How the CoinSmiths Pick Their Altcoins

I get asked all the time "What's your favorite coins?"

I don't usually designate it with an answer.

Favorite is relative to since I can love a coin all I want, but if the market for is crap, then I can't even suggest it. There are a lot of aspects that I take into consideration when I am browsing for coins to buy into. This is a set of questions that I suggest you review while picking your coins.

Main tools:

www.coinmarketcap.com

www.coinlib.io

www.discordapp.com

https://coinmarketcal.com/

Masternodes.io

coingecko

First thing that I even say to my husband when he starts bringing up a coin is "What does the chart look like?"

Let's break down just that part first:

- If it's an old coin, does the chart have an over all upward trend?

-New coins are different sometimes, because the chart is irrelevant, too soon in the game due to many factors such as 'dev dumping', 'ICO dumping' or 'Miner's Dumping' I give it a few months to even decide while I watch. Buying a little here and there are encouraged, since that sort of trading does support the project.

-Typically if it has a history of mirroring Bitcoin, I take it as a good sign.

-If it isn't mirroring it, it should have a match trend coin. There are a lot of strong coins that do not follow Bitcoin.

-I think it goes without saying, everything ALWAYS goes up, but if it's over all trend is not going up, it might be a dying coin.

-VOLUME!!!! If the coin has NO MOVEMENT take a pause and find out why. Are the wallets dysfunctional? Has it been released in ICO yet? New to the exchange/on exchange that has very little volume? Worst news is that the developers have left. Best news is that the coin is open source + community, has a strong chance of survival.

"What's the community like?"

I regard this as one of the most important questions. This is something I ask because a chart can look great, but if there is nothing to back the coin outside of it's developed purpose, then it will fail.

If all the coin can advertise is high ROI% on staking and Masternodes and fast transactions, then it's garbage.

Can you really believe in the value of something that was designed to burn out in a few months from too high returns and whales selling thousands of dollars in coins in just the first few weeks because they bought in ICO directly with the devs, who pre-mined their coins, while keeping a portion for themselves and advertising the coins via bounties supported by the minnow ponds desperate to get a slice of cake early enough to get a couple bucks. (This is unfortunately a frequent heard story...)

"When did we hear from the devs last?"

Always check the communication outlets and socials. If they aren't consistent in posting, posting at least once a week/bi-weekly, or they aren't replying to the community when they ask questions or comment concerns, they are not dependable. There are always exceptions to all this, so please use your own discretion to this.

An example I can use is that the developer for Bitrad.io has made it clear that he has a full time job and other responsibilities to care for, so he isn't overly chatty. He does however deliver. Bugs that occur on the site are regularly tended too, and there is word that a  second phone APP may soon be available for android.

Websites aren't everything. I'm not going into analysis over this, because I have a feeling that there are too many personal opinions that get in the way.

So let's revisit the idea of a use-case. This is really really really crucial people. You need to realize that a coin can mine fast, earn you tons, and be fast at transactions, but do you notice that is like boring and pointless without a real reason to use the coin. It how you you get paid for using a freelance platform? Perfect. Platform use for selling and sharing your personal belongings while building localized trust circles? Pretty meaningful. Payment tokens you earn for streaming on a platform? Tight.

It's going to "earn you a lot of money" is not a use case.

We live in a day in age where the market has shifted majority online. You earn money by giving your time and gaining audiances, and providing income to people enjoying their hobbies and sharing their cultures. Governments and Banks are afraid of the coming tides, and we are on the fore front of open ledgers and fairer distribution of cash for everyone. If your coin hodls aren't doing any of these things, then you might need to make a few more picks, in case it back fires.

Things that we prize as important when picking coins:

-The ability to earn in a unique fashion in congruence to it's mining/staking/masternodes.

This is not limited to built in interfaces. I'm talking referrals and affiliates. Bounties and prizes. Streaming and faucets. This is all support for the coin, and it's a really good sign if the community is using and creating their own resources,

-Read the news. You want to see them meeting other coin developers, and hosting events. You need to see that they just released an improvement to their platform, or adjusted the app, or anything! Gosh, are they active?

-Value is important in proportions. If the market cap of a coin is less than a million, you have a lot of details to gauge, so be cautious, this is where community is the most important. You also must take into account how many coins are released and total amount of coins.

-Locked Developer funds: This may seems like a strange thing, but some devs are only paid in their own coin. So when they get all their coins at once in the beginning, it isn't really a good sign. Sometimes though with pre-mined coins, the devs will create a designated wallet in which their funds are tied up for a certain amount of time while they are still producing the product and introducing it to the public. If they aren't consistently tending to the coin during that time, the coin could lose value, hence the dedication to keep it up while they are still waiting to get paid themselves. I've read lock-ins for 2-5 years, or as little as a year from the ICO.

These traits of studying the community and developers is crucial, because you're fleshing out a company. You're testing how strong their structure is, as well as the integrity of the builders, surrounded by their community.

Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies are used by less then 2.5% of the world's population, and that acknowledging countries that have integrated the full use of crypto into their markets. Altcoins are absolutely necessary, and if last December was any display of Bitcoin's strength in value, it was also a reflect of it's weakness in being a transaction coin. We will need others to handle the volume of the market as it exponeniates beyond the tech savvy and ambitious entrepreneurs. Companies will bloom and flourish in ways we could never imagine.

Welcome to the summer of alts, the markets are slow, and the alts are plenty.