Litecoin’s popularity is rapidly growing, with many people favouring it as an alternative to Bitcoin. So, it is important to know what to expect from this virtual currency in the coming year ahead. Charlie Lee , the founder of Litecoin, tweeted earlier on in the year;“The Litecoin team has been hard at work working with companies to support Litecoin. Nothing to announce yet, but here’s what’s in the works: Merchant processor, popular online wallet, goods trading platform, one huge unexpected surprise…2018 will be a good year for Litecoin!” The goods trading platform that Lee was referring to was Open Bazaar, which is a peer to peer online commerce platform with zero fees. It is unclear yet what the unexpected surprise is. People have been speculating that it might have something to do with Facebook or Amazon, although Lee has never confirmed this. Despite Lee recently admitting that he had in fact sold all of his Litecoins, experts do believe that there is still big things to come from this virtual currency. Any changes that Bitcoin will see throughout the year, Litecoin will too; but, thanks to the fact that Litecoin is a much smaller project than Bitcoin, it is likely that these changes and improvements will happen much quicker.Among the most important developments that we are set to see over the course of the year, are the Lightning Network and the Atomic Swaps. The Lightning Network will ensure that Litecoin becomes the fast, easy to use coin that is also affordable, and the Atomic Swap will easily let you transfer your Litecoin into Bitcoin. Another development set to benefit Litecoin is MAST, which will allow complex smart contracts to be created on the Litecoin blockchain. Covenants will add a layer of security to Litecoin, and allow users to build vaults and coloured coins, which will allow your Litecoins to be attached to an asset, which could then result in ICO’s being created on the Litecoin network, although these are unlikely to be seen until next year. Because of all the developments that have been set for Litecoin, experts are expecting the popularity of this coin to rise rapidly this year.