CoinGecko is a great resource if you are looking for a high-level overview of the crypto market, or needing more specific information about a particular project. Whether you are curious about a project's market cap, recent price action, or how to trade it, CoinGecko is a tool that will serve you well.
Total Market Value
The first data point that may interest you is the total cryptocurrency market capitalization (market cap), which is located at the top of the page. This number is calculated by summing up the market caps of every cryptocurrency (crypto) listed by Goingecko. If the number is positive and green, that means that overall market sentiment is good.
By the way, the market cap of a crypto is calculated by multiplying its circulating supply with its current market price. The fully diluted market cap of a crypto is a future projection, and is calculated by multiplying its maximum supply with its current market price.
Bitcoin Dominance
Along the top of the page you will also find the current Bitcoin (BTC) dominance. This percentage point indicates what share of the entire marketplace is made up of Bitcoin, and what remaining percentage is made up of alternative cryptocurrencies. This is a good signal to keep an eye on to see if Bitcoin is gaining in popularity, or losing ground to competitors.
Price Performance
You may want to check which cryptos have increased most against the dollar today. You can do this by clicking the arrow beside the 24h table header. Click it again, and you will see which cryptos have fallen in value the most. By default, only the top 100 cryptos are listed on the main page.
The first thing you may want to examine about a crypto project is its recent price history, which you can do by clicking on it from the list. You can see how the token has performed against the dollar over the past 24 hours, 7 days, month, etc.
By the way, if a crypto's price has recently skyrocketed, my advice would be to avoid trading it until the market has calmed down a bit. On the other hand, if the price has recently crashed, it could be a good buying opportunity.
Current and Maximum Supply
The other data points that you should consider are the project's current supply and maximum supply. The crypto's current supply is the number of available coins that could be bought and sold on the market right now. The maximum supply is a future projection, and indicates how many coins will be on the market after they have been completely distributed to all participants.
Checking these numbers will give you a good idea of how much inflation to expect in the future. Whether the gap between current and max supply is high or low, you should look further into the project's tokenomics to see how the token supply has been distributed among the team, early investors, and the community.
Available Markets
If this particular crypto has managed to capture your attention, the next tidbit of information you probably want is how to get it. Click on the Markets tab and you will see a list of centralized (and possibly decentralized) exchanges where the crypto can be traded.
Finally, you can often find the crypto's website, Twitter account, Discord channel, etc. on CoinGecko's page. Use these resources to get further information about the project, and perform your due diligence before investing.
Remember that not all cryptocurrencies are listed on CoinGecko. Some tokens only exist on their respective blockchains and CoinGecko has either yet to add them, or considers them irrelevant. In this case, you could check Coinmarketcap to see if it's listed there instead. Otherwise, you'll have to dig much deeper to get the relevant information.
Crypto Categories
CoinGecko also has a section called Categories, where you can find organized lists of cryptocurrencies. For example, you can determine which tokens belong to which blockchain ecosystems, as well as which projects are classified as DePIN (Decentralized Physical Infrastructure), RWA (Real World Assets), gaming, etc. if you wish to do further analysis in these areas.
Conclusion
When you discover an intriguing new crypto project, you may want to head over to CoinGecko to look into some of the project's basic data points such as its market cap, total supply, and available marketplaces.
You can also use CoinGecko to keep yourself apprised of the overall crypto market, such as the total market capitalization, and the bitcoin dominance percentage point.
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