Predictions
I thought it'd be fun to make some predictions for the near future and beyond so I hope you enjoy my overview.
I would like to preface this by saying that there are two outcomes that 2018 could hold. In this blog post I'm going to talk about the positive outcome because I really just think it's more likely. The ball is in motion and it's going to take a lot to stop cryptocurrency. The other possibility is that we see a crash in the next few weeks and it keeps the crypto ecosystem depressed for another 3 months to a whole year.
Coins to nab this Christmas
That being said, every coin in the top 50 will likely appreciate in value in 2018. It's going to be glorious. The real question is which coins have the most upside. My personal belief is the money will be flying everywhere, you should really try to mitigate risk by investing in solid fundamentals though. Here are some coins I believe strike a good balance of upside and fundamentals.
Steem / SMTS: Okay listen. I am a little biased. But at $2.80 as of writing this post, it's still an amazing buy. I really think that the $10 steem is within reach for 2018. If SMTs see early adoption and the initial reviews are good, we could even see a gradual healthy pump into the $50+ range. The tech behind steem is some of the best in the game right now and with SMTs around the corner the low price will be very difficult to justify.
EOS: With 500ms confirmation time and smart contracts, it's easy to see why EOS has been getting so much buzz. The early work looks pretty promising and we all know Dan can deliver a solid product. Even at $8 I don't have too much issue suggesting this one. I think EOS will likely see the $100+ range as it approaches 1.0 release.
IOTA / BYTEBALL: It's interesting to group these together, but they makeup the major players right now in the DAG coin game. DAGs are very interesting because it's an alternate approach to scaling that actually improves and becomes faster with each transaction added to the DAG. IOTA's execution leaves a lot to be desired but overall I think their heart is in the right place. Byteball is really interesting too in that it has all the advantages of IOTA with no coordinator. It also supports confidential transactions that are done in a way that is significantly less cryptographically intensive. All it uses is hashing and emails on chain. Pretty interesting stuff.
Golem: Truebit is a verification protocol which allows for computationally expensive smart contracts to be computed off chain. This allows for massive scaling benefits. This technology has yet to be implemented into its own currency, but until then, golem is the next best thing. Golem is bringing to life the spirit of truebit by using its verification protocol. The software is still in alpha but I'm 100% sure this technology will be getting lots of attention as the scaling race heats up in 2018.
Monero / Zcash: As the demand rises for cryptocurrencies so will the demand for privacy. Especially as we begin the regulation era. Zcash and Monero are on the cutting edge of the confidential transaction technology right now and I don't see them going away in 2018.
Bitcoin: As much as we all love Bitcoin (yes you do, don't try to hide it), it's your mom's cryptocurrency. I believe that buying Bitcoin today could still double your money in 2018. While it may not have much upside, it's a very safe bet.
Coins to give to your bratty nephew
And just to say we did, why don't we enumerate some bad apples to avoid for 2018.
Tether: Listen, I don't have any solid evidence, but the writing is on the wall.
BitConnect: Another obvious choice. Cryptocurrency is already way to volatile for Warren Buffett, do you really need to add a ponzi on top?
Hope you enjoyed this article and let me know what you guys think are the best investments down below in the comments.