This year marked the third bear market in the history of Bitcoin; a year in which BTC lost 70% of its value, and the second biggest cryptocurrency, Ethereum, lost 85%.
Looking down the list of altcoins those numbers don’t get any better. At least not for the majority. However, there are a small handful of cryptocurrencies that have quietly bucked the 2018 trend, and have carved their own successful path through the crypto landscape.
Some simply weathered the storm better than others, while several diverged completely from the surrounding market. Here are five of the most bullish coins and tokens of 2018 so far.
Chainlink (LINK)
There was hesitance to include this token in the list since it followed the rest of the altcoin market in a 37% decline between the dips of April and June. But ever since then it has been nothing but upward trajectory for LINK as it maintained higher lows even throughout the dips of August and September.
Recent news that Bithumb is to add Chainlink resulted in another pump for the token in mid-September, and could help snare another higher low when the next dip comes.
DigiByte (DGB)
Lowers lows have been common throughout every dip of 2018, yet DigiByte has managed to achieve just the opposite. The DGB/USD valuation has been sustained by higher lows through every dip of the year.
From early April’s low of $0.016689, DGB went on to $0.018986 by the dip of late June – a 13.8% rise. For some perspective, Bitcoin lost around 10.7% in the same timeframe.
From there DGB kept on rising despite fluctuations, and by August’s dip had gained another 10.8% as it hit another higher low of $0.021042.
In fact, the dip of September 12th is the only time this year that the DGB valuation has recorded a lower low. The price of $0.020744 recorded on that date marked a 1.4% loss for DGB since the previous low, although it has since recovered 25% of that figure and returned to the $0.025 range.
Metaverse ETP (ETP)
Metaverse ETP sunk throughout the summer months like most, but from the end of June has grown 484% in value, rising from a valuation in the $0.50 range, up to the latest coin price of $3.14.
The rise of Metaverse throughout Q3 came as a surprise to many, and few have been able to pinpoint a clear catalyst. However, the coin is heavily traded against the Chinese yen, and is finds itself heavily wash-traded and used for transaction mining on the TOPBTC exchange.
Binance Coin (BNB)
Q3 of 2018 has been less kind to Binance Coin than the preceding quarters, but the fact that BNB has recorded net gains for the year makes it worthy of a mention.
BNB’s actual token price on January 1st was $7.96, meaning Binance Coin has grown 21% over the last nine months up to the current price in the $9.70 range.
At one point BNB had surged 119% for 2018 when it reached a valuation of $17.44 on June 7th, but that momentum couldn’t be sustained.
Dogecoin (DOGE)
Unlike some of the coins mentioned above, DOGE did fall to consecutive lower lows throughout most of 2018, but Q3 saw a brash reversal of fortunes as it was added to Yahoo Finance, and Elon Musk began to take an interest.
From August’s low in the $0.00214 range, DOGE climbed 161% to the currently traded price in the $0.00561 range, completely subverting the majority of the market in its ascendance from joke coin to trend setter.
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