[Altcoin Investment Ideas]

Altcoin Investment Ideas


please share Altcoin Investment Ideas,
with arguments only.

Posts with no reasoning can be removed.

http://alt19.com
Altcoin all-in-one page. For my personal use since 2013, probably will be helpful also to someone.
A lot of data, archived and real-time, may be delayed a little, "as is".

Now altcoin market indicators added: Altcoin advance/decline ratio etc.

Also prices of BTC and LTC in China converted to $.

Moved to https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1508480.0

The 19 significant coins required for the ALT19 Index are…

1. LTC
2. DOGE
3. NXT
4. NMC
5. DASH
6. PPC…

Other blue chips significant coins? Which to select?
ETH? XMR? DGB?
BLK? QRK? VTC? XPM?
Old and good WDC, IFC, FTC?


Thank you!

[True decentralization is in diversity of cryptocurrency.]

The rise of Litecoin demonstrates pretty well that Bitcoin is not the only ruler or the only driver of crypto world.
How about other coins?

An year ago POS coins were popular. Now anonymous coins are trendy.
Devs are working hard to implement true anonymity features and to bring their coins to the mainstream.
Unfortunately both POS and true anonymity coins are less decentralized than POW.
About POS you probably know, but why anon coins are bad for decentralization?

When you buy online, you anyway leave your delivery information, thus it doesn't matter how anonymously you pay in this case.
In fact true anonymity is good for illegal things mostly (scams or violence).
Government will fight anon coins, and it will hurt other cryptocurrencies.
Anon coins will not get wide adoption because the masses don't like "spy games" and don't like to risk by being involved in something illegal or suspicious.
Even if government can not regulate or destroy anon coins, they still may tell people that these coins are both immoral and illegal.
If government tries to ban coins with transparent transactions, people don't approve that, but if government tries to ban anon coins, 90% of people will agree with government.
Government can say that anon coins are bad, but after all it is nonsense to say that coins with transparent transactions over long term can be used to trade illegal things or finance any violence.
Transparency is one of the most important features of decentralization.

Thus anon coins cannot be the decentralized solution: they never will get wide adoption, their capital will be concentrated a lot, investors will avoid them.
Transparency is a very important thing. Cryptocurrency doesn't mean anarchy or dissoluteness, cryptocurrency refers to a fairer world.
We have nothing to hide, we just know that cryptocurrency is fair and moral, let's keep this and people will never say that we stealthily want to do something bad with crypto.

Satoshi's POW idea is simple and ingenious. It will work over long term. Merged mining and mining contracts will help.

But you know that Bitcoin is not 100% decentralized.
Early adopters, some unfairness of distribution (who knew about BTC in 2009-2012? IT workers and almost nobody else) and concentration of capital.
BTC can be attacked: price manipulations, possible ban or very strict regulation for exchanges and other BTC businesses, hackers' attacks.
BTC reputation can be attacked also, and we see how it is being attacked now: ask people who know about BTC but don't buy it and 90% would say BTC is HYIP  (but we know that it is not true of course).
But the most sensitive targets are BTC related websites: Coinbase, Bitcoin.org, Blockchain.info, Bitcointalk, exchanges…

While BTC market cap is so high in comparison with other cryptos, while cryptocurrency means BTC, a successful attack against BTC can destroy people's trust.

How about limitations of technology? Be it issues with block size, with the speed of transactions, or with synchronizing a wallet?
Yes, there are lite versions and online wallets, and "0 confirmations", but all these solutions are less decentralized again.
It seems Satoshi Nakamoto didn't mean that Bitcoin would be the only one solution of decentralization in digital economy. He was speaking of "several years" of BTC leadership.

True decentralization is in diversity of cryptocurrency.

There is one problem.
You know how people are bashing altcoins now. Even Litecoin or Dogecoin with its large community are being called garbage, clones. To say nothing of other coins.

This way of thinking affects decentralization more than any government control or regulation.

Are crypto innovations are so important indeed?  Do traditional currencies differ so much due to technical features or they all are printed, protected against forgery, and have different names and logos?

One important thing about altcoin market that it is not similar to stock market. Coins are not stocks, coins are currencies. So there are no penny stocks, no bankruptcy, no dividends. Things that matter: inflation (deflation), price fluctuations, liquidity, a number of users who use and trust this currency, name, security, usability and what you can buy or sell with it. But if somebody tells you: we have BTC, we have LTC, why do we need DOGE or other coins, that is not correct. There are many traditional currencies, not only dollar and euro. There are precious metals and stones, not only gold and silver. Diversity. Many nations. Many ideas. A lot of people. We all have pretty similar DNA and consciousness but it doesn't mean we all are simple clones of each other. Currencies (coins) are quite similar, too, the same technology often, but the spirit of their community, name, fortune and history make them all different.

Let's say, improvement is always good. But does it mean that we need new and new coins to provide decentralization?

No, launching a new coin is not decentralization-friendly in fact. Why?
Just imagine there is a good talented dev (not scammer). He would want to launch a new and cool project.
He would need to run a website (thus not decentralized), he would need to promote, to create community, to run network (again not decentralized) and provide market liquidity.
Anyway first adopters will be his friends. It is not decentralized either.

Forget about new coins, there is another way, good and decentralized at the same time: devs can just choose one from 200-300 old abandoned coins with community (even small or inactive one), and to develop it, to revive, to fork, to swap coins to completely new blockchain, even to rename it, if community approves it.
Cryptsy doesn't delist old coins as they wait for somebody who will develop them. Many prefer Bittrex or Poloniex, but it looks like Cryptsy still has more users than Bittrex and Poloniex together.

This way would be more moral,  launching a new coin always hurts crypto market because it dilutes market, other way round developing an old coin helps investors who probably earlier had invested even more that they could afford to lose in "new and cool" projects. They would be thankful to that talented dev who would bring a coin to life again. A dev could also buy a coin on exchange and get a good motivation to work.

Speaking of decentralization, the solution can be 200-300 developed old coins (similar to the number of traditional currencies in circulation) with merged mining and mining contracts (and long term derivatives) which would balance the market and mining profitability. That would be hard to attack them all, and people will be more free in selecting a coin. They could choose one with the name they like, with community they like, with other features to prefer.

True decentralization is in diversity, not in monopoly, nor in anarchy.

[B+ L++ DO? N+ O+ R- AN?]

Many Bitcointalk users have their own vision, their own views, opinions on crypto market.      
Can you make it more simple and share your view with this simple coding system:      

Bitcoin   B   
Litecoin   L   
Dogecoin   DO
Dash           DA
Ripple     R         
Nxt           N          
Altcoins in general   A   
Old coins                   O   
Anonymous coins           AN
My altcoin (your picks)   M
      
very good   ++   
good   +   
bad   -   
very bad   --   
not sure   ?   
have no idea   ??   
      
An example:            
B+ L++ DO? N+ O+ R- AN?    
that refers to:
'I believe that Bitcoin is good, Litecoin is very good, about Dogecoin I'm not sure, Nxt is good, old altcoins are good, Ripple is bad, not sure about true anonymity coins'.
      
If you like this idea, post your own code (your market view) like described above.      

The idea is that first altcoins with bright names can be seen as collectables is indisputable.

But nigerian stamps are also collectables and rare but not very valuable. How about altcoins?
Let's compare the features.

Nigerian stamps:
1. don't have name (theme only)
2. not liquid
3. only for stamp lovers
4. boring to discuss with non collectors
5. if you are a large holder of nigerian stamps you feel you are oddball in eyes of other people
6. country-linked
7. you can not buy anything for nigerian stamps
8. not instant delivery
9. not hi-tech
10. can not be mined
11. other limitations due to physical nature
12. not universal gift
13. very specific and exotic thing to trade
14. cannot be developed later
15. no movement, no drive, no idea.

Altcoins:
1. have name ('brand recognition')
2. liquid (to some degree though)
3. money assosiation and people love money (can attract attention of many)
4. can be discussed with friends
5. if you a large holder of crypto you feel like a whale (oligarch), vanity fair
6. global
7. you can buy goods and services with altcoins (to some degree though)
8. instant delivery
9. high-tech (crypto technology is innovative, be it Bitcoin or Bitcoin Version Number 1000).
10. can be mined
11. advantages of virtual nature but can be converted to physical paper wallets at the same time
12. universal gift
13. traded on the same exchanges with liquid and high estimated assets
14. can be developed later
15. movement, drive, decentralized economy idea.

Other features that differ?

If you have read these topics  https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1089664.0  https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1092079.0 ,
you know there are some arguments that a rise of Litecoin refers to the up trend of altcoin market.

If you read comments, it will seem some people believe that LTC is just "uninnovative", "uninteresting" etc, even that it is "pump and dump" coin.
Okay, let's not argue. If people believe in something, it is an idea that affects inverstor's sentiment and a price.
But LTC price has doubled since May.

[Note:]

Will the LTC price hit $3 this summer?

We'll use altcoin wide market indices to try to predict LTC price.
 
Let's compare daily charts of LTC/USD (Litecoin, btc-e) and ALT100 index (BTC value).
ALT100 Index is a wide market index (based on value of 100 coins, being traded on Cryptsy).

There are three evident divergences, and all three successfully have predicted LTC price earlier.



Now LTC long term trend is still down, but wide market index ALT100 trend is already up.
In 3 previous similar cases of 2015, LTC has followed ALT100 (a chart).

Let's predict that LTC will hit $3 this summer.

Note: there may be another divergence later which would signal to sell LTC.
But now strong BUY (BUY signal has appeared in May when LTC price was flat $1.5, see a chart).

1. Some old abandoned but bright coins (with market cap less than 100,000 usd or less than 10,000) are being revived now, not fast.
2. To have a strong motivation to develop a coin their devs need to have pretty large their own share in it. So they need to buy their stake first.
3. But buying a large amount of these pretty unliquid coins is not quite simple task, especially if you want to buy them cheap.
4. Devs understand that even small development of low cap coin will throw up its price dramatically.
5. So they have a choice: to continue slow accumulation at low price levels (not fast) or to start active developing (and forget about buying cheap).

In my opinion it's normal that devs want to be awarded for their work and want to buy some coins before active development stage.
We see quiet accumulation in many low-cap coins all last year long.
But how to decide where is a final point? When to stop 'to have' and start 'to be'?

What do you think? When will a final countdown begin?

NEW!
15minute, 1hour, 1day interval CSV price history.
Cryptocurrency quotes. Altcoin market indexes. Charts.
http://alt19.com

[1. 'infrastructure' theory]

Now in altcoin 'economic theory' or, it's better to say, in 'altcoin community consciousness' (the set of shared beliefs, ideas and moral attitudes which operate as a unifying force within community)
there are two main concepts of what altcoins must have to grow in value in a long-term perspective.
Of course, everyone will agree that a responsible development team and altcoins listing on main exchanges are very important,
but if that's ok, what else?

1. 'infrastructure' theory
A good altcoin must have good infrastructure (growing around altcoin services).

2. 'innovation' theory
A good altcoin must have new innovative features and provide better maintenance (first of all,  as a payment method for goods and services)

Let's add one more theory.

3. the concept 'nomen est omen'
3.1. A good coin must have a bright name, an idea, a memorable trade history, to be a meme.
3.2. The earlier the release date, the better.

Why?

The first altcoins with bright, memorable names and/or dramatical trade history are like collectibles.
Investments in collectibles grow in value in a long-term perspective.

You can add an infrastructure, you can add innovative features - to any coin, theoretically, but you cannot change the past,
you cannot change the history that is in price logs and in a people's memory.

Thanks for reading. Have a good day everyone!

[ALT19 index]

This thread is to promote indices for altcoins (like Dow Jones and SP500 for traditional stock market)

Why using indices:
1) easy to estimate market trends on the whole
2) stability
3) say 'no' to more and more new coins which are destroying altcoins market idea. Using Indexes means dealing only with fixed number of coins included.

There are ALT19 index (19 cryptocoins included, values are in BTC) and ALT100 index (100 cryptocoins included, values are in USD).
alt19.com/marketindexes.html
If you know any other altcoin market indexes, post it here, please.

Crypto coins price percentage change: day, week, month... Also volumes, capitalisations (hard limit), USD values... The table is sortable. Enjoy!
http://alt19.com/19/cryptocurrency.php