As an investor, if you’ve gone beyond Bitcoin and the major altcoins in your research, then you’ve probably heard of Lisk. I hope you’ve given this project a closer look though, because it’s actually quite an interesting one that looks like it could really take off in the future - for several reasons.

Those of you who have been in the market for longer will remember the time when the project NEO was often called the “Chinese Ethereum” because it set out to do what Ethereum was doing (though it has pivoted away from that slightly).

It’s now a “Smart Economy” focused project, but it still has the fundamental features that originally drew the comparison to Ethereum, namely encouraging developers to utilize the extensive toolkits to develop dapps for the ecosystem (which includes infrastructure development and DeFi.) The comparison and subsequent analysis of the project shot the price of NEO up - even if you didn’t sell at the ATH, the ROI is fantastic.

NEO's ROI has been phenomenal.

I like to think of Lisk as the “European Ethereum” (yes, yes, I know there are many bigger projects out there but hear me out).

Lisk was started in 2016 by Max Kordek and Oliver Beddows. Based in Zug, Switzerland (known as “crypto valley”), the project is strictly focused on blockchain applications, which runs on its sidechains. One of the most important aspects of the Lisk network is that its SDKs are written in the most popular programming language in the world, JavaScript. The key features are user experience, developer support, in-depth documentation and the Lisk Academy - all of which are very important for development to get going, a critical step for DApp ecosystems.

Being in the heart of Europe’s blockchain scene, Lisk has an immense amount of potential to form strong bonds with enterprise entities and smaller companies that want to leverage the strengths of blockchain technology.

But there are some specific reasons as to why Lisk can do really well.

1. Lisk has a LARGE audience

Lisk's annual event, Lisk.js.

A lot of people have been paying attention to Lisk and there is proof on how much of an audience they have with their Lisk events. The Lisk.js event is probably their biggest event, held annually in Berlin, and brings together all sorts of people who celebrate development and research efforts.

Both hardcore community engagement via social channels and more general awareness is also spreading. But the key thing here is community development - many community members are looking into their own development initiatives, like an Incognito mode that offers privacy. This is the kind of give and take that a blockchain project should have. The more users put into it, the more they get out of it (and it benefits everybody.)

Quite a few followers for an altcoin.

With nearly 3 million transactions performed since its launch, Lisk also has consistently been improving the technicals of its network to support more users.

2. Lisk has over $50M in reserves to fund their development for years ahead

Lisk's January 2020 financial report.

Another thing I really like about Lisk is the fact that the team is extremely transparent, frequently releasing financial reports that give a clear picture of the development capital of the project (which unfortunately doesn’t happen enough in the space.)

The most recent financial report of January 2020 shows us how much there is in both fiat and crypto funds. There is over 2.1 million in Swiss Francs and 4.5 million Euros in fiat assets, and more importantly, 1 million CHF in managed funds.

Even better is the fact that they clearly state where expenditures have gone, which for the most part is development, market, bounties and sponsorships, and operations. Looking at earlier reports, expenditures usually vary from 400,000 - 600,000 CHF, which shows that they carefully budgeted the use of their funds.

Having funds in reserve like this and judiciously using it is important in the crypto space, for when winter comes, projects suffer as their crypto assets grow thinner. This is smart resource allocation by the team.

Development usually accounts for the biggest expenditures and speaking of which...

3. Crazy development happening behind the curtains (Lisk ranks 2nd for Commits in the last 9 months)

Lisk is 2nd in terms of GitHub commits over the 9 months. Source.

...Lisk is doing a fantastic job with its development. One of the most appealing things about Lisk is the fact that its team has consistently hit its development milestones, which has been laid out efficiently as well. Since its launch, the team has added feature after feature and made refinement after refinement, which in my opinion partially explains the better than average performance.

The Lisk roadmap clearly shows what the team has done and ongoing tasks. The proof of their work ethic is in the GitHub commits, they rank 2nd when it comes to most commits in the past 9 months, behind only enterprise platform Insolar. The most notable of recent milestones is the introduction of block rewards for delegates, the addition of block finality and a peer selection and banning mechanism.

I have to mention the launch of Lisk Betanet 3.0.0, which was released just a few days ago,

The team says that this concludes the security and reliability phase, but it helps to know the specifics of this change. The block finality and peer selection and banning mechanism were introduced with this new version. The latter is especially important as it allows “Lisk peer-to-peer network to scale to an unlimited number of nodes and increases the robustness of the network and individual nodes.”

Just as important is the block finality, because it is a major security improvement. This prevents blocks from ever being reverted after a certain amount of time and the team says it is critical for Lisk sidechains.

Additionally, the team has released plans for future versions of Lisk SDKs after having changed roadmap priorities. This is so that development will be expedited. Currently, they are working on the Lisk SDK version 4.0.0, which focuses on network economics and consensus. This will bring both dynamic fees and a Delegated PoS consensus algorithm. Developers who are interested in knowing what changes have been made and what they can do now can read the documentation.

For proof that money is in fact where the mouths are, take a look at the development activity (the lull is because of the Christmas holidays):

Development activity? Check.

Consistently good.

Lisk is Massively Underrated Today

The LSK token's price chart.

Current prices for Lisk are at roughly $1.85, with a market cap of about $225 million. Before the recent rise of the market, the value of the LSK token was $0.60. It has actually been one of the better performing assets of 2020, regardless of the recent surge in prices. At its peak 2020 value, LSK actually went up about 200%! This is the best performance since late 2017/early 2018.

I believe that this is due to the fact that investors have taken a good look at the value proposition of Lisk and agreed that it is a solid investment. And in the long run, the 200% rise seems like just a blip before much bigger gains arrive. There is plenty of room between now and the all-time high of $39.31.

The strict focus on getting developers on board so that they can flesh out the ecosystem, for the benefit of everyone, and the ties and active engagement with local entities in Europe make Lisk one of the go-to projects in the long run - or the Ethereum of Europe as I like to call it.

Who knows what price LSK might reach, but if development continues as it is, then it is very possible that Lisk will cement itself in the blockchain space as a go to platform for blockchain development. Without a doubt, Lisk is one of the most solid altcoins around.