Top 12 Coins for Long Term Crypto Investment

Bitcoin was created by the pseudonymous Satoshi Nakamoto in 2009 after publishing the 2008 whitepaper. It remains the first cryptocurrency, and the largest with a total market cap of about $2.17 trillion.

Its decentralized nature and limited supply makes it preferable for investors, media, and businesses. The Bitcoin chain operates on Proof of Work consensus mechanism to secure transactions. In return, the miners win reward for their efforts.

Ethereum was launched in 2014 co-founded by Vitalik Buterin, introducing smart contract functionality. This enables developers to create dApps and automated contracts. Ethereum has also upgraded to Proof of Stake consensus mechanism. This enhances scalability and energy efficiency.

Solana was co-founded in 2017 by Anatoly Yakovenko with the goal of solving blockchain’s biggest challenge, speed and scalability. It is recognized for its speed and sclalability, offering a transaction speed of approx. 65,000 per second. It uses the Proof of History consensus mechanism which synchronizes time across the network. Solana has become a popular choice for DeFi, NFTs, and dApps, making it one of the strongest Ethereum rivals.

Polkadot works towards blockchain interoperability, having launched in 2017 by  Dr. Gavin Wood, an Ethereum co-founder. It enables easier communication across blockchain networks. It further allows collaboration and innovation, enabling projects to interact and share resources.

Thus, it has also become a preferred platform for building scalable and interoperable dApps.

Cardano offers a secure and scalable platform for P2P transactions, using the Proof of Stake algorithm. It also prioritizes energy efficiency and sustainability while maintaining higher throughput. Cardano offers a structured architecture and focuses on safety. 

It employs peer-reviewed academic methods for upgrades, ensuring sustainability and formal verification. This makes it a preferred choice for building dApps, with a total market value exceeding $27 billion. 

Avalanche came into the limelight in 2018, founded by Emin Gün Sirer and Cornell professor. The platform enables quick and secure transactions in a decentralized manner, powered by $AVAX, its native token.

Avalanche also has an innovative consensus mechanism and incentivized participation model. This helps encourage active engagement within its ecosystem with a total value locked (TVL) of around $1.99 billion, according to DefilLama data.

Polygon Matic (now Polygon) began operating in 2017, after being established by Jaynti Kanani, Sandeep Nailwal, and Anurag Arjun with an objective to scale solutions on Ethereum. The Layer-2 project offers faster transaction speed and affordability.

It also focuses on interoperability and expands Ethereum’s ecosystem, with a TVL of $1.21 billion. 

Injective offers lightning-fast transactions and smart contracts support. It enables developers to create advanced financial applications. $INJ has utility within the platform and shows a growth potential.

Why choose Injective?

Investors choose $INJ due to its rapid growth and innovative approach to DeFi. Injective also supports various DeFi applications.

Uniswap was created in 2029 by Hayden Adams, after getting his inspiration from Vitalik Buterin, Ethereum co-founder. Its decentralized model allows Peer-to peer (P2P) token swaps from users’ wallets. The project’s governance token $UNI allows users to participate in decision making.

Uniswap also has a user-friendly interface, and is attractive choice for investors seeking transparency.

Cosmos was founded in 2016 by Jae Kwon and Ethan Buchman, who built the Tendermint consensus engine. Tendermint later became part of Informal Systems. Cosmos helps enable interoperability between disparate blockchains. This helps ensure seamless communication and collaboration.

It also has a stronger consensus mechanism and lower transaction costs. $ATOM, the native token of Cosmos, allows users to stake their tokens. With this, they get a chance to contribute to the network’s security, earning rewards in the process.

XRP is a streamlined solution for international transactions. It offers fast and cost-effective payment solutions. Ripple Labs’ is also making initiatives to incorporate Automated Market Makers into the XRP Ledger. This further strengthens its position in the cryptocurrency landscape.

• Reduced risk

The extreme volatility of crypto markets can profit traders willing to study infinite market moves and carefully buy and sell. Still, there is the same risk of substantial losses. Potential long-term cryptos also have significant risk, but long-term holding is a way to somewhat avoid volatility and the stresses of short-term trading. Long-term cryptos often have higher market capitalization with liquidity spread amongst investors and markets, lowering the risk of whale movements or pump-and-dump scenarios. 

• Greater potential return 

Time may allow smaller investments to gain substantial traction, particularly for early buyers, and if a potential long-term crypto or its native blockchain builds its use base over a period. There is a similar risk of losses, but there are also investors who have carefully picked “the next big thing” in crypto and profited. 

• Avoiding scams, ICOs, and weak projects

Some investors seek a profit from a riskier strategy, say choosing an ICO coin or NFT, especially buying before a crypto is listed on exchanges. However, choosing cryptos with long-term potential and perhaps that have already become somewhat established can avoid some of the risk and stress of newer coins. 

1. Define goals and identify quality projects
The first part of any strategy should be to identify investment goals and risk tolerance, deciding how much can afford to be lost and over what time period. Investment goals might range from preserving and growing wealth to supporting an innovative technology or particular project of interest.

2. Regular investments
A common strategy for long-term investment, which helps avoid investing more than can be lost, is to invest regular smaller amounts over time. This strategy also helps to avoid some of the impacts of market volatility and accumulates assets over time.

3. Long-term holding
Holding potential long-term cryptos may be a strategy that sees investments span some years. This strategy is one of muting out a certain degree of short-term market volatility.

4. Support a technology of the future
Cryptocurrencies, similarly to stocks, allow investors to support a technology or innovation with future potential, contributing to its success and with the hope of profits when the project gains traction.

5. Active portfolio management
Long-term investing still needs active portfolio management consisting of monitoring project performance, market trends, regulation, consumer sentiment, and competitor awareness. An informed investor can mitigate some market risk and make portfolio changes as required.

6. Risk management
Managing risk is not only being thoroughly informed and knowing one’s risk tolerance but also diversifying investments and, in some cases, taking advantage of stop-loss orders.