The trend of cryptos has been here for almost 13 years, starting from 3 Jan 2009, when Bitcoin was initially released. By 2021, there were more than 6000 currencies, which are creating and shaping the current market. Although the market is full of several assets, there are quite a few ones that hold the most significant share, which are Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Binance Coin (BNB), Cardano (ADA), and Solana (SOL).

Bitcoin (BTC)

Satoshi Nakamoto, a pseudonym for an unknown individual or group of persons, created the cryptocurrency in 2008. In 2009 an open-source software was released, which was basically a reward-based program for a function called mining. Miners are simply rewarded a specific amount of bitcoin for every block mined.

An initial release price of Bitcoin was 0$, meaning that if you had invested a 100$, you could’ve been a millionaire or billionaire by now, and yet the initial price is unknown; by 2011, the price was howling around $0.30. The record price for Bitcoin is over $68,000 on Nov 10, 2021, and the current price of Bitcoin is around 43,000$ on Jan 17, 2022.

Bitcoin holds almost 40% of market capitalization, being the most prominent crypto and having the number one position in our list for keeping further updates.

Ethereum (ETH)

Vitalik Buterin, a developer and programmer, created Ethereum in 2013. Work on the network began in 2014 and was crowdfunded, with the network becoming live on July 30, 2015. Anyone may use the platform to develop permanent and unchangeable decentralized services that users can interact with.

NFTs are non-interchangeable tokens that are tied to digital works of art or other real-world items and marketed as one-of-a-kind digital assets., may also be created and exchanged on Ethereum.

Also, various cryptocurrencies mainly operate with the ERC-20 network, meaning that Ethereum is responsible for the creation of many altcoins in the network.

By August 2014, during Ethereum ICO, it was sold for $0.31. So far, Ethereum has created a massive network for transactions among Crypto traders. The record price of Ethereum was $4,891.70 on Nov 16, 2021. The current price of Ethereum is $3,270.84 on Jan 17, 2022. By now, Ethereum holds the second position in the market capitalization chart, having ≈19% of the share in the market.

Binance Coin (BNB)

Binance Coin was initially created in the Ethereum blockchain with the ERC-20 network, as previously discussed. The date of the creation is July 2017, and it launched as an ICO offering 100 million BNB tokens and sold for 15 cents each. When released, 40% of tokens were supplied to the BNB founding team, 10% to investors, and the other 50% (100 million) of tokens were offered for public sale.

Currently, Binance is doing periodic quarterly BNB burns, which means that they use 20% of their profits to buy back and permanently burn (Destroy) them, keeping the scarcity and finite amount to provide and maintain the price and value. On the Binance cryptocurrency exchange, BNB may be used to trade and pay fees.

An all-time high of BNB was achieved on May 10, 2021, being worth $690.93. The current price of BNB is $482.76 by Jan 17, 2022. Currently, BNB is the third-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, having a share of ≈4%.

Cardano (ADA)

Released in 2015, Cardano is the largest cryptocurrency to use a proof of stake network. Cardano was founded by one of the co-founders of Ethereum, Charles Hoskinson. Proof of stake technology is basically a more environmentally friendly alternative to proof of work protocols. As stated by Charles Hoskinson, “ Cardano is created to provide a more balanced and sustainable ecosystem.”

Proof of stake network is famous for its technology, which avoids the computational cost of proof of work schemes. It creates a much faster and cheaper operating network, thus providing users with a more transaction-friendly environment.

Cardano achieved its all-time high on Sep 02, 2021, being worth $3.10. When initially released, Cardano was worth $0.0024; the current price for ADA is $1.52 by Jan 17, 2022. It holds 2.4723% of market capitalization and earns fourth place in the chart.

Solana (SOL)

Originated in 2017, Solana was initially created to introduce a new technology of transaction validation called proof of history which claims to be a faster and cheaper alternative for proof of stake technology. After fundraising, Solana hosted a public token auction sponsored by CoinList and raised $1.76 million. Solana became live on Mainnet Beta in March 2020 after raising $1.76 million in a CoinList public token sale.

Basic transaction capabilities and smart contract functionality were available on the project’s beta network. Many consider Solana a long-term rival and alternative of Ethereum, as it has all the criteria regarding speed, environment, and price.

The initial price of Solana was ≈$0.74, the registered record high was $260.06 on Nov 06, 2021, and currently, the cost of one SOL is $142.77 by Jan 17, 2022. Solan takes a 2.1937% share of the market, yet it has a total potential to grow even higher and leave Cardano behind the capitalization chart.