Now and Then #3: Litecoin

One such example is Litecoin, a cryptocurrency often called "the little brother" of Bitcoin. Litecoin was launched by a former Google employee – Charlie Lee – in 2011. Whereas there were huge similarities between the two, Litecoin mainly aimed to outperform Bitcoin in terms of transaction speed. 

In today’s SpectroCoin blog post, we will discuss how Litecoin succeeded in reaching its goals and how this cryptocurrency has evolved over the years.

What was Litecoin like back in 2011?

Litecoin was originally founded as a Bitcoin fork, meaning a split of a blockchain was made to create a new version of Bitcoin. This new version intended to enhance Bitcoin functionality and offer faster and cheaper cryptocurrency payments. 

As is the case with most cryptocurrencies, one Litecoin was worth less than one dollar – approximately 30 cents during the initial stage. In 2013, for the first time, the price increased to almost $40.

The idea of Litecoin quickly gained a lot of popularity in the crypto space. As it was possible to mine this currency on personal computers, it was easier for miners to engage in the network activity and gain rewards from block creation. 

In 2017, there were a lot of controversial discussions ongoing in terms of Litecoin. That year, the price of this cryptocurrency reached its all-time high of around $350; however, it decreased significantly after the vast portion of coins were sold by the creator Charlie Lee. 

After causing anger among the crypto community, Charlie Lee explained that he wanted to get rid of his coins and no longer be included in the system he was working on. According to him, such a move would have positively impacted his decisions about further Litecoin project development. 

Litecoin experienced many forks throughout its existence that aimed to develop new coin versions with specific improvements. Examples of such forks are Einsteinium, Feathercoin, Junkcoin, and one of SpectroCoin's supported cryptocurrencies – Dash. 

What does Litecoin look like today?

Today, Litecoin is among the top 10 most popular cryptocurrencies on the market. Even though the price is much smaller compared to more prominent market players such as Bitcoin or Ethereum, it does not preclude crypto enthusiasts from buying this currency. 

Precisely as it was aimed, Litecoin has enabled faster payments compared to Bitcoin. The block generation time in the Litecoin network is four times faster. While Bitcoin takes approximately 10 minutes to produce a block, Litecoin has reduced the time to only 2.5 minutes per one block. 

Block rewards in the Litecoin network are also different – it is 25 LTC per block, while Bitcoin offers two times smaller amounts of 12.5 BTC. Miners get these rewards for validating transactions and adding new blocks to the blockchain. 

What is more, the total supply of Litecoin is four times bigger than the one for Bitcoin. Whereas there can be only 21 million Bitcoins in existence, of which more than 18 million have already been mined, Litecoin's total supply is 84 million, with almost 70 million coins existing so far. 

In 2020, Litecoin Foundation became partners with a famous video game producer Atari. This has allowed gamers to pay for its products at a discounted rate. The partnership between two growing communities worked both ways – it contributed to the adoption of cryptocurrency in more industries and attracted more attention to the crypto world. 

Litecoin, which has been known as an initially similar cryptocurrency to Bitcoin, offers new possibilities by constantly updating its technology. At the same time, it continues to improve network privacy and scalability. For example, the MimbleWimble privacy protocol is currently in development, encrypting or hiding transaction information. 

Want to discuss more about Litecoin? Don’t hesitate to get in touch with us via the LiveChat bubble available on our website or share your thoughts on our social media! 

You can buy and sell Litecoin at SpectroCoin.