The article is for educational purposes and doesn’t contain investment advice.
Bytecoin is one of the oldest cryptocurrencies – the “grandfather” of many anonymous digital coins. Although the coin has a long history, things are not going very well for BCN. Freewallet will try to figure out what happened with Bytecoin in our price prediction for 2020 and 2025.
What is Bytecoin
The Bytecoin story starts in 2012 when an unknown developer known as “amjuarez” decided to create a new cryptocurrency. Unlike over devs, he didn’t want to create a new and improved version of Bitcoin. He didn’t even use its source code, as many other devs did, and wrote his own code from scratch.
Later, more specialists joined him, and together they started working on a project that reflected their personal conception of what the ideal cryptocurrency would be, namely:
- completely anonymous;
- accessible to everyone;
- as safe as possible.
The result of their work was the Bytecoin cryptocurrency. It is still unknown why they chose such a name, as many traders confused the coin with Bitcoin. The developers in their turn say that it has nothing to do with BTC and their project doesn’t depend on it.
Bytecoin blockchain value
Bytecoin is based on the unique CryptoNote protocol. It is a predecessor of the CryptoNight protocol, which is used in the Monero cryptocurrency. The main features are:
- Single-use addresses – to perform any transaction the protocol generates an address consisting of the real address of the sender and a random key. As a result, the transaction becomes untraceable. Even if you were to send several transactions to one person they would look like entirely unrelated payments transferred to different addresses.
- Ring signature – the transaction is approved by one person from a list of validators, but nobody knows by whom exactly. Moreover, the ring transaction contains links to other transactions, which could have been sent to anyone. This mechanism of address mixing not only complicates the tracking of transactions, but also eliminates the possibility of changes by third parties.
- Smooth emission – the reward for opening a block decreases very smoothly, so a change in the speed of mining does not have a profound impact on market value.
- Unique algorithm – Bytecoin uses on a Egalitarian algorithm based on POW. However, mining speed doesn’t depend on hashrate, but access to RAM. Initially there’s no need to use special equipment to mine BCN, so PC or laptop was enough. However, today you’d better to use ASICs.
The main aim of Bytecoin is to enable fast and anonymous payments between people around the globe. By design, coins can be used to pay for goods and services, while not depending on official structures and financial regulators. But for most BCN users, the currency remains mostly just a trading option.
Bytecoin price analysis
When the coin first appeared in 2012 it cost absolutely nothing. Only in 2014, when the cryptocurrency got listed on a few exchanges did the rate increase to $0.000005. The market capitalization was about $9 mln.
By 2017 the price of BCN remained low but in the second half of the year, the coin started growing. The coin was added to Poloniex and HitBTC and gradually the price achieved $0.001 and a capitalisation of $700 mln.
In winter 2017, when the cryptocurrency market turned bearish, Bytecoin suddenly surged. The price of the digital currency reached the 1 cent mark and market capitalisation was $1 bln. That propelled BCN into the top 30 of cryptocurrencies.
The price jump was possibly triggered by two factors: the fall of the top cryptocurrencies and impressive Bytecoin roadmap presented in February 2017. However, the hype surrounding the cryptocurrency went down and the rate corrected itself. The price fell to the $0.001-0.002 range.
By the end of April, news broke that BCN was going to be added to Binance. This revived interest in the cryptocurrency and the exchange rate began to grow again. On May 8, the coin appeared on the exchange, and literally in a day, its price soared, gaining 114%. Unfortunately, since then the coin has been downtrending and is currently traded for $0.0003.
Bytecoin price prediction
Bytecoin price predictions for 2020 – 2025 by WalletInvestor
According to WalletInvestor, the price of BCN will fall to $0.00147 until April 2020. For several months, the price will fluctuate between $0.00117 and $0.004038 and continue falling to $0.000173. In 2025, the price of the coin won’t be very impressive. Bytecoin will be traded for $0.00019-$.00021.
Bytecoin price predictions for 2020, 2022, 2024 by CoinLiker
CoinLiker claims that BCN will increase in price in the long-run. In 2020, it will cost $0.005012 and in three years it will go even higher to $0.009874. In five years the coin will achieve $0.022777.
Bytecoin price predictions for 2020 – 2025 by CryptoGround
CryptoGround has a surprisingly positive BCN price forecast. By the end of this year, the coin will cost $0.0004. In one year it will achieve $0.0006 and five years later, in 2025, it will cost $0.0103.
Final thoughts about Bytecoin’s future price
Bytecoin has a dubious future. Growth looks only possible if widespread adoption occurs. Today it is very unlikely that the coin will become widespread for several reasons.
- Slow development – for 7 years the team created several versions of their wallet, performed a few hard forks, etc. but still it has not been enough. While other projects work on PR and Marketing campaigns and the practical implementation of their technologies, Bytecoin has been focused mostly on the development of their blockchain technology.
- Highly competitive environment – back in 2012 BCN was the only cryptocurrency focused on anonymity. But today it has tough competitors. For example, Monero and ZCash are more favourable among traders.
Currently, it seems that Bytecoin is supported by the work of very few people. They are mostly working on the network to improve anonymity and blockchain features. The lack of real-world applications for this technology has strongly impeded the price growth of BCN.
Disclaimer: This article should not be considered financial advice and serves only as informative material. The cryptocurrency market is subject to high volatility and regulatory uncertainty. You should do a substantial amount of research before engaging in financial activities with cryptocurrencies.