal portals to exchange cryptocurrencies, as it allows the user to view many exchange rates, and select the best amongst them. It also allows for the cryptocurrencies to be stores in the user’s own Litecoin wallet, so should any exchange go down, your coins will still be available to you. Litecoin, due to its similarity with Bitcoin, can be stored in all major wallets, who’ve supported it across the board. There are plenty of Litecoin wallets, such as a desktop LTC wallet (Electrum LTC), hardware wallets, which are in a USB Style (such as Trezor), and even paper wallets. Android and iPhone wallets like Jaxx and Loafwallet can also be used for storing Litecoins. However, it is advised to not store large amounts of the cryptocurrency on mobile wallets.

Also Read: Complete Analysis of Litecoin | Live Litecoin (LTC) Price Charts & Predictions

#4 - What is the future of Litecoin?

Though Litecoin has been around for a while now, its importance has not diminished. Litecoin value remains high in the favour of markets, and due to its simplicity, it has quite a lot of potential for changes, such as the introduction of Smart Contracts, which will make it all the more useful. According to Bitdegree, it is the fifth largest cryptocurrency, with a market cap of over $12 billion dollars. Neither do you need to worry about Litecoins flooding the market nor Litecoin value decreasing, as only a total number of 84 million coins can be mined. The Litecoin cryptocurrency has grown in the past years, and even though it has faced some lows in the market, it continues to be one of the major cryptocurrencies. It went from a low of $4 in March 2017 to a high of $320 in less than a year, delivering 80x returns for its investors.

Support & Regulation

By ensuring quick and safe transactions, with almost zero transaction cost, the Litecoin cryptocurrency can be of much use to corporations and individuals alike. According to Smartereum, Litecoin is accepted by merchants such as Sean’s Outpost for donations, and even by Benz and Beamer to buy cars.[1] According to Coinjournal[2], Swiss Bank, in August 2017, added support for Litecoin amongst other digital currencies. According to cryptorecorder, Litecoin has partnered with a bank in Germany as well.[3]

#5 - How is Litecoin different from other cryptocurrencies?

Litecoin was built based on Bitcoin. But Charlie Lee, used the Scrypt algorithm in its Proof-of-Work Model, making it a faster and safer cryptocurrency, and also more accessible to an LTC miner who may not own high-performance machines. As compared to other major cryptocurrencies, Litecoin offers lowered transaction fees, making it a more economic choice for transactions. As it is quite similar to Bitcoin, all major wallets can be used to store Litecoin.

#6 - Should you invest in Litecoin?

Litecoin is among the older and more stable cryptocurrencies in the market. Investors looking to enter Litecoin typically see the returns from the investment in both immediate and long-term, as Litecoin is the choice of cryptocurrency amongst those who perform a lot of transactions and wish to save on transaction costs. This means both new users will adopt it, while the long term future also looks bright.

Litecoin technology is also very likely to incorporate newer features in the future, while keeping its original benefits, and could soon be used by large corporations for transactions. Having fallen from its high of $320 in early 2018, the Litecoin cryptocurrency is looking to be a tempting buy for many investors. Having said that, there is a section of the market that argues that other coins - such as Ethereum - serve the same purpose, and offer more features. But would they succeed as much? Do your research!