Things change fast in the crypto sphere and today’s hot cryptocurrency may well be tomorrow’s shitcoin. Looking back at the scene a year ago in June 2017 shows a slightly different set of coins and tokens in the top 20. The question is: where are they now?
Aside from Bitcoin, the stalwarts that have stood the test of time over the past 12 months and remain in the top ten are Ethereum, Ripple, and Litecoin. All of the rest have fallen back down the list and have lost out to newcomers such as Eos, Bitcoin Cash and Cardano.
The fourth most popular altcoin in June 2017 was Nem with a market cap of $1.9 billion. Since then it has dropped down to 15th place but with a marginally increased market cap of $2.2 billion. Ethereum Classic was a strong contender at 5th spot with $1.8 billion market cap. Now it is down in 18th with $1.5 billion, a loser in the grand scheme of things.
Dash at 7th with $1.1 billion has dropped to 13th but over doubled its market cap to $2.5 billion. Bitshares was a strong token in mid-2017 at 8th spot with just under a billion dollar market cap. Today it is way down in 34th place with almost half the capitalization.
Stratis was another hot coin sitting at 9th place with $780 million market cap. 12 months later it has slid down to 43rd spot with $420 million, another loser on the list. Monero rounded out the top ten and it is still in a similar spot a year later but with a 235% gain on market cap.
Bytecoin was in 11th spot and has also increased its market cap from $650 million to just over a billion despite sliding back to 22nd place. Waves in 12th spot has lost a lot of ground, falling down the list to 39th position and shedding over $150 million from its market cap. Steem is the next one to drop down the list though its market cap has remained stable at around $580 million. Neo has done very well surging from 44 to 11 with a 300% rise in market cap.
Stellar Lumens has also done well in the year climbing from 17th with $415 million to 7th with $5.4 billion. Zcash and Lisk have remained in similar places while Golem and Augur have dropped out. BitConnect has disappeared completely and Dogecoin has slid down to 42nd place.
Many of the other altcoins simply did not exist in the current form back then. Eos, Cardano, Tron, VeChain, and Ontology are all new kids on the block and have taken some of the losses from last year’s hot cryptos. The question is, how many of them will be around and prospering this time next year.