Litecoin – an asset that derived from bitcoin, the world’s number one digital currency by market cap – has undergone its third halving, and analysts are emerging left and right to comment on the results.
Litecoin Remains a Dominant Force in Crypto
Litecoin is one of the oldest digital assets around. At roughly 12 years of age, it’s almost as old as bitcoin and dates Ethereum by about four years. As bitcoin is often referred to as “digital gold,” Litecoin has earned a reputation as being “digital silver,” and there are many that swear it’s the next best “crypto thing” after BTC.
This new halving brought down the rewards that miners receive from about 12.5 LTC units to 6.25. A halving occurs (for most assets, anyway) every four years or so, and each time one happens, the rewards that miners get for extracting and adding new units to the blockchain go down. They’re literally cut in half, but while things may get tough for miners during those periods, things work out great for the networks these assets stem from given they’re then considered rarer. Thus, their values grow, and investors learn to see them in entirely new (brighter) lights.
Bitcoin itself is scheduled to endure a halving sometime in 2024 (roughly seven months from now), and there are many analysts that think the event will launch the asset to new heights and help increase its price to a level nobody thought possible.
Charlie Lee, the founder of Litecoin, says that each time a halving occurs, adoption becomes considerably easier. He stated in a recent interview:
Satoshi chose four-year block halving so that it gives enough time for the network to grow in time for the fees to eventually take over. The idea is that there will be enough usage on-chain creating enough fees. The fees will be enough to pay the miners to continue to help secure the network.
He also commented that Litecoin was designed to always retain value, even though it’s nowhere near as big as some of its rivals (i.e., bitcoin or Ethereum). He said:
It’s on a silver card, so even if Litecoin goes to zero, it will still be worth the price of silver. Like I’ve previously said, a lot of the price action is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Just because people think the halving is going to cause the price to go up, they will buy ahead of the halving or even right after the halving. For bitcoin and Litecoin, sometimes the price went up before, sometimes it runs up afterwards. Sometimes it doesn’t really have too much of an effect. It all depends on how the market reacts to the halving.
Always One of the Top
Litecoin consistently ranks among the top ten digital currencies.
It currently has a market cap of about $7 billion.
