There seems to be a trend in cryptocurrency investment.Traders of Bitcoin often leap from one digital currency to another, spreading their investments across popular currencies such as Ethereum’s Ether (ETH), anonymous currency Monero (XMR) and Litecoin (LTC).With the exception of some timeframes, Bitcoin price is usually stable and significantly less volatile in comparison to other digital currencies.At a market cap close to $20 bln, the volatility rate of Bitcoin has substantially decreased over the past few years.However, Bitcoin price fluctuates upon the emergence of major market and industry-affecting events.For instance, when the discussion of hard fork contingency intensified and the market began to panic, Bitcoin price plunged, stabilizing in the late $900s.Traders usually attempt to pinpoint certain timeframes that Bitcoin price could either go up or down.Most recently, the acceptance of Bitcoin by major Japanese electronics retailer company Bic Camera and the legalization of the digital currency in Japan led to a surge in Bitcoin price, moving it from around $980 to $1180.

Investors who miss these short and mid-term rallies of Bitcoin tend to bet on the performance of alternative cryptocurrencies such as Ether, Monero and Litecoin that have demonstrated a significantly higher level of stability in comparison to the rest of the digital currencies on the market over longer periods of time.bitcoin wallet physicalMore importantly, crypto assets like Ether have drastically increased in price because of the rising interests of corporate investors and financial institutions.ebay bitcoin alternativeSpecifically, the formation of the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance increased the market cap of Ethereum by around 4x, as it jumped from $1 bln to over $4 bln within a span of two months.ethereum maximum amount

The back and forth movement of Bitcoin investors and their diverse portfolio of cryptocurrencies explain the ratio of trading pairs in major assets like Ethereum.More than 50 percent of trading in the Ethereum exchange market is processed with the ETH/BTC pair.bitcoins kaufen chartTherefore, there exist more domestic traders within the cryptocurrency community purchasing alternative crypto assets such as ETH than conventional investors trading altcoins.bitcoin dumpsterBitcoin dominance index is currently at one of its lowest points.bitcoin gratis italianoBut, the 69.2 percent dominance index of Bitcoin does not represent a declining interest in the digital currency.bitcoin builder legitRather, users are simply gaining more interest in altcoins that supplement or make up for the missing links of Bitcoin.hd 4000 bitcoin mining

Specifically, Ethereum represents a Blockchain platform designed for developers and decentralized applications.Many developers have expressed their concerns over Bitcoin’s limited development framework.What Bitcoin lacks in flexibility is supplemented by its high-security measures and robust infrastructure.bitcoin pool rewardMonero, Dash and Zcash provide anonymity to cryptocurrency users, which Bitcoin does not.Litecoin is a unique currency in the sense that it represents nearly identical philosophies, structure and monetary policy of Bitcoin.Traders or investors who feel like they missed out on Bitcoin or the recent rally of Bitcoin price still have accessible altcoins like Monero, Litecoin, Zcash, Dash and Ether to profit from.Now that the Litecoin price is hovering at around $30 - as the Lightning Network, expected to make transactions faster on the network, is set to kick off in about two days - is it time for the digital currency, dubbed as the silver to Bitcoin’s gold, to aim for the $50 goal?

As it stands, its market cap has crossed the $1 bln mark to join the three other major networks - Bitcoin, Ethereum and Ripple - in the category."This is a huge plus for the currency which just got listed on top Korean cryptocurrency exchange, Bithumb.This comes in the wake of its addition on the Coinbase platform also last week."If Litecoin succeeds with the SegWit activation and LN implementation - considering that Bitcoin has not been able to reach this far in terms of its scalability issue - it would definitely reflect in LTC price in the coming days.As such, wallet providers and other major users are expected to deploy SegWit-enabled apps."Litecoin’s Charlie Lee also confirms that Bitcoin Core developers have been working with his network on Confidential Transactions (CT) and Merkelized Abstract Syntax Trees (MAST)."As it is expected to take the first mover advantage as one of the first to activate SegWit, all eyes would be on Litecoin and what it has to offer in terms of making transaction confirmation quicker.

This will continue to be the case for as long as Litecoin serves as a relief to any transaction issues that are usually associated with Bitcoin.This will make it easier to send money from a point to another instantly and for less.The current issue of transaction delays on the Bitcoin network and rising transaction fees now seem stuck at the moment and some say it is no longer seen as an incentive to encourage new users to switch from fiat.Though not the first and only network to be working on activating SegWit, the upgrade is important for Litecoin because it is one of those networks with the oldest Blockchain beside Bitcoin.It also has an identical code to that of Bitcoin.However, despite the forward-looking consideration of how Litecoin is going to benefit users, we are yet to see it proven that people in the market really need what it has to offer.The debate on whether there is demand for its use continues.People have often described litecoin as silver to bitcoin's gold.It is the third largest cryptocurrency after bitcoin by market cap, with Ripple sitting in second place.

Litecoin was developed as a bitcoin alternative to address some of that cryptocurrency's perceived shortcomings.It was designed to be ‘lightweight’ and more abundant than bitcoin.In addition, it uses scrypt as its proof-of-work algorithm, which was aimed to make it impervious to ASIC mining, although several companies say they are planning to launch scrypt ASIC miners in the near future.A total of 84 million litecoins can be produced on the network (compared with 21 million BTC), which was designed to process blocks faster than bitcoin.If you would like to know a bit more about litecoin, then read this more detailed introduction on how to get started.Some points of note before you buy litecoin: If you are aware of the risks, if you’ve done a lot of research and you are still willing to enter the litecoin market, there are a number of potential pitfalls and issues that need to be addressed.Buying litecoins is not as straightforward as buying bitcoins, but this is hardly surprising given the lesser-developed litecoin infrastructure.

One of the easiest ways of buying litecoins is to simply purchase them with bitcoins – this approach also happens to be the fastest, and for most users it will be the cheapest option.Anyone with a stash of bitcoins can easily use them to purchase litecoins on a number of exchanges: At present, one of the biggest issues facing litecoin is the lack of exchanges willing to deal in it.There are roughly two dozen litecoin exchanges, but most of them only allow BTC/LTC conversions, making the buying process cumbersome.BTC-E, Bitfinex, Crypto-Trade and Kraken sell litecoins for euros, dollars and roubles, but availability depends on your location.For example, UK investors can buy litecoins directly from Bittylicious and BitBargain with a domestic banking transfer, but this is not the case in most countries.Australians can convert to and from AUD at CoinSpot.You can buy litecoins for fiat on these exchanges: You may think the most straightforward way to purchase would be to buy litecoin via fiat wire transfer using an exchange, but this can be a tedious process for a number of reasons.

Some major bitcoin exchanges like BTC China and Coinbase do not handle litecoin transactions at present.Speed is the most obvious advantage of using bitcoin to buy litecoin.In theory, it should take just minutes, whereas international wire transfers can take days to clear and potentially incur additional costs.The limited number of litecoin exchanges means that the vast majority of potential investors have to rely on international transfers.An alternative is to buy bitcoin locally, forgoing the hassle of wiring money abroad, and converting it into litecoin.The upside is that you will get your bitcoin sooner and possibly get a better price when you convert it, provided litecoin's value keeps going up.You are likely to pay more for bitcoin if you are limited to the local market.A number of exchanges offer online litecoin wallets, but they are hardly elegant solutions.Many users will want something more secure, like cold offline wallets.Luckily, litecoin features built-in encryption that you can use to protect your wallet in just a few clicks.