Many investors see Bitcoin as a store of value like gold. But other cryptocurrencies have more utility in payments, NFTs or Blockchains. Analysts at consulting giant The Motley Fool think that in the long run, the value in crypto will come from building real businesses. This means that the cryptocurrencies underlying valuable digital economies will likely be more valuable than Bitcoin. Here are 3 altcoins that The Motley Fool analyst Travis Hoium thinks could surpass BTC in the long run…
The first altcoin on the list: Ethereum
There is nothing that Bitcoin can do that Ethereum cannot do. But there’s a lot that Ethereum can do that Bitcoin can’t. At its core, Ethereum was built to be a smart cryptocurrency with smart contracts that developers can build on. They did this quickly with decentralized finance and NFTs. Even more encouraging are network updates, which are likely to improve performance significantly.
As we have reported as Kriptokoin.com, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin recently made statements. He said the network could now process around 100,000 transactions per second if the update in question happens. According to the analyst, Ethereum is a great leader in crypto in terms of real utility. Therefore, there is a possibility of defeating Bitcoin in the long run.
Solana’s transaction speed and fee stand out
Just behind Ethereum comes Solana, which today can handle around 3,000 transactions per second. Solana plans to continue to increase this figure over time. It wants to increase it to 30,000 operations per second or more. Solana has similar smart contract capabilities to Ethereum. But transactions are faster and much less costly.
In Ethereum, we can sometimes face costs in the hundreds of dollars. But a typical transaction in Solana costs a small fraction of a penny. This allows developers and innovators to potentially create more jobs on the Blockchain than on a more expensive Blockchain like Ethereum. Solana now has more active users and more transactions than Ethereum. According to the analyst, this will be an extremely disruptive cryptocurrency if the current growth rate continues. But it’s worth noting that at the time of writing, about $8 million has been raised on the Solana network.
Last coin on the list: Polygon
Ethereum upgrades are partly aimed at improving the performance of projects known as layer2 blockchains like Polygon. Layer 2 sits on top of layer 1 (Ethereum in this case). But it does provide important tools like scalability or security. Polygon was built with scalability in mind. It has become a leading way to lower the cost of running on Ethereum. Instagram has recently introduced support for Polygon NFTs. Then Stripe enabled payments using Polygon. According to the analyst, Polygon will be a key solution if Ethereumi is to scale as the developers hope. This, in turn, could give MATIC the ability to be larger than a cryptocurrency like Bitcoin.
Future for altcoin projects, “beneficial”
It is worth noting that each of these cryptocurrencies was created with utility in mind, according to the analyst. Benefits may include real-world payments, digital asset ownership in the metaverse or NFTs. But here, doing something productive is key.
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