Now I know people will probably decimate me for even considering LTC, but I do not get the hate. I get the criticisms, I really do, but outright hate is still something I cannot wrap my head around- I hold multiple coins- VIA, BTC, LTC, and a fair amount of DRK. The reason is because I see them all having a future in an internet arena which already caters to many different people and ideas on the internet.
Great post Pansyfaust.
I agree - the shakeout is going to really change things. I now think it's going to be very healthy in the long run, especially if this is the bottom and we don't go to sub 100 valuations for BTC. The mere fact that Bitcoin didn't die will raise a lot of eyebrows.
Re. your remarks on LTC, "hate" is often in the eye of the beholder as is love. I myself have made posts on LTC's demise which have bordered on sarcasm at times, but I wouldn't call it 'hate'. On the other hand, for someone who's holding it can feel like that if you have assets at stake and are willing it to succeed.
I was in LTC and got out months ago simply because I couldn't see any future in it. It was caught in the crack between insufficient adoption and insufficient fundamentals to compete with other alts. There was simply no reason for it to have the marketcap it did any longer and so was judged to be overvalued.
Thanks Tok. I always appreciate your posts, even the ones that show LTC at its worst and cause me to have a self-deprecating grin on my face. In some regards I wish I only got into Crypto now, since I could have bought an MN, had a lot more LTC & VIA and some BTC, but like a stary-eyed nooblet I got in when the market was overvalued. I cannot invest anymore since I should just wait it out and see what happens the next few months. I still think that LTC has more room to grow and develop; it still has a strong hashrate and it has gained wider merchant adoption and accesibility than this time last year- case in point, the only way I could buy LTC at the beginning of last year was to buy BTC and trade into-now there is an Exchange here that accepts FIAT for LTC.
I am cognisant of the that if LTC does not improve in price and adoption it cannot succeed. I am also aware that as much as other alts have been created which have some unique features and selling points that I like (and which shows through my varied collection of the coins I have) I am of the opinion that there is a lot of animosity directed at LTC
that is not the fault of LTC, but of heightened expectations and the supposed ASIC boom driving a price increase. I examine it like this: BTC started to get popular in early 2013 and it was around the same time that big money was circulating, buying ASICS were starting to come online and secure the network- the ecosystem of BTC was growing, there was a price spike and money was being put into infrastructure- the correlation was that all this money being put into BTC was clearly having a positive effect on its price. Money poured into BTC, money was made, people were happy.
One cannot argue that 2013 was a massive boom year for BTC, one that coincided with the release of ASICS. By contrast LTC got popular and had massive amounts of money pour into it, and the expectation was that through mining one could envision a massive boom like BTC the year before-yet the only difference is expectation fell on a market that was clearly in the clutches of a inevitable market bear cycle, and so the sentiment has soured somewhat. So when people say that LTC has failed or that it is overvalued, everything was overvalued a few months ago and most definitely a year ago- bulls had achieved what they wanted to, and morphed into the bear we've seen this year.
So I still feel LTC was just caught up in a classic cycle of the market, whereas BTC had money and mining infrastructure develop in a Bull year, LTC has had it in a Bear year, so the losses and sentiment is compounded. This is my feeling, so this is why I think that the value of LTC will "right" itself- it's hit the bottom I feel and can now recover. If it does not, then clearly my observations were wrong and I accept that. I just think that even after all this time, all the decimation this bear cycle has wrought, it is still has the second highest market cap and is the second most traded crypto in the world.