The vast majority of cryptocurrencies will fail

As can be seen from CoinMarketCap.com , there are more than 660 cryptocurrencies today, but only a few are widely used. The authors of all currencies should not avoid the question of whether there is really a target market positioning and willingness to expand practicality before creating these cryptocurrencies.

Some of these competing coins cannot be mined, some have pre-mining, and some have irregular and ultra-low daily trading volumes (even as low as $11). From the current perspective, these currencies have no development vision or plan.

As a result, some altcoins exist only as brands. David Duccini, executive director of the nonprofit Digital Trust, said: "Most altcoins have failed because they are empty 'pure trademark' altcoins with no real application."

He explained: "If you look at the list of digital currencies on the CoinMarketCap.com webpage, they just modify some numbers, change the diagram, and fork. A few miners will tangle with his algorithm - such as output time, total currency amount, etc. They tend to focus on the characteristics of the currency rather than the use of the currency, which makes these currencies have no practicality. BTC or LTC, or Dogcoin (DOGECOIN), they are the original "trademark" digital currency representatives, but people are no longer satisfied with this. In order to have actual value, they must have a market and external practical value other than digital currency exchanges, otherwise they will enter a vicious circle, pure miners and speculators between the absorption and dumping of goods."

Oleg Khovayko, CTO of Emercoin, agrees with Duccini. He compares altcoins to 70% of startups, which die within the first three years of creation. He believes that the proliferation of MLM coins has affected the growth of some altcoins, which have clear goals but are forgotten at the bottom of the list.

“The impact is there, but it’s not decisive,” he said in an interview via Skype. “Many altcoins have very interesting features, and I like to see them exist in the world.”

Why does he consider them “non-deterministic?” He said, “According to CoinMarketCap.com, the market cap of all cryptocurrencies is $13 billion, and $10 billion is in BTC. So imagine if all altcoins disappeared and all the money flowed into BTC, its price would increase by 30%, which is comparable to Bitcoin’s monthly fluctuations.”

As for the price of Emercoin, after btc38 opened the EMC/RMB trading pair on July 20, the daily trading volume rose to US$2.1 million, the price almost doubled, and the trading volume increased fivefold.

Lisk CEO Max Kordek has a similar view, saying that many cryptocurrencies are just “coins” that are stuck in an endless loop and do not solve any real social problems.

“I can’t speak for every cryptocurrency, but many never have a grand purpose, target market, or utility to build,” he said via email. “However, even projects with a great vision can have problems (regular startup failure rate is about 90%. The number is probably even higher in the blockchain industry). I think the biggest mistake everyone makes is trying to solve everything at once and trying to implement dozens of different features. It’s a marathon, and I don’t think we’ll see big results in the next 12-18 months, it takes time to build the foundation, it takes time to build a good product, then it takes time to design a great user experience, and then you can expect to have hundreds or thousands of users, not before all of those things are done. So stay in this industry for a long time and stick with it. That’s the key for me.”