Bitcoin Forum

Hi guys,

I was wondering if it is dangerous to invest in new Altcoins? I mean, when you look at all the charts, every new coin launches pretty high, or it increases to a high peak and after that it decreases every time. Lots of altcoins are freefalling. So, the question is, are the lot of them a pure pump&dump scheme or a scam so the developer can cash in pretty big? I mean what is the point of all the altcoins when they don't "innovate" over the altcoins; i.e. NXT/QRK coins are indeed an innovation over BTC in the sense it has at least another encryption method.

Thanks for explaining,

I don't thank any coins are added to exchanges right after the start. Which means there is no set price. Which means you can request any price you want. DOGE was .0000005. then it went to 0.000002, now it's around  at the same place as it started on an exchange. But you could buy it cheaper. First people were mining millions of DOGE and surely some of them sold them quite cheap. I think it's always a good idea to buy into new coins.

Pump and dump

The Altcoins are designed to enrich the creator, plain and simple. BTC may have been designed for that purpose as well, but at least it was extremely innovative.

Many risk, high danger, high reward (or loss).

That said, a few coins of each alt sounds good. Some will go to the moon!!

My advice:  stay away from all shitcoins.   If you are going to play with them then consider it gambling and play accordingly.

In other words consider all money lost.

Shitcoins are for losers

Aye that seems right. Then I will be careful with how much I will invest in new coins. However, do you guys suggest to start mining new coins at the moment they are released? Think that is your best bet, right.

Thanks for the answers. I bought QRK and NXT, however, QRK is down from the initial value I bought them, however I could have cashed some NXT today (bought them 3 days ago when I was starting).

It looks like most of the alt coins track bitcoin, broadly speaking. One might wonder if any of the altcoins are designed to be more adoptable as currency than bitcoin (anybody old enough to remember betamax vs VHS will know what I'm talking about here) and would have a chance of passing up bitcoin in adoption over the long run. I really think it's way too early to tell, and that would make them unsafe (among other reasons that they might be).

That said, any kind of investment is a risk vs. reward proposition. You're not going to see big appreciation without big risk. People who want to be safe buy treasuries.

Watch enough blogs, news op-eds, etc. etc. (and yes, forums) and you'll hear that bitcoin is also a shitcoin in a lot of people's opinion. I don't pay a lot of attention to the debate because it's all unfounded opinion at this point - around 7 or 8 billion people in the world and they all have opinions about something, so they're pretty cheap.

Yes it is, buy bitcoins ;)

I don't invest in Altcoins.  I mine the new ones that show promise.  

New altcoins are very much dangerous to invest in seriously, when investing in altcoins it may be best to invest in something with a little history and with a dev team moving forward, if you had invested in doge before it was on an exchange there was high risk of the bottom falling out at any time and a person could have lost all of their investment, who is to say it was a pump and dump though? it is a meme coin, hilariously fun and not worth as an investment unless you enjoy the entertainment.
I currently collect Bernankoin and at a steady rate, although I am constantly reminded by the community that it began as a big joke much like doge, I like the joke, I like sending others BEK, I like the fact that it draws attention to the FED and how impossible it is to continue with unsound economic principles and remain independent, I like the fact that it is modeled like the current FED economics, no new innovations, no plans to improve beyond FED policy, I give it value because it is entertaining to me, that is the point of this coin, it has no value except we give it value.
Stablecoin makes some sense to people who are looking for decentralized coin options and anonymity, they have a dev team working towards their goals and a growing community, still an altcoin and still high risk.
Quark is using more security to secure it than bitcoin, has a dev team actively working toward their goals and a strong group of supporters, trading on many exchanges, bounty's to further its progress, still an altcoin and still a risk.
altcoins are a risk, high risk investment, but then bitcoin has been just that to some also, depending on individual investing targets.
Who can say which way either one of these coins can go? If a developer makes the wrong enemies in the community then obviously the coin is going to get bashed on, there is no one person ATM that can convince me completely that any single coin was built to be a pump and dump for the developers profit, I find some people holding large amounts of coins bashing others just to increase the value of their holdings moving forward, as bitcoin has been viewed as a threat to some currency's around the globe, altcoins have been viewed as a threat to bitcoin, which they may be, the joke coins could tarnish the image of altcoins, and altcoins could tarnish the image of bitcoin, and if you have any holdings then its most likely that you would like a positive light to shine on it to bring large investors to the table that would help stabilize your investment and bring growth, you do not want another altcoin to bring down your the value of your holdings, but I could wrap them all together and if one burns me i could view it as if they all carry the same risk and pull out altogether.
I guess i could ramble on and on but my point is this, altcoins are a risk, not to be viewed as a get rich quick program, you could lose alot of money as so many have, new innovations or not, your gambling

Pump and dump all of them

Hi Burnum. Yes I read a lot that altcoins are dangerous. I see the ridiculous rises and falls in the charts. Now this with QRK. I bought QRK, but then people said this Keiser report with Bill Still would be a pump before the dump. Seeing the charts, you actually see the dump. Today I woke up and booted the PC, saw that NXT had risen about 200%. I could cash out with a 4 times profit of my initial input. However, I chose to cash only my input and continue with still keeping the rest of the coins (seen the value of each coin quadripled). Next thing I noticed was that many people started to sell NXT. I watched the sales carefully and saw people just going lower and lower with their selling prices, unintentionally "dumping" the value of their coin.

Now you could say that the altcoins are just there for pump and dump, which could be partially true. However, every altcoins (even BTC) could be seen as a pump and dump, because of the crazy increases and decreases of their value. While the problem lies with the owners of the coins themselves. When they see the coin has risen in value, each of them gets the look of $_$ in their eyes and tries to sell an x amount of their coins. Because people buy the cheapest coin, everyone is going to lower their prices, yielding a decrease of the coin value.

Many of those alt-coins are made by programmers solely looking to get profit.
They changed the block award, block time, difficulty adjustment time, etc, randomly, and made a fancy name, but without a single new feature added. I see no values in those coins at all.

While it is probably a bad idea to invest in altcoins, they often have higher mining returns for people like me who have a spare gaming rig and rent-included electricity.  A week of Doge mining made the previous week of LTC look like a joke.

the higher the reward = the higher the risk

I think there are a few good alts out there at the moment - Anoncoin looks very promising and I have a stash of them waiting for the price to skyrocket.....

Oh really , and why would it skyrocket?
Any solid arguments?

Sorry, the ...... after skyrocket was meant to imply that I actually have no idea  :)

I was 99% sure of it , but i like to test people that believe every insertnameherescamcoin is the next big thing.

Sorry Mauerbrecher I am not sure about altcoins but I guess it’s a good time to invest in crypto-currencies as they are full of potential these days> I myself have invested large amount in bitcoins and yeah for sure I will research on altcoins too. If they seem good I shall invest myself and shall even inform you guys on this forum.

I almost bought NXT, its not easy trading altcoins, how can a person really know what is going to happen? With the Keiser report and the QRK pump and dump, it was hardly anything at all, also happens all the time with stocks in the same manner. Now bitcoin.. wow, someone is making alot of money when it drops and rises.

Unless you really believe in them its probably just better to pump and dump. Dogecoin is forever though.

I just started this bit coin thing. I never mined anything before. I did buy 6000 doge coins. Is this good or bad?

I dont believe in any other coin than bitcoin.

Look in the mirror, read the name on your coin aloud. Repeat.

Of course thats why I never put in money, just mine.

Well, of course it is dangerous to invest in altcoins. BUT, i also believe that  investing in new coins that offer innovations and have good marketing behind them are worth taking the risk. Also, if you can jump into the ship before the market cap of the coin is less that $1M you should be relatively safe.

The thing is that the market is currently very hot and people are willing to put huge amounts of money into it.

Yup

I don't feel that Doge hase a bright future ahead, but some were able to make a nice profit out of it  ::)

Yeah you wouldn't want to "invest" in alts especially new ones unless you thought it was going to do something really different and new from other coins. Other the more established coins probably have a shot at doing something for you. Look at btc, it did nothing for a while and took time to establish.

I'm a scrypt miner. Personally I just solo mine most new coins that has enough interests and will make it to an exchange for me to dump.

If your not a miner than I would suggest not buying straight into an altcoins.

NXT might be worth an investment, as the system is kinda different and there is also much buzz around NXT.
I see a big chance there..

Which altcoin has potential  to be the next star beside litecoin and namecoin?

Hey all, first post and I'm stuck here with you all, so bear with me on my ramblings.

Altcoins are just that, alternatives. I'm very new to this, but I'm pretty sure the people that happened to buy into BTC when it was $1200 are looking to diversify just a little now. Until there are more direct-exchange sites between each coin and USD/EUR, of course everything will be funneled through BTC and their values will be on a short leash. But what will happen when there is a user-friendly way to buy for example, DOGE?

On a side note, the ones who are really winning out from this phenomenon are hardware manufacturers. Their products suddenly turned into solid gold before their eyes.

For me personally, I'll be trying a few different cryptos to mine casually before I invest any cold hard cash, but we are forging the path for the future 'universal' net currency, whichever one it pans out to be, so enjoy the ride.

If you wanna do it long-term, better to stick with BTC

Here's what I've seen so far:

1.  Alt coins make entry into the crypto currency game more possible to those who otherwise couldn't afford larger coins.  It's much easier to get the alt coins and then convert them to other coins.

2.  Arguments saying that you should only go for bitcoin should be viewed skeptically.  These arguments may be from folks that have more interest in you going for bitcoin because they themselves are invested more into bitcoin.

3.  All crypto currency is developing.  Litecoin is starting to gain some ground on bitcoin in that some vendors are accepting it as currency.  There's a website that lists vendors and what coin they accept.  Google search for vendors that accept litecoin

So what I've seen is that crypto currency has as much value as what it can be used for.  For now, the value of altcoins is to trade and exchange for other coins that I may be able to use to purchase some other goods and services.

Also consider traditional world currencies.  Think about the regulatory bodies over these currencies: The World Bank and International Monetary Fund.  This is an important aspect of our lives because they have the affect of regulating currencies which in turn impacts big things like labor costs which affects unemployment which affects quality of life for many people.  Similarly, altcoins make achieving the bitcoin dream possible by giving crypto immigrants an opportunity. 

We aren't 'just' newbies, we are also the second wave or next generation of cyber laborers. 

This.

I agree, I GPU mine new altcoins and sell for Bitcoin when the price seems high after initial rise

Its always a good idea to dabble with new currencies because they will be very cheap to begin with so it wont really cost u much. Also some give away loads at the start like nxt. People were passing them around on request. So i think just holding on to them is the wisest thing to do. Especially when theyve cost u nothing.
Im trying to get a hold of nxt but everyone wants btc in exchange. Ugh!! If theres anyone willing to trade for cash (gbp) hit me up!...still a newbie but remember my name so people wont doubt me in the near future. lol

It's always fun to collect new alt coins. Maybe they will be worth something in the future, maybe not. Don't invest to much and have fun.  ;D

See it like a hobby, its fun to trade with em. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. Dont invest more than you can afford to lose..

It really depends on how much work and effort is put into the coin. You can almost tell which will fail and which will flourish. Just remember when investing time and money, if it seems too good to be true or it looks crappy, it most likely is.

be a collector of most of them since they'r generally easy to mine on their first days/weeks. and invest some more on the one that has a potential, you can tell by the development quality and from how the community approach to that coin.

Amd just turned profitable

95% of coins coming after BTC don't represent anything else, but an attempt to cash out on crypto currency gold rush. very few offer something new or have useful application. but even these represent a risky investment in conventional investment sense.
the best investment is to mine perspective coins at launch, when the difficulty is low.

I think it depends on whether you really BELIEVE in the altcoin for its unique characteristics, or if you just want to make a quick buck. Chances are if you feel one of those ways about it, many other feel that way too. If it's just to make a quick buck theres a good chance it will be a pump and dump that eventually fades away. If it actually brings something unique and new it has potential to be big, as all coins have much room for growth in the future, atleast in my opinion. Personally I am only seriously intrigued by Namecoin as a serious longterm altcoin, as the alternative .bit domains seems to me like it could have some serious benefits, especially as internet censorship becomes a larger problem as times moves on, bundled with some ease of access issues that should be fixed in the future. Just my opinion.

I wouldn't even put money into any altcoin unless it's been around for at least a month while able to hold a value. Before then you're better off mining it. Even with an old laptop I'm able to get a few hundred of these altcoins the first few days they come out.
Also you have to realize that in the long run a majority of these altcoins will be dead or near worthless if they haven't been able to prove their worth and importance, so like all coin trading, sell at peaks and buy back at dips. I wouldn't hold on to any of these unless you only spent a few hours mining thousands of them and don't care (like our doge friend).

NXT smells Ponzi scheme ...

If we're being honest most are just get rich quick attempts. Very few offer anything new or have any longterm goals or have any longevity. So yes, investing in altcoins can be a dangerous investment, but so can any other investments.

I would invest (very small amounts) on some of the coins, as sometimes some of them suddenly x10, but read about them, I think this is a quite interesting webpage to see which ones are scamcoins:
http://altcoins.com/scamcoins

Most coins are just pump and dump. Very selected few are worth the investment.

IMO the hype on DOGE now is terribly overrated.

You should always try to understand and try out things before investing in them.

There are a lot of faucets, and wallet is a free software, so just spend some time trying out each currency you are interested in.
By seeing the differences of all crypto you can choose the best ones.

Some things you can explore:

What is proof of work?
What is the difference between sha256 and scrypt?
How coins are mined?
Who are the developers?
Does the coin has a good marketing and dedicated community?

Doge is doing pretty well. It's because it's more accesible to the mainstream and it just seems less serious and techy, more fun. That's my guess.

There's also the idea that cryptocurrency is still, despite much publicity, a very new thing.

I will be interested to see how long the altcoins can sustain themselves once the 'dust settles' - if it ever does.

I am not sure as to whether BTC will eventually be the only true legitimate digital currency around or whether LTC and others will be able to survive.

There surely must eventually be some control over the number of currencies springing up. As someone posted above, altcoins are purely the product of programmers seeking to make a quick buck. The pump and dump nature of multiple-currency pools reflects this.

I think for Altcoin, it is ok to invest in small amount.  It is like buying the lottery.  If one of the altcoin goes up in the future, then you gain.

Sounds more like a risky investment than a lottery.

If you get in early enough, people will be giving it away for free. You could just ask, or maybe you could find some faucets. Or buy like a couple dollars worth instead of buying. I assume you'd wanna buy these altcoins to sell them at a higher price. Even if it's an obvious pump-and-dump, you can still make money by either dumping at the right time or buying after the value drops and selling if it goes back up.

It definitely is a very high risk investing in Altcoins, especially in new ones. However, on the other hand, there is also a slight first-movers advantage, and most likely you will be able to make a profit from them. Of course, this is also provided you selected the right one, considering that there were more than 10 new alt coins produced in the last 2 weeks alone.

I think it is worth a gamble on the ones that show some improvements. But the community around it is mainly what matters. But it is probably best to put any profits into BTC as a precaution and just let your original investment ride or fall. Many people just like to gamble on an exchnage purley on market movements not the fundementals or community support of a coin. More people are gamblers now than I have ever seen in my life.

Someone is about to release an altcoin generator. Next month we will have 1000 new coins. Including BitPopCoin

NXT its not pump and dump, it is very legit. Very skilled people behind it! :P

NXT seems promising other than that all is pump and dumb

newbie first post , just ignore me

Theres always a risk but yolloooo. Give some a go. eg doge?

Investing in btc is risky too, do whaeva you wanna.

Never risk more than you are willing to lose.

+1

Just follow the news, Nxt is launching decentralised asset exchange soon and then there will be a lot of noise. People will issue assets and there will be a lot of fees going to forgers (Nxt is not about mining or forging but people still don't get it, but will like the forging when the asset exchange is launched and buy more Nxt)

My view is invest and then sit on them but do not invest money / BTC that you are not willing to risk.  My friend told me about BTC when they were 7$ each and I thought "unregulated digital currency?  That looks risky" now I am kicking myself big time.

I say speculate to accumulate but be sensible about it.  ;)

Good luck to you.

I would rather play some bets directly.  ;)


The programmers may be skilled, but the coin can still be used for bump and dump.

Try to find the coins that offer something unique, else why would they have potential?

Pump and dump maxcoin today

I would stay with the 2nd gen. coins and not the clones of bitcoin.

Altcoin is profit able but don buy just 1 type buy a lot type and keep them raise sell :)

Id say, knowing what you are getting into is the most important. Don't let anybody tell you whatever. Make your own decisions and let others make theirs.

In my opinion, a lot of alts are made just for the fun and creating a new possibility of getting a pump and dump.

Exactly, even bitcoins are risky. It's worth a shot.

Well you can always try.. because earning smth from  BTC requires big investments :) if those altcoins rise huge profit.

everyday three four new coins are spring. Which one to invest? Most of the (90%) coins are not promoted by creators. I am not investing in any new coins.

Doge is just a litecoin clone with an adorable icon....
IMHO, it will stay for a while, but not forever...

Just based on the factor of sustainability, proof-of-work is is not energy efficient. For long term investment I am going with the new coins based on proof-of-stake (NXT and NEM).

Litecoin has a limit to the number of coins that can be mined. 84 million is that limit. dogecoin has no such limit.

Since the value is very very less for altcoins compare to bitcoin. even if you invest small amount you would get lot of altcoins, if it increases the value then you will get lot of profit, But if you invest in bitcoin the quantity is less but the profit also less,

if can pey the utility bills no one is going to stop u bat self

The higher the risk the higher the potential profit or loss  :P that my advise

doesn't matter..

as time goes doge will be mined more and more and more slowly generating less and less coins ;)

A little... jeje

@OP it's dangerous to invest in new alternative cryptocurrencies as everything

Buy btc, ignore the rest

It's really dangerous to invest on new altcoins with big amount  of premine. Might be better to invest on those innovative altcoin with no premine.

The greater the gamble, the higher the return.

yes it up to you

Not every creator pre-mines their own coins, those are the alts you should steer clear of.
2nd you should avoid buying instamined coins early because they are usually dumped to hell as soon as they hit an exchange.
Doge is an anomaly in that it is a piece of crap coin but ppl are still buying it.
It violates all the rules of being a good coin.

1. Instamine
2. High block rewards/hyper inflation
3. infinity coin production

Basically stay away from alts like doge

Better invest in genuine coins.;)

Not all Crypto currencies apart from Bitcoin are solely made in order to make the creator rich, thats a ridiculous statement for anyone to make. In anything in life once something is proven to work and it adopted by a significant number of people copies of it will be made. This isn't a bad thing it produces competition and advancements in any industry. Yes there are some coins out there that are somewhat unethical but there are definitely a lot carrying a great deal of credibility that can be useful as currencies as well as speculative investment opportunities. Its sorting out which ones are which that is the fun/profitable part ;) 

Stick with btc for now
Still a little too early to call the winners amongst other cryptos

I don't invest in Altcoins. It will always be risky

It is very very risky to invest in BRAND NEW alts. Litecoin is okay tho

Altcoins carrying a great deal of credibility?
Could you please name a few?

Innovation is a must for new altcoins, or it will have no chance to be bigger.

Yep, investing in any altcoin with limited or zero innovation is dangerous.

But investing in cryptocurrency with great innovation, such as Bitcoin, does not make you feel very safe either.

So always remember the investment golden rule:

"If you don’t fully understand it, don’t invest."  ;)

Any investment into a technical innovation is risky.

Probably an alt that is PoS will replace the energy wasting mining process of the early cryptos. No coin that blatantly wastes energy is going to be widely adopted but the concept of trustless decentralized digital currency is not going away.

That should tell you something about the potential this very dangerous investment.

if you were planning to invest some of the altcoin then go for the steady one though it failing a lil bit if you think its worth for investing then go on you can keep it and when you see that its increasing then trade it or sell it imidiately

Too many scamcoins, Try to get some info on d coin before investing

This is good advice. Our research team likes Litecoin, Goldcoin, and Dogecoin, for long-term holds. If BTC recovers over the coming months, these three coins could provide exponential returns.

Invest only in well established coins and try to avoid pre-mined pump-and-dumps which are floating around like flies these days.

99% of the Altcoin clones are Pump and Dump.

+1

Because so many people want their own coin. I wonder what will happen when BTC becomes mainstrezm - even more useless altcoins will be created.

a currency serves whatever purpose it's user's determine.

If you want it only to play pump and dump on a virtual stock market then that is it's use.

If no one uses it for anything then it dies.

Thus 99% percent of all altcoins die out in a few months from launch.

Well the chance of an alternative currency reaching the level of adoption of USD is exceedingly thin so it is to be expected that most attempts to do so will fail.

On the other hand, altcoins aren't a threat to btc being seen as legitimate by the public. The threat is the idea the general public has about the legitimacy and safety of using cryptocurrency in general, which is not solved by making out all altcoins to be a scam.

They don't distinguish between various cryptos. To them it's all fake money so going around talking shit about altcoins because you think they will detract from the value of your bitcoins isn't really helping your cause.

The very same features that make altcoins seem like a scam to certain holders of btc exist for btc and btc is therefore regarded as a scam by the general public. The argument that it is somehow "better" is not valid in any regard. It actually has a energy wasting feature that is not desirable that is not found in newer types of cryptocurrency.

Innovation is key, my friends! scrypt is about to be overtaken by ASICs, better switch to SHA3-like currencies!

By fail I meant, nobody mining or using them aside from the maker, his few friends and some fool who still believes it's not over. If an altcoin could gain the level of Litecoin, I'd consider it super successful.

Don't twist my words: I said 99% altcoins are crap. You see 100%-99%=1%. That's the percent of all legitimate coins that exist and still function comparing to all those created.

I'm only talking crap about altcoins due to the fact that the majority (90-99%) are poor copies of either Litecoin or Bitcoin. Most of them offer no benefit except for the maker: the possibility of him becoming rich if his coin managed to stand the tests of the community. Look around: coins are being created every day, yet only a few actually are being used.

Regarding the fact they will detract from Bitcoin: not really, it didn't even cross my mind that one of those failures could ever influence Bitcoin in any way. Aside from those, any useful coins that introduce new functional features are welcome and some healthy rivalry is always a good thing.

Most people feel this way about bitcoin in regard to USD. Would you still be interested in cryptocurrency despite this fact?

If so, well...

well, I guess you deleted your response

lol

It's not dangerous. It's foolish, but you won't get hurt. You will simply loose your money.

Despite the fact that USD is more widely used than Bitcoin? Well, yeah, I am know. Bitcoin offers innovation as compared to the dollar such as semi-anonymous electronic payments, decentralization and low fee transactions comparing to banks. While 99% (not all of them) of altcoins offer tweaked versions of Bitcoin or Litecoin without any useful features and often premined.

Who did what now?

so they are all the same, except for the waste of energy caused by PoW mining

you are just repeating slogans, not thinking

Well, those that use other methods of securing the blockchain and succeed in it are the 1%. However, I'm talking about all those coins created every day almost identical to each other, made to bring profit to the owner.

I can agree with that.

If you have a little time to buy and hold, I think these will be the top three coins in a few years: BTC, GLD, and LTC.

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I invest most of my "investment" money into Bitcoin. However, I also put a small percentage into ALTcoins each month. I figure it is worth the bet. Some may win, some may lose. I have a mindset that I will lose it all, and then I am not too fussed if they do in fact lose.

I must admit it is fun, and i really enjoy it. You only need one to take off and it will pay off huge! Risky and fun, thats why you should only invest a small amount if any.

The future looks like a lot of fun!!