In a recent interview at Consensus 2024, Litecoin creator Charlie Lee discussed the growth and adoption of the OG cryptocurrency over the last six years, and his expectations for the future given LTC’s resilience.
Lee spoke about numerous tailwinds and all-too-familiar positive undercurrents that might tip the scales for Litecoin in terms of investor interest.
During the past six years, Litecoin has gained a lot of adoption and usage. For example on BitPay – one of the largest payment processors, Litecoin has actually overtaken Bitcoin as the number one used cryptocurrency for people paying with crypto. So that’s kind of a surprising turn of events but very promising.”
On Bitpay, “Litecoin has actually overtaken bitcoin as the number one used cryptocurrency for people paying with crypto,” @Litecoin creator @satoshilite says.
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Asked about his ‘war stories’ as an OG in the space, Lee highlighted that the biggest pitfall is that people get in when the price is peaking, “when there’s so much news, everyone’s talking about it and people hear about bitcoin”.
He said that “since Bitcoin is very volatile, it can drop 80%-90% in a year or even half a year”.
“When that happens, those people get wiped out. People get in at a high and sell at a low and they get wiped out from the space,” he added.
Lee went onto give a piece of indirect friendly advice, saying that newcomers should buy in slowly, have conviction and be able to hold through the volatility.
Asked about a potential Litecoin ETF and potential regulatory hurdles, Lee was not concerned, saying “it’s easy to get [the ETF] passed because it’s a commodity just like Bitcoin”.
Presently, the question revolves around demand, according to Lee.
When there is enough demand, an ETF will happen. I believe it’s a matter of time not ‘if’.
An Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) gives everyone the ability to invest in an asset such as Bitcoin. According to Charlie, this is good for the space and it does not infringe upon decentralisation because at any time, users and entities can self-custody their coins.
By taking control of funds, users or entities are inadvertently taking due diligence measures which are practically impossible to achieve in traditional finance without third party trust.
Lee then elaborated on the double-sided reasons for Bitcoin adoption; speculation and usage as a money transmitter in countries with an inadequate monetary regime. However, the underlying core strength for Bitcoin and Litecoin is the technology, per Lee.
Litecoin exchanges hands at around $80 at the time of writing. Expectations of a 4-digit Litecoin in the near future remain high among LTC enthusiasts.
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