No stranger to strange milestones, the cryptocurrency sector may soon see a historic first, one that could upend long-held perceptions of its market.
Branded 'The Flippening' by market observers, this new hypothetical is defined loosely as the point at which a competing blockchain network could replace bitcoin as the largest and best capitalized blockchain. Sparked by increasing inflows in cryptographic assets, the concept has already seen a dedicated hashtag and website.
Given that bitcoin invented and popularized blockchain systems, the development could herald a time of new diversity and experimentation for the nascent sector that, until recently, was largely defined in context of bitcoin.
At earlier points in 2017, bitcoin accounted for more than 80% of the total cryptocurrency market share, though this figure has been higher than 90% at times.
However, so-called alternative cryptocurrencies have drawn robust inflows this year, causing their total market cap to reach a record high of roughly $117m today, a more than 500% year-to-date increase, according to CoinMarketCap.
Read more: http://www.coindesk.com/flippening-will-ether-pass-bitcoin-will-mean/
