Cryptocurrencies are no longer just a fad. The mass adoption of virtual currencies despite concerns expressed by regulators and experts is a clear indication that they are here to stay. Bitcoin, Ethereum, and XRP are the most popular cryptocurrencies in the world, but they are not the only ones. Here we take a look at the ten most popular cryptocurrencies in the world by market capitalization.
Most popular cryptocurrencies
Cryptocurrencies are highly volatile assets. There are more than 2,000 cryptocurrencies worldwide, and each of them witnesses extreme volatility. There is no way to predict whether a cryptocurrency ranking among the top ten today will still be in the top ten a few weeks later.
As of March 24, 2020, these cryptocurrencies dominate the market. The ranking is based on the market cap data from CoinMarketCap.
10- Tezos, $1.24 billion
Tezos is a decentralized crypto network linked to a digital token. Unlike other cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, Tezos doesn’t rely on the mining of its digital token Tez. Instead, it uses a proof-of-stake mechanism to reward the token holders. It debuted in June 2018. As of March 24, it has a market capitalization of $1.24 billion.
9- Binance Coin, $1.94 billion
Popular cryptocurrency exchange Binance introduced Binance Coin in 2017 as its utility token. Binance offers a discount to people who pay fees in Binance Coin. Its ICO took place in July 2017. Binance sold 100 million Binance Coin tokens at $0.15, raising a total of $15 million in the ICO. The coin has become an integral part of the Binance ecosystem. Binance suffered a massive hack in May 2019.
8- EOS, $2.17 billion
EOS is a crypto token created by Dan Larimer, the founder of Bitshares crypto exchange. Its initial coin offering (ICO) took place in June 2017, and its platform was released as an open source software in June 2018. The EOS smart contract platform is capable of conducting millions of transactions per second. EOS has a market cap of $2.17 billion.
7- Litecoin, $2.58 billion
It’s often referred to as Bitcoin’s ‘little brother.’ Litecoin was born in 2011 when a hard fork, an update which is not compatible with its previous version, caused Bitcoin to split into two. Litecoin offers 4x faster transaction time compared to Bitcoin. It also has a much higher token limit of 84 million. But Litecoin’s market cap is significantly smaller than Bitcoin.
6- Bitcoin SV, $3.3 billion
Bitcoin Satoshi Vision (SV) is a hard fork of Bitcoin Cash. It aims to restore the original Bitcoin protocol as defined by Bitcoin’s version 0.1. Bitcoin SV has a block size limit of 128MB, much higher than Bitcoin Cash’s 32MB. It was introduced in November 2018.
5- Bitcoin Cash, $4.19 billion
Bitcoin Cash ranks among the most popular cryptocurrencies in the world. It was forked out of Bitcoin in 2017 when developers couldn’t agree on the changes in Bitcoin’s code. It offers faster transfer times and cheaper transfer fees than Bitcoin. Bitcoin Cash has a market cap of $4.19 billion.
4- Tether, $4.65 billion
Tether is a stablecoin, serving as a stable dollar substitute. It converts cash into digital currency. Previously, Tether claimed that each of its tokens were backed by one US dollar. Last year, the company claimed that the cryptocurrency is backed by loans to affiliate companies. Tether is the first blockchain platform that facilitates digital use of fiat currencies.
3- XRP, $7.11 billion
Ripple’s XRP is taking a different approach than other popular cryptocurrencies. It aims to replace SWIFT as the main transaction network for international money transfers. Ripple Labs introduced XRP to make international transactions fast and cheap. Over time, there will be 100 billion XRP coins, and Ripple Labs will own 50 billion of them.
2- Ethereum, $15.55 billion
Launched by Vitalik Buterin in 2015, Ethereum is the world’s second most popular cryptocurrency with a market cap of $15.55 billion. Ethereum provides smart-contract applications, allowing users to set specific conditions to carry out a transaction. Following the DAO hack, Ethereum was split into two – the original Ethereum Classic and the new Ethereum.
1- Bitcoin, $123.83 billion
Bitcoin is the most popular and widely used cryptocurrency in the world. Currently, there are about 17 million Bitcoin tokens in circulation. The total limit is capped at 21 million, meaning nearly 80% of the world’s Bitcoin has already been mined. Bitcoin’s slow transaction speeds and higher transaction fees are hurting its growth, but it remains global leader in the crypto space so far. In 2008, a person named Satoshi Nakamoto published a paper called “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System” outlined a peer-to-peer network for electronic transactions. The Bitcoin network was born in January 2009.
