Litecoin used to be a top player in the crypto space, branded as the “silver to bitcoin’s gold”.During the 2013 bitcoin bubble, LTC was the #2 market and was highly correlated to the price of bitcoin.In 2013, bitcoin gained +11,000% and litecoin gained +500% over the price of bitcoin during its peak.The price of LTC hit an all time high of around $50 on some exchanges.The last major litecoin rally was during the summer of 2015, when a Chinese LTC Ponzi scheme managed to accumulate at least 20% of the entire supply.Most of that supply was instantly dumped and the LTC/BTC markets have been on a long bear trend since.Litecoin lost its correlation to bitcoin after the summer pump and was left behind during most of the year long BTC bull trend.That said, its USD value has remained somewhat stable and consolidating within a tight range.Although litecoin hasn’t been a very good market to trade for most of 2016, it’s possible that this rock is a sleeping giant ready to rise from its slumber.

Here are four reasons why litecoin may hit a bullish trend reversal in 2017.Recently the People’s Bank of China cracked down on major crypto exchanges.The result being that they stopped all margin trading and have eliminated the zero fees model.This means that Chinese traders can only play in the spot markets and will have to devise entirely new strategies for making profit.The only way to make profit on the spot markets is to buy low and sell high.Traders can no longer short by selling coins they don’t have.If they want to be a participant in the crypto markets they need to own some coins.The larger bitcoin bull trend is still intact but likely due for several months of consolidation, perhaps forming a large symmetrical triangle.Generally speaking, when the price of bitcoin stabilizes, liquidity shifts into the altcoin markets.As it turns out, the only altcoin market available on the top Chinese bitcoin exchanges (OKCoin, Huobi and BTCChina) is litecoin.Given the choice between the two markets, the percentage gains for moving a smaller cap market like LTC can be much higher.

Accumulating litecoin at the bottom of its price range is also a cheaper option than accumulating bitcoin at the top of its range.Game theory would suggest that buying litecoin has more profit potential.Litecoin is the only altcoin that trades more volume in fiat than against BTC.The majority of litecoin’s volume is actually in CNY, which means the markets could take on a life of their own and easily become non-correlated to the price of bitcoin.Litecoin is currently in the process of trying to help bitcoin’s scaling debate by moving towards the activation of Segregated Witness and Lightning Networks.Litecoin founder Charlie Lee stated in a recent post: “Until SegWit, LN, and Confidential Transactions, I didn’t see a need for Litecoin to come out to help test features before they are on Bitcoin.So I was happy to let Litecoin go on without a lot of development.Hence my tweet about Litecoin not needing development.But with SegWit and Bitcoin’s current block scaling deadlock, I see a potential for Litecoin to help Bitcoin break through this deadlock.

Litecoin can take a lead and be a positive force in the cryptocurrency space.We have been drafting behind the Bitcoin race car for many years.It’s about time to take a turn out front.” If Litecoin implements these changes before Bitcoin, this will completely change the network’s fundamentals and offer something new to the ecosystem.That alone has the potential to attract market interest from crypto traders.The Litecoin network’s hash rate is starting to show exponential growth.купить bitcoin qiwiSometimes a coin’s price can be correlated to the amount of hashing power on the network.tesla nvidia bitcoinThe increased difficulty means that miners need to spend money in upgrading their equipment to be more efficient.bitcoin isa

If the cost of mining coins is on par or greater than the price, miners will hoard coins instead of immediately selling on the markets.Litecoin is currently the second most secure blockchain in the world and it doesn’t seem like the market value is reflecting this achievement.If there’s one thing that can be said about the markets, it’s that trends don’t last forever.Any market that’s still alive with decent liquidity tends to go through cycles.Litecoin currently ranks #3 for crypto trading volume and is #4 for market capitalization.ethereum raspberry piLTC is currently at its lowest BTC satoshi value in years.ethereum to usd converterGiven that this is still one of the top crypto markets, it wouldn’t surprise me to see a bullish trend reversal in 2017.bitcoin seminar report

Looking at the LTC/BTC charts we can see litecoin starting to creep past the descending trend line.If we use a fib extension off the last major high to measure the bear trend, we can see the price is hovering around the 61.8% sweet spot.If LTC starts consolidating sideways then it may be entering into the accumulate phase, which is the first period within a bull cycle.About Latest Posts Latest posts by Rocky (see all) Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies for Beginners 3 Things You Should Know if You’re New to Bitcoin Cofoundit Aims to Help Blockchain Startups Raise Capitalethereum ico termsCoinbaseCoinbase Adds Litecoin and Prices JumpJeff John RobertsYou've probably heard about the digital currency called bitcoin.akbar bitcoinBut you may not realize there are literally dozens of other so-called alt-currencies out there that work in a very similar way and that, like bitcoin, their value has been soaring in the last year.While bitcoin is far and away the biggest—its market cap is more than twice all the other alt-currencies combined—some of its rivals are gaining traction.bitcoin mining alone vs pool

These include Litecoin, a currency introduced in 2013 by former Google employee Charlie Lee, and that is currently the fourth most valuable alt-currency.Litecoin, as its name suggests, is a "lighter" version than bitcoin.It can process transactions four times faster and has not run into the sort of controversies related to scaling for growth that are currently consuming the bitcoin community.Get Data Sheet, Fortune’s technology newsletter.But despite its history and positive reputation, it hasn't experienced the same recent dramatic increase in value as bitcoin or ethereum, which is the No.2 alt-currency on the list.One reason for this could be that Litecoin is harder to obtain than those other two currencies.That changed, however, on Wednesday as the popular digital currency exchange service Coinbase made it possible for people to buy and sell Litecoin.And, indeed, prices jumped over 25 percent on the Coinbase news according to the site Coin Market Cap.The Coinbase tie-in is significant because is by far the most popular way for ordinary people—as opposed to dedicated crypto-heads—to buy and sell digital currency.

Litecoin's appearance on the platform means it is suddenly a lot more liquid as an asset.Lee, the Litecoin creator who is now head engineer at Coinbase, is (unsurprisingly) bullish about the currency's potential.But his optimism is not just due to the fact it's now easier to buy and sell Litecoin.As Lee points out, Litecoin is in the middle of adopting a number of new technologies (such as Segregated Witness or SegWit) that increase its transaction speed—bitcoin backers have been trying to implement similar improvements for months, but the process has been caught up in internecine fighting."Wehave all the cool scaling technology.But the reason we adopted SegWit was not for the scaling features, but because it allows for instant payments off-chain," said Lee, referring to a method for clearing transactions using a variation of the digital currency's core computer protocol.This week's development is likely to give a boost to Litecoin, though it's unlikely the currency will ever emerge as real challenger to bitcoin—a mantle increasingly being adopted by relative newcomer ethereum.