Shares in Grayscale Investments' Grayscale Litecoin Trust, or LTCN, have been trading at a whopping 1,800% premium over the market rate of their underlying asset, Litecoin (LTC). $319 per Litecoin? This difference is primarily due to retail investors' inability to purchase shares directly from Grayscale Investments, whose funds are aimed exclusively at accredited investors. It costs $319 to buy a share in Grayscale Litecoin Trust. However, its LTC holdings per share are currently worth just $16.42. That means it's almost 20 times more expensive to buy Litecoin via the trust than regular spot exchanges. LTCN shares have recently traded for …

The start of a new month has brought renewed fervor from the cryptocurrency market as Bitcoin's (BTC) price steadily climbed from a low of $43,537 on Feb. 28 to a high of $49,200 during Monday's early trading hours. As traders get excited about positive moves in the market and look to reenter positions, the increasing use of decentralized finance (DeFi) continues to drive fees on the Ethereum network higher, shining the spotlight on the top layer-two protocols that offer working solutions. Three protocols that have emerged as top layer-two contenders with working platforms are Polygon, xDai and Loopring. Each offers …

DeFi has steadily grown in prominence over the past year thanks in large part to the strong foundations established by decentralized exchanges (DEX) that enable easy access to the latest tokens and projects. While there have been previous iterations of DEX user interfaces, such as IDEX or Etherdelta, it wasn’t until Uniswap launched that trading in the DeFi network really took off and facilitated the launch of the finance tokens. Here are six of the top-performing tokens in the decentralized finance sector. UNI/USDT Uniswap has risen from the humble beginnings of a simple user interface that allowed for a token …

Cardano's Ada received a fresh wave of optimism and buying volume on Feb. 26 that pushed its price to a new all-time high of $1.29, making it the third-ranked cryptocurrency by market capitalization. Data from Cointelegraph Markets and TradingView shows that Ada surged 27% from a low of $0.98 during the early trading hours on Feb. 26 to its new high at $1.29 on record trading volume. Momentum for the project has been building throughout the month of February following the integration of the Mary upgrade to Cardano’s testnet on Feb. 3. The upgrade enables smart contract functionality, helping transform …

Bitcoin’s (BTC) strong bull run and the immense popularity of the decentralized finance space have attracted several new investors to cryptocurrencies. A report from Crypto.com shows a massive increase in crypto users as the figure rose from 66 million in May 2020 to 106 million by January this year. Contrary to the popular notion that new crypto users are mostly speculating on the price, data from Unchained Capital shows that investors who bought in the past three to five years are still holding and are not yet tempted to book profits. Unlike the 2017 bull market where many low-cap altcoins …

On Feb. 3, Cardano conducted a hard fork and successfully integrated the Mary upgrade to the testnet, transforming the blockchain into a multiasset network similar to Ethereum. This event seems to be one of the reasons for the impressive 475% year-to-date rally of ADA, and the altcoin is now causing unexpected ripples in the derivatives markets. Since the end of December 2020, ADA's $81-million aggregate futures open interest hiked to the current $580 million, becoming the third-largest derivatives market, behind Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH). Data indicates this was not purely a technical adjustment, as Cardano's on-chain and trading metrics …

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) holders have no reason to celebrate, despite the 46% year-to-date gains in U.S. dollar terms. One year ago, the altcoin was the third-largest by market capitalization. It now risks dropping out of the top 10, having been surpassed by other cryptocurrencies including Litecoin (LTC) and Chainlink's LINK. After three years of continuous devaluation, BCH finally traded below 0.01 Bitcoin (BTC) on Feb. 22. Besides being psychological support, it marks a 96.5% devaluation from its highest close of 0.285 BTC on Aug. 2, 2017. Even though both cryptocurrencies' combined hash rate was somewhat comparable at the time, it …

The cryptocurrency market is showing signs of progress following a multiday sell-off that saw the total market capitalization drop by more than $400 billion as Bitcoin's (BTC) price briefly fell below $46,000. While the majority of altcoins have entered a consolidation phase that includes a retest of underlying support levels, several projects have started to regain lost ground after new developments reignited investors' optimism. ADA/USDT Cardano's ADA started the year with a bullish spark that saw its price increase 624% from $0.165 on Jan. 2 to a high of $1.20 on Feb. 20. This week's sharp correction pulled the price …

Over the past few weeks, the price of Golem's GLM network token saw a strong rally that pushed the token to a three-year high at $0.65. The altcoin also underwent a strong pump on Feb. 19, but most of the gains evaporated as Bitcoin (BTC) corrected below $45,000 during the past three days. Nevertheless, GLM still holds a 230% gain in February alone. Golem is an Ethereum-based decentralized application that enables users to rent out computing power resources. Since November 2020, the project has been migrating from GNT to GLM tokens after deploying a new ERC-20 contract. Although most exchanges …

Bitcoin's (BTC) sharp correction below $45,000 sent shockwaves throughout the entire market for a second day and many altcoins are fighting to hold the gains they've accrued since the start of the year. Two exceptions to the current downturn are Solana (SOL) and Cosmos (ATOM), which have both managed to experience minor price breakouts following recent bullish developments for each project. Data from Cointelegraph Markets and TradingView shows that SOL and ATOM saw initial price dips in the early trading hours of trading on Feb. 23 but both were able to quickly bounce back and outperform the wider market for …

Cointelegraph Markets Pro, a data platform designed to level the playing field for cryptocurrency market participants, is now available to the public following a successful live testing period. The platform, which has been in development for a year, is the result of exhaustive analysis of the crypto markets and the key drivers of asset price movements. It was developed jointly by Cointelegraph and The TIE, a leading provider of crypto data, analytics and software that counts major hedge funds, market makers and over-the-counter desks among its clients. Testing the VORTECS Score At the heart of the platform is the VORTECS …

Interoperability has emerged as the hot topic in February as platforms like Binance Smart Chain and Polkadot work on building Ethereum network bridges that allow users to escape high transaction costs and network congestion. Fantom (FTM) is the latest project to receive a boost by offering cross-chain functionality with Ethereum, and data from Cointelegraph Markets and TradingView shows a 1,570% increase in FTM price from $0.025 on Jan. 23 to a new high of $0.43 on Feb. 21. Three fundamental reasons for Fantom's current rally are the release of a cross-chain bridge between Ethereum and Fantom, the roll-out of on-chain …