Okay, it’s official. Litecoin is definitely having a moment, and its price is heading into the stratosphere.
The astronomical price increase in the cryptocurrency means it has topped out at $390 today, up from around $90 just five days ago, meaning it has spiked 333 per cent in a mere five days.
But between the hours of 11pm PST and 6.24am PST, Litecoin made another – even bigger – leap, rising from $225.82 to $390.70, according to Forbes.
This growth is a humongous 73 per cent, which means the total growth for the 24 hour period is 115 per cent.
Since then, the price settled back to (a still huge) $333.60, and Coinbase has suspended all trading in Litecoin because of the massive peak in prices.
There are a couple of reasons which could help explain just why Litecoin is experiencing such a massive price hike, not least of which is the trading of Bitcoin futures on CBOE just a few days ago.
This gives legitimacy to the cryptocurrency, and provides an element of stability for traders which will no doubt increase confidence for other currencies.
Obviously, with this increased confidence comes a higher amount of activity on the market, which has caused a surge in transaction fees as well as a clogged network – this could be sending users to quicker and cheaper alternatives like Litecoin and Ethereum.
There is also the increased user activity on cryptocurrency brokerage Coinbase, which has recently surpassed YouTube as the number one app on the Apple App Store. Coinbase only supports three currencies, however: Bitcoin, Ethereum and Litecoin.
But Charlie Lee, the creator of Litecoin, has made efforts to put limits on everyone’s expectations about the crypto-craze.
Ok, sorry to spoil the party, but I need to reign in the excitement a bit…
Buying LTC is extremely risky. I expect us to have a multi-year bear market like the one we just had where LTC dropped 90% in value ($48 to $4). So if you can't handle LTC dropping to $20, don't buy! ?
— Charlie Lee [LTC] (@SatoshiLite) December 11, 2017
Charlie tweeted:
Sorry to spoil the party, but I need to reign in the excitement a bit…
Buying LTC is extremely risky. I expect us to have a multi-year bear market like the one we just had where LTC dropped 90% in value ($48 to $4). So if you can’t handle LTC dropping to $20, don’t buy!
To be honest, this is the most realistic expectation of what is going to happen. As is the case with a lot of cryptocurrencies, when they surge in price, they are not reflecting their real value (obviously).
That said, let's go to da moon first! ??
— Charlie Lee [LTC] (@SatoshiLite) December 11, 2017
Therefore, the overshoot is definitely going to even out over some time, though it’s not entirely clear just how much this will happen or how quickly.
