Author – Waldo Alencar – 02/23/2018
On last December, Litecoin ($LTC) reached its All Time High, first hitting a high of $380 on December 19th. The currency then crashed again with lows of $113 on early February. Nevertheless, suddenly, Litecoin got back in the saddle and saw a 25% bump. The surge can be explained by the launch of a new payments solution, LitePay. But other causes might explain the rise of the silver phoenix.
Litecoin’s price has risen more than 50% after the announcement that LitePay payment processor would be soon released. The sudden bullish volume made the cryptocurrency back to the Two-Thousand level, price that was not seen since January 21. Litecoin now ranks 5th in the Market Cap list.
The founders of Litecoin have seen a number of positive stories published in recent weeks. A large part of the reason for the LTC’s gain during this period can be attributed to the launch of LitePay, which was first announced in the days before Christmas 2017. It is scheduled for release on this Monday, February 26.
The company made the announcement on Twitter on February 13: https://twitter.com/LitePayInc/status/963245378618343424
So – what does LitePay do?
LitePay will offer many of the same features as BitPay: it will give companies the ability to accept LTC payments that are settled in fiat currency. In addition, it will issue Litecoin debit cards, which users can recharge with LTC and use at virtually any retailer.
LitePay is the payment processor of Litecoin where shops, sellers and retailers can accept Litecoin payments instantly, independent of fiat currency, from anywhere in the world. A Litecoin wallet will be available where users can load litecoins onto a Visa-compatible LitePay card which will be supported worldwide.
According to The Express, it is a game-changer for Litecoin: it would allow businesses to accept Litecoin without worrying about price volatility because the payment can be converted into dollars immediately. When businesses accept the cryptocurrency at a given price at a given time, they will be paid that final value – they do not have to be concerned about any price changes.
LitePay users will be able to convert litecoins to U.S. dollars and vice versa through the Visa-compatible LitePay cards, which can be used at all cash points or business that support Visa payments. The LitePay Visa card can be used wherever Visa cards are accepted – even ATMs – and takes the fiat money directly from your virtual Litecoin wallet. However, it is not clear yet if the service will work only with a LitePay wallet or if any Litecoin wallet is suitable for the service.
LitePay will charge a 1% fee per transaction. This cost is much cheaper than the standard credit card fees (~3%) and the BitPay transaction fee (~$5).
Microsoft also announced plans to use a Litecoin platform as the basis for its decentralized identity system. Any news that brings Litecoin closer to the mainstream may have a positive impact. But LitePay and Microsoft are not the only reason why Litecoin is trending again.
Litecoin Cash Fork
A new hardfork is planned for Litecoin. This isn’t new for the cryptocurrency, since there are already 3 other Litecoin forks: Litecoin Ultra (LTCU), Litecoin Gold (LCG) and Litecoin Plus (LCP).
Litecoin Cash ($LCC) landed on a Russian cryptocurrency called Yobit and, in a timeframe of a couple of days, the coin pumped almost 1,000%. LCC is not supported by many of the major cryptocurrency exchanges yet.
However, Litecoin’s Founder, Charlie Lee, gave a public service announcement a few weeks ago via Twitter dismissing the project, calling it a “scam” meant to confuse Litecoin owners and that it was no way related to the actual Litecoin team.
According to Coincodex.com, Litecoin Cash fork work as expected and on schedule. Litecoin Cash is promising new tokens to existing holders at block 1,371,111. It will award Litecoin holders 10 Litecoin Cash coins ($LCC) for each original Litecoin token ($LTC).
Besides that fact, there is another good hint for the recent pump: Chinese traders and the Chinese New Year’s Eve.
Chinese New Year’s Eve
This celebration lasts over two weeks long and follows the Lunar calendar. In 2018, the New Year’s Eve was celebrated on February, 15th.Traditionally, Chinese families get together on New Year’s Eve and enjoy a dinner together and then they clean their houses the next day to sweep away any bad fortune from the year before.
The first theory is that teens received their New Year’s Eve gifts, called ‘lucky money’, on New Year’s Day and might have taken them and invested in the most popular cryptocurrencies.
There is another belief that Chinese crypto traders do not want to get into new investments and trading during the Chinese New Year, as they have a long period of rest and celebration. After the New Year, then the Chinese will get back to the markets. If that is the case, we might see some volatility.
Market Summary
In a nutshell, Litecoin price for today is $206.69. It has a current circulating supply of 55.3 Million coins and a total market cap of $11,435,755,705 USD. On the other hand, Litecoin Cash price is $4.99, with an unknown market cap, according to coinmarketcap.com.
It is a red morning for the Top Cryptocurrencies. By the time of this publication, the Top 5 Cryptocurrencies market values are:
Bitcoin $10,281.70
Ethereum $825.17
Ripple $0.970974
Bitcoin Cash $1,238.40
Litecoin $203.83
$LTC $BTC $ETH $BCH $XRP $XMR $LCC $LTCU $LCG $LCP
References
[1] https://www.express.co.uk/finance/city/918797/Litecoin-price-2018-why-is-Litecoin-rising-cryptocurrency-surges-today-litepay
[2] https://www.tradingview.com/chart/LTCUSD/UwU2QOjF-Litecoin-Rises-35-After-LitePay-Launch-Announcement/
https://en.insider.pro/topnews/2018-02-05/Litecoin-launch-litepay-transaction-processor/
[3] https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2962794.80
[4] https://www.reddit.com/r/Tronix/comments/7xw6jo/this_is_why_chinese_new_year_is_mentioned_as_an/
[5] https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoCurrency/comments/7xw05r/this_bull_run_could_have_been_predicted_in_2016/
