It was not that long ago that many in the cryptocurrency community had pronounced Litecoin dead. Nevertheless, the Litecoin community stayed the course and refused to abandon their coin. Their persistence is paying off.
The litecoin price rose more than 60% this week in anticipation of and following its June 19 listing on BitStamp. Litecoin now has EUR, USD, and BTC trading pairs on the platform.
As Europe’s first licensed bitcoin exchange, BitStamp handles a great deal of cryptocurrency trading volume, and the Litecoin community was understandably ecstatic about BitStamp’s decision.
Litecoin Price Gains Weight
Litecoin began the week hovering in the $28-32 range, and it remained there until June 16, when it began to experience a profound climb. By June 17, it was trading above $40. On June 19, the litecoin price briefly crossed the $50 threshold leading up to litecoin trading pairs going live but had fallen back to $48.97 at the time of writing.
7-Day Litecoin Price Chart from CoinMarketCap
This is the first time litecoin has pierced the $50 mark since November 2013. After falling from this peak, the litecoin price spent several years averaging below $5, and it held a value of $10 as recently as April. This means the litecoin price has rallied more than 500% in the past two months.
Litecoin has a 24-hour volume of $1.276 billion, a remarkable feat considering the Litecoin market cap is currently only $2.5 billion. In fact, litecoin’s 24-hour volume is only $67 million less than bitcoin’s, even though bitcoin has a market cap 17x as large.
Litecoin currently has the fourth largest cryptocurrency market cap, according to CoinMarketCap.
Vindication for Litecoin Creator Charlie Lee
BitStamp’s addition of Litecoin support was vindication for Litecoin creator Charlie Lee, who says BitStamp was far from open to adding Litecoin support when he first approached them about it in 2013. As he triumphantly posted on Twitter:
Hell has frozen over!
I still remember the "not a chance" look @nejc_kodric gave me when I asked him about BitStamp adding LTC in 2013.
Other Factors Affecting the Litecoin Price
These are exciting times for the Litecoin community. Earlier this year, Charlie Lee spearheaded the activation of SegWit, which helped solve scalability and transaction malleability issues. The transition to SegWit should also allow Lightning Networks to be built on top of Litecoin, as Lee noted in a blog post explaining his vision for SegWit.
This month, Lee resigned from his job as director of engineering at Coinbase so he could devote his full attention to Litecoin development. This is not a decision one makes lightly, so Lee’s resignation demonstrated a firm commitment to the growth and development of Litecoin. Both of these developments have likely spurred investor confidence in Litecoin.
Featured image from Shutterstock.
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