Litecoin (LTC) emerged as a fork of Bitcoin a decade and a half ago, in 2011. Due to the fact that it uses a different hashing algorithm, hard cap, block transaction times and other factors, the project ended up being significantly faster and more scalable than Bitcoin itself.
Initially, it was released via an open-source client on GitHub on October 7, 2011, only to launch the Litecoin Network a few days later, on October 13. Immediately, it exploded in usage and acceptance among merchants, and it has been one of the top-ranking cryptos ever since.
In the past, it used to be among the top 10 largest cryptocurrencies by market cap. However, as of March 2024, it holds the 21st spot with a market cap of $6.04 billion.
LTC price history – Coinbase chart
Over the years, the coin’s price participated in all major rallies, but unlike Bitcoin, which outperformed its old ATHs by a wide margin each time when a new major rally arrived, Litecoin saw relatively similar peaks each time, hitting $318 at its peak in 2017, and $360 at its highest point during the 2021 rally. In comparison, BTC hit $20k in 2017, then $69k in 2021, only to reach $73.2k in mid-March 2024.
Litecoin Price History
Litecoin was launched on October 13, 2011. At the time, the token’s value was $4.30, and while it initially dropped to $1.69 over the first few months, it skyrocketed near the end of 2013, reaching the price of $35.
The coin then spent most of 2014 spiraling down until it returned to $2 at the end of the year. In 2015, it found a bottom at $1.5, only to gradually start to recover throughout the year, and spike up in early July, climbing to around $8. After that, it corrected to 3, which is where it remained for the second half of the year.
In 2016, LTC once again remained fairly flat until May of that year, when it started a surge that took it to $5.5, only to once again correct by the end of June. It then spent the rest of the year fluctuating between $3.5 and $4.
Then, in 2017, things finally changed thanks to Bitcoin’s massive post-halving bull run, which allowed cryptocurrencies to step out of the shadows, and start their first real massive rally. LTC saw a 100x pump, going from $4 to nearly $400 between January and December 2017. However, immediately after reaching this height, the coin started its drop, which ended up lasting for over a year.
This was true for all cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin itself. This was the first great crypto winter, which finally ended in February 2019. After that, LTC saw a slight recovery throughout the first few months, gradually surging all the way up to a resistance at $140 by late June 2019. This was when the market once again turned bearish, and the token dropped back to $40 by the end of the year.
LTC entered 2020 with a price of $40, and while it quickly started surging during January and February, reaching its peak at $75, the arrival of COVID caused the stock market to crash, and cryptos — including LTC — to crash as well, in correlation. However, cryptocurrencies quickly started to recover, and LTC gradually grew back up throughout the year. By November 2020, BTC was starting the second big bull run, and LTC was among the first to join in, ending the year with its price at around $150.
Then came 2021, and the rally which started in 2020 reached its full potential. LTC managed to hit a new all-time high by May 10, climbing to $412.96. In fact, to this day, this is still the highest price it has ever managed to reach. Unfortunately, immediately after that, the market crashed after Elon Musk’s Tesla, the US-based EV maker, announced that it would stop accepting BTC payments due to the coin not being environmentally friendly.
The crypto community took profits, taking this as a sign that the bull run is over, and LTC crashed from $412 to $125 in less than a month and a half. However, the market started to recover in July, and while some coins like Bitcoin got the second wind that took them to new ATHs, this was not the case with LTC, which only climbed back to around $280 before the bull run truly ended in mid-November, and the second year-long crypto winter took place.
The coin found its bottom at $50 in October 2022, from where it even recovered to $110 in the first half of 2023. However, by mid-August 2023, LTC returned to just above $60, initially fluctuating between this level and a resistance at $70, and later managing to push beyond this level and find a new resistance at $80.
With the start of 2024, LTC price corrected under the $70 mark once again, fluctuating between a support at $65 and a resistance at $70. This started to change around February 22, when the price first climbed above the $70 mark, and then above $80 on February 29.
During the first week of March, LTC was struggling to breach a resistance at $90, which finally rejected the price back to $75 around March 6. After that, the price spent the next week slowly climbing back up, until it suddenly blew up to $105. This happened on March 12, and it represents Litecoin’s 8-month high, and the highest point it had reached on the YTD chart.
However, following this peak, the price started to spiral down until it once again dropped below $80. It found a bottom at $78, only to then recover slightly and start fluctuating between $82 and $85 over the last several days.
At the time of writing, March 25, the coin’s price sits at $89.30, and seems to be waiting for the next signal from the wider market. However, given that this latest 2-week surge was led by Bitcoin as part of its pre-halving rally, chances are that the prices will soon see a sharp correction, if BTC keeps following historical patterns, and the altcoin market keeps following Bitcoin’s lead.
Where can I buy Litecoin in March 2024
Litecoin is an old and still quite popular cryptocurrency, despite the fact that it dropped out of the top 10 list, and is now ranking as 21st largest coin. As such, it is available on most major centralized crypto exchanges (CEXes). However, it can also be purchased on platforms such as eToro, which are generally for more traditional assets, but also offer a few handpicked cryptocurrencies.
eToro, specifically, is a trading app with over 33 registered accounts as of June 2023, although not all of them are active and regularly used. The platform offers both traditional assets, such as stocks, as well as multiple cryptocurrencies, making it a great choice for users who wish to differentiate their portfolios by adding LTC and mixing it with other assets.
Furthermore, eToro is highly reputable, and regulated, and it has been around for about a decade and a half now, with plenty of positive reviews. It also offers the ability to buy cryptos with 0% fees, plus it has features like social and copy trading, allowing users to consult with other traders, or openly copy some of the most successful traders move-for-move. That way, even inexperienced traders get to see similar results as experts with years of trading experience.
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How is the price of Litecoin (LTC) determined?
When it comes to cryptocurrencies, their prices are constantly moving. The only exceptions from this rule are stablecoins, which were designed to have a fixed price. Since LTC is not a stablecoin, its price is constantly moving up and down, as it changes with supply and demand. This happens because the coin is not pegged or backed by any other asset that would give it value and ensure its stability.
With that said, supply and demand are the main, but not the only factor that influence the value of LTC. There are many of them, but here are some of the largest and most impacting ones:
Supply and demand
As mentioned, supply and demand are the main factor behind any cryptocurrency’s price. Supply determines how much of the asset is available, while demand shows how much traders and investors want it.
When there is a surge in demand — possibly caused by some positive news — the demand increases, and with it, the price does, as well. Alternatively, if the demand does not grow, but the supply does, the asset’s value tends to drop. This happens when traders start selling their coins, flooding the market, and making them less valuable.
Volume
Another thing that can affect Litecoin’s price is volume. Changes in volume can indicate changes in demand, and even the market sentiment. With that being the case, a surge in volume can suggest that the demand is growing, which in turn suggests that the price is likely to increase.
On the other hand, low volume suggests little activity, and as a result, chances are that the price will continue to remain flat. Alternatively, the price might also fall if there is no demand for the coins.
Social media
Social media coverage is an important factor that affects some cryptocurrencies, but so far, this has had very little effect on Litecoin. Increased mentions on social media typically affect meme coins the most, and Litecoin does not fall under this category. However, it can still be an important factor as social media can be used to spread awareness of LTC, especially during times when its price is already growing due to other reasons.
When this happens, the coin might end up trending on platforms like X, which could help draw other users in simply by letting them know that the coin is growing.
Media coverage
Media coverage can have the same effect on Litecoin as social media mentions. In other words, if Litecoin is featured in positive news, it could notify more crypto users that this is a coin worth buying, which could increase its volume and price.
Alternatively, negative coverage could result in its price dropping further, if more holders start selling as a result. However, usually, media coverage will likely have a weaker effect on coins like LTC than it would on meme coins, which depend on popularity and coverage due to the lack of use cases.
LTC mining
One more factor that could affect Litecoin’s price is LTC mining. Just like Bitcoin, LTC has a total supply, although it is significantly higher than that of BTC. Where Bitcoin is capped at 21 million BTC, Litecoin’s supply is four times larger, totaling in 84 million LTC. As of March 2024, Litecoin rewards its miners with 6.25 LTC per solved block.
This means that the coin’s circulating supply continues to increase with each solved block. While this makes its supply greater over time, the crypto community still knows that its total supply is capped, and that it cannot grow indefinitely. Even so, the constant arrival of new LTC to the market can affect its price.
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How often does the price of Litecoin change?
Given the fact that Litecoin is not backed by another asset that would maintain its value at a fixed point, that means that its actual value changes at all times. Cryptocurrencies are available around the clock all over the world, which means that there is always someone buying or selling, and all of the previously mentioned factors affect the prices 24/7.
The crypto market never closes, and they are even traded during the weekends and holidays. Of course, trading tends to slow down during holidays and weekends, but it never stops completely, especially nowadays, when digital assets are commonly held by people around the world.
When the trading slows down, price changes can be minimal, while they tend to change a lot during busy periods and periods of great rallies or crashes. LTC has surged and crashed many times, often by a massive percentage, depending on what is going on in the rest of the market. But, the coin usually follows Bitcoin’s lead, only on a much smaller scale.
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Investing in Litecoin
With Q1 of 2024 now seeing its end, the year has already recorded a very busy period. The first three months have been mostly bullish, with the prices of many cryptos even rising to new all-time highs. Litecoin was not among them, as mentioned, but it did see a considerable surge that left it much higher up than where it used to be back in January.
However, with Bitcoin’s market dominance determining what will happen in the crypto industry, chances are that the market is going to see a sharp correction in Q2 and Q3, as Bitcoin halving is about to take place in April.
Is it worth buying Litecoin in March 2024?
So, should you buy Litecoin in March 2024? The answer is that this is a fairly decent time to buy LTC if you are prepared to invest long-term.
As mentioned, Bitcoin is about to see its next halving in a matter of weeks, and once that happens, the crypto market will likely see a sharp correction for the next 6-12 months, possibly even shorter. After that, historical data suggests that a new major rally will commence.
If you can invest now and then wait for a year or two, you will likely see significant returns on your investment. Alternatively, for an even better impact, you can wait for the prices to hit the bottom during the upcoming correction, and then buy LTC.
That way, you will pay for it even less, and be able to sell it for even greater profits once the prices go to the moon once more. However, we should point out that this is mere speculation, and that there is no firm evidence that all of this will come to pass. All we have to go on is past performances, in crypto markets that looked and felt a lot different than the one we are seeing today, and definitely the one that will come in the future.
With that said, this should not be taken as financial advice, but merely observations of what might happen. If you are interested in buying LTC in March 2024, we recommend that you create your own price prediction based on historical facts, technical and fundamental factors, and other aspects, and draw your own conclusions.
Who should invest in Litecoin?
Litecoin is not meant for any specific group of people. This is a cryptocurrency that is generally meant to be used for payments. It is faster than Bitcoin and its fees are cheaper, but it is also far from being the fastest and cheapest crypto on the market.
It is reputable, and as a fork of Bitcoin — which was recognized by even the US regulators as a non-security — it likely won’t be accused of being a security token. This makes it a slightly safer coin to own than most of the altcoin market, although it is difficult to know what views the regulators might change in the future.
Over the years, LTC was bought by those who wanted to use it to make purchases with merchants who accept it, or those who wish to pay others for their services, assuming that they accepted it. Apart from that, people have been buying LTC in order to profit from its price changes, either in short-term trading or long-term investing, so if this sounds interesting to you, then LTC might be a crypto to consider.
How to get started with Litecoin investments?
Investing in Litecoin is actually very simple, and all you need is to follow four simple steps:
- Open an account on eToro. The platform offers LTC as one of its coins of choice, in addition to several other major cryptos, like BTC or DOGE. It has 0% fees for crypto purchases, it is reputable, secure, and it offers a variety of deposit and withdrawal methods.
- Verify your identity. Once you sign up, eToro will request that you verify your identity by uploading certain documentation to the platform. This will help establish that you are who you claim to be, and that you are an adult, and therefore allowed to use its platform.
- Deposit the funds. Once your account is created and verified, the next step is to deposit the money that you will use to buy LTC. You ca make deposits using bank transfers, cards, as well as other methods, which may depend on your location.
- Buy LTC. Finally, all you need to do is type ‘Litecoin’ in the search field on eToro’s platform, and click the trade button once you find it. Enter the amount you wish to buy and confirm the trade.
Investing in Litecoin responsibly
Buying and selling Litecoin is easy, however, it is also important to remember to do it responsibly, in order to ensure the safety of your money. That means following several key rules that will increase your likelihood on profiting from the investment. Remember – there is no guarantee that you will profit, but you can improve your chances, and when it comes to assets as volatile as cryptocurrencies, every little bit helps.
With that said, here are some things to keep in mind that will help you invest in Litecoin responsibly:
- Listen to the experts’ opinion, but draw your own conclusions. Do not act on someone else’s advice.
- Diversify your portfolio. Do not make LTC the only asset that you have.
- Do your own research, and research as much as possible before you actually invest. The more you know, the better you can prepare yourself for various scenarios that might happen.
- Once you buy LTC, do not leave it in the exchange’s or broker’s wallet. Instead, withdraw it to a private wallet that only you have access to.
- Make sure that no one else can access your wallet. The safety of your funds depends on it, as no one can help you recover them if someone steals them or if you lose access to the wallet.
- If you can’t or do not want to use eToro, research which other platforms are available in your area. Compare their fees, offerings, reputations, and more, and see which one works the best for you.
- Use a VPN to shield your internet traffic and prevent others from monitoring it. Bad actors often monitor crypto transactions in order to find inexperienced users who would be easy to trick and rob.
- Follow the money management and risk management strategies in order to safeguard your capital.
Above all else, remember to research. The old saying that knowledge is power is an undeniable truth when it comes to investing in crypto. Even then, there is still risk, but the more you know, the better off you are. Platforms like InsideBitcoins can help you learn more about cryptocurrencies, investing in them, trading them, and many other related topics.
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Litecoin taxation
Despite the fact that very few countries have adequate crypto regulations even now, in 2024, most of them have already developed laws and rules regarding crypto taxation. This means that you will have to pay taxes on any profits you make while trading LTC.
Chances are that you won’t have to pay taxes on unrealized gains, but as soon as you sell your coins in exchange for fiat currencies, you will be obligated to pay taxes on those gains. With that said, we recommend studying your local laws carefully and keeping track of any and all crypto purchases and sales that you make.
Remember to note down the details such as the time of purchase or sale, the exact price, and anything else related to the transactions. Calculating taxes on crypto payments is not easy, even when you have all this data available. Failing to record it in time can make things quite complicated down the line.
The bottom line is, remember to learn your region’s crypto tax laws before getting into the crypto market, as some transactions are not subject to taxation, such as gifting cryptocurrencies to charities and non-profit organizations, although this may not be the case everywhere.
Litecoin vs. other cryptos
While Litecoin has historically been a pretty good coin to invest in, it is certainly not the only option. There are plenty of major cryptos that you can pick instead, such as Dogecoin, Ethereum, or Bitcoin itself. In fact, let’s see how LTC compares to these cryptos and give you a general idea of how they work.
Litecoin vs Dogecoin
Like Litecoin, Dogecoin is also one of the oldest cryptos that has been around for over a decade now. However, unlike LTC, Dogecoin was not created to solve any particular problem that older cryptos were facing. Instead, it was created as a joke, based on a meme that was relevant at the time, and it wasn’t supposed to survive for more than a few weeks, at most. Somehow, DOGE became a community’s favorite and it survived for more than 10 years, becoming more and more relevant as time went by, and even starting a whole new sector of the crypto industry which we now know as meme coins.
Litecoin vs. Ethereum
Ethereum is the cryptocurrency that changed the crypto sector forever when it emerged back in 2015. It introduced smart contracts, the ability to build decentralized applications, and in general, it changed the way the industry viewed blockchain technology. Up until Ethereum’s creation, blockchain was nothing more than a distributed ledger to record crypto transactions, but Ethereum showed everyone that blockchain can be a development platform for much more than just a single crypto per chain. As such, it is the first crypto of the second generation of digital currencies, and the second-most important crypto that was ever created. As such, it appropriately ranks as the second-largest coin in the industry.
Litecoin vs. Bitcoin
Bitcoin is the cryptocurrency that started it all, and the crypto from which Litcoin itself comes. Litecoin is a fork of Bitcoin, meaning that its basic technology and architecture came from BTC. Of course, Litecoin changed a lot, but the origins are still there, and are quite visible to this day. Bitcoin launched on January 3, 2009 as the first-ever cryptocurrency, and these days, it is over 15 years old. It introduced all the new concepts that have been dominating the crypto sector ever since, including decentralization, financial independence, and even blockchain technology itself.
Day-trading Litecoin vs. Long-term Litecoin investments
One important distinction to make when it comes to dealing with cryptocurrencies is the difference between trading and investing. Trading is something that you do in short term, often within a single day, while investing means buying the coins and keeping them for weeks, months, or even years, and in some cases — decades.
Both are perfectly valid approaches, although they are not the same, and different people might prefer a different approach. Someone who is good at day trading may not have the patience to wait for years for their investment to pay off. Alternatively, someone who can afford to invest and forget about their investment for years might not have the time, discipline, and nerves of steel that are required for trading.
Trading allows you to use minor fluctuations in the performance of Litecoin’s price to buy low and sell high and make a small profit. Over time, through multiple trades, if you play your cards right, you can make quite a profit.
Alternatively, investing requires you to simply buy the coins, lock them up in a wallet, and come back months or years later to sell them, once the price has grown a lot. You won’t be making small earnings many times, but instead, you get one big payoff after a long period.
From this, you can conclude that trading requires a lot of attention given to the market, current events, changes in price, trends, sentiment, and more, and then the discipline needed to react at just the right time.
Investing, on the other hand, requires you to study the coin and determine that it has what it takes to survive for years to come. Once you are sure that it is a legitimate crypto that has the potential to grow in the future, you simply buy it, and that’s the end of it.
Each approach has its own benefits and flaws, but in the end, it depends on you and your preference. If you prefer high risks and action while following market events on a daily basis, then trading might be something you could thrive at. If, on the other hand, you would like to make a profit without the work and action that comes with trading, then investing might be a better choice.
Your capital is at risk.
Future Predictions for Litecoin Price
Speaking of long-term predictions, we have considered a number of reputable platforms to see what the experts expect from Litecoin in the future.
WalletInvestor, for example, believes that LTC will see its price drop one year from now, and hit $67.66 in March 2025.
CoinCodex, on the other hand, has a much more optimistic prediction. It believes that Litecoin’s yearly low in 2025 will be $86.58, while its yearly high would go all the way up to $351. Even if this prediction ends up being true, it would mean that LTC still won’t be able to hit a new ATH in 2025. However, CoinCodex believes that it might happen in 2026, as it predicts a yearly high of $559 for that year.
After that, in 2027, the platform’s experts believe that the new bear market (or maybe the entirely new crypto winter) will bring LTC down to a yearly low of $91 in 2027, while the yearly high for that year will be $203. However, by 2030, LTC is exected to hit $961 as a yearly high, putting it just short of $1,000 per coin.
Finally, we also considered Changelly, and its prediction says that the average price of LTC is likely to climb to $92 next month, and then rise and fall throughout the rest of the year, fluctuating between $75 and $100, Meanwhile, in 2025, it will finally manage to climb up and go beyond $100, reaching the highest price of $171 in December 2025, on average.
The best Litecoin alternative
While Litecoin is an old and high-ranking crypto that many consider to be a valuable investment even today, it is not the only crypto worth looking into. In fact, many in the trading and investing community believe that the best opportunities are coins that are still in presale. One such crypto that has been attracting a lot of attention recently is the new Dogecoin20 (DOGE20).
Dogecoin20 is a new project that emerged on Ethereum’s network, as an ERC-20 token. It was inspired by the original Dogecoin, but it has introduced several changes that might establish it as an even better version than the original.
For starters, being launched on Ethereum means that it will have a very low carbon footprint, which will barely be above zero. As such, it is meant to be an eco-friendly version of DOGE and act as a crypto that will help establish a more sustainable future.
Next, it also introduces staking — something that multiple other meme coins have added in past years, but also something that Dogecoin itself doesn’t offer. Thanks to smart contracts powered by Ethereum, DOGE20 wants to be more than a meme coin, and reward its supporters with rewards.
Boom!!! 💥
Another milestone in the bag for #DOGE20! 🎉🐶
We have just raised over $2,000,000! 💰
The excitement never ends with #Dogecoin20, stay tuned for more! 🚀#Memecoins #Altcoins #Crypto #Web3 pic.twitter.com/28AWvdtrGZ
— Dogecoin20 (@DOGE_COIN20) March 18, 2024
Finally, the token has a limited supply of 140 billion DOGE20, unlike Dogecoin, which has an uncapped supply, meaning that it will never reach a maximum number of DOGE coins. This will eventually lead to huge inflation issues, which can still be solved by burning some of the coins. With DOGE20, the supply is limited, but even then, burning remains an option in order to reduce the circulating supply and potentially increase its price moving forward.
The token has an established roadmap, well-developed tokenomics, and even a rewards calculator that will help stakers learn how much they get to earn by staking DOGE20. Best of all, its presale is still ongoing at the time of writing. So far, the token has raised over $9.1 million, all while selling its tokens for $0.00021 per unit. If you wish to join the presale, you can buy DOGE20 in exchange for ETH or USDT, or purchase them with a credit/debit card.
Conclusion
Litecoin is a crypto with a long history, and while it never received the same attention that Bitcoin did, it still found a loyal and supportive community that allowed it to stay among the top-ranking cryptos.
It is not the only fork of Bitcoin that is still ranking relatively high, but it remains as one of the most important cryptocurrencies in the first decade or so of the industry’s existence.
Its creation represented one of the earliest efforts to make Bitcoin better, as its developers explored changing certain aspects of Bitcoin’s technology and code in order to see what can be improved.
Even today, LTC is an asset worth considering, even though it is not often under the spotlight. And, while the regular crypto risks still apply, there are benefits to using it, especially when it comes to payments and making a profit from long-term investing.
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Who founded Litecoin?
Litecoin was founded by Charlie Lee, an MIT graduate and a former Google engineer.
Where to buy Litecoin?
Litecoin can be purchased on a number of cryptocurrency exchanges. However, you can also use online brokers such as eToro, which charges 0% in trading commissions.
What is Litecoin?
Litecoin is a decentralized, open-source cryptocurrency project based on a fork of Bitcoin. It is the crypto industry’s attempt to improve Bitcoin’s technology by making it faster and cheaper.
Is Litecoin Dead?
Not at all, on the contrary, Litecoin is still among the largest and most popular cryptocurrencies in the crypto market. As of March 2024, it ranks as the 21st largest cryptocurrency by market cap, with a daily volume of $644 million.
How many Litecoins are there?
As of March 2024, Litecoin has 74.34 million coins in its circulating supply. However, its total supply consists of 84 million LTC, with the rest having yet to enter circulation.
Is Litecoin legit?
Yes, Litecoin is a legitimate crypto project and not a scam. It has acquired huge popularity thanks to the fact it has improved Bitcoin’s technology. However, with the crypto industry seeing the rise of countless cryptos with numerous use cases, Litecoin does not hold the attention of the market. Even so, its simplicity makes it practical and convenient, especially since it is accepted by numerous online stores.
How to Mine Litecoin?
To mine LTC, you will need a wallet to collect your coins in, and an account with a mining service provider. While many such services are available, you should do your research and carefully decide which one to use.
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