You constantly hear about finding the latest 100, 200, or even an elusive 1000x gem. Still, you are banking on a few killer partnerships and mass adoption of these little-known cryptos to see them go parabolic, only to stagnate and fade away.
At the opposite end of the spectrum, the idea of BTC, ETH, and large-cap altcoins doing a 100x (let alone 40-50x for the foreseeable future) is pushing it. They remain solid options in the long run but far from life-changing for anyone putting a small amount in.
What are the alternatives here?
Enter small- to mid-cap altcoins/tokens.
These assets have established a reputation as more reliable cryptos, i.e., less likely to be scams, particularly mid-caps) but are still far from their peak.
Based on definitions by Coinbase, a small-cap has a market cap of <$1 billion, whereas mid-caps have a market cap between $1 billion and $10 billion.
Note that this often refers to the circulating market cap rather than a fully diluted valuation (the market cap if the max supply were in circulation).
As a reminder, there’s no guarantee that these cryptos will pump, even amid a bull run when most of the market is rapidly appreciating.
Besides the nine cryptos in focus, I will also identify others worth following, so there’s plenty to discuss.
Let’s begin.
Pyth Network (PYTH): ≈$1.75B circulating market cap, ≈$1.43 per token, $1.20 ATH, approx. 36% of the max supply in circulation
Category: AI/AGI (Decentralised oracles)
Pyth Network is an emerging player in the decentralised oracle space. It helps provide smart contracts with rapid, secure, dependable data from institutional sources.
Users can also obtain historical market stats from any Pyth feed and apply them to on- and off-chain products via Pyth’s Benchmark feature. Moreover, its Entropy product can securely generate random numbers for blockchain applications.
While PYTH is native to Solana, the protocol claims to offer more than 540 price feeds across over 80 compatible networks, including Ethereum and EVM-compatible alternatives.
Some of these include L1s like BNB Chain, Polygon, Sui, NEAR, and Aptos, with a vast swathe of servicing popular L2s such as Optimism, Arbitrum, and Base, to name a few.
Wrapped versions of PYTH can exist on these abovementioned networks via a permissionless bridge, notably Wormhole.
Swiss financial institution AMINA Bank declared a strategic partnership with Pyth Network in July, incorporating the latter’s real-time price feeds of digital assets into its systems.
The following month, Pyth Network announced a partnership between Sony Group and Startale. The former will provide live data feeds to Sony’s upcoming L2 project, Soneium.
Its biggest and most renowned competitor is Chainlink, one of the first decentralised oracle networks to hit the scene. Despite mediocre gains so far this year, LINK remains a major token.
Pavle Marinkovic, who brought this to the community’s attention on Medium, deserves special thanks. I’ve included his article covering this and its token.
The Graph (GRT): ≈$2.54B circulating market cap, ≈$0.26 per token, $2.84 ATH, approx. 89% of the max supply in circulation
Category: AI/AGI
This Graph simplifies data indexing and storage by opting for open and secure networks that verify the data’s authenticity.
To achieve this, it utilises a subgraph tool that obtains information from a blockchain, handles it and stores it for simpler querying through GraphQL.
Its homepage claims that using its competitive data market instead of relying on costly infrastructure can help you save time and lower expenses by 60-98%.
Its whitepaper was released in March 2018, and the network went live on Ethereum in December 2020. Since then, The Graph has expanded its services to Solana, Polygon, and over 70 chains.
What sets The Graph’s system apart from many conventional systems is that teams can bypass the need to commit considerable hardware and engineering resources to operate proprietary indexing devices and programs.
The Graph’s transition to a completely decentralisedprotocol is underway in three phases: Sunray, Sunbeam and Sunrise.
It is among the top 5 AI coins/tokens by circulating market cap.
Image by ddRender at Shutterstock
Ethereum Name Service (ENS): ≈$784M circulating market cap, ≈$23.66 per token, $83.40 ATH, approx. 33% of the max supply in circulation
Category: Name Service, NFTs
Rather than displaying a long, boring Ethereum wallet address, you can have a personalised ETH-related domain name (for example, vitalik.eth) that you can use to interact with numerous dApps.
This will become more popular as crypto becomes mainstream and dApps become ubiquitous.
It ties in with making crypto more user-friendly for the masses and the notion of account abstraction.
Check out the following article to learn more about this concept.
Since Ethereum remains a popular choice among crypto users, I anticipate ENS will stick around and be a reliable medium- to long-term token. Keep an eye on the eventual uptick in popularity for Solana’s equivalent(s).
Image courtesy of ENS brand kit.
Axelar (AXL): ≈$784M circulating market cap, ≈$0.91 per token, $2.64 ATH, approx. 73% of the max supply in circulation
Category: Interoperability
Axelar is an up-and-coming interoperability protocol aiming to improve connectivity between various blockchains and many of their associated projects across DeFi, real-world assets (RWAs), decentralised physical infrastructure networks (DePIN), etc.
One of its most innovative use cases is the Interchain Token Service, permitting ERC-20 tokens to be accessible on numerous chains. This provides a superior alternative to bridging assets on Ethereum L2s or other EVM-compatible networks.
“Interchain Tokens run on open-source code via smart contracts on a public blockchain secured by a dynamic validator set. With ITS, you can have multiple blockchains with canonical versions of your token that all share a single EVM address.”
Axelar Docs
Unlike Cosmos (ATOM), an established interoperability player, Axelar is relatively new. As a result, there’s a higher likelihood that current and prospective AXL holders will be willing to put money into this than an older crypto asset (in ATOM’s case), currently ~80% below its ATH.
Nonetheless, Axelar will need to be conscious of Cosmos’ progress in the interoperability space alongside similar initiatives such as Polkadot (DOT), Quant (QNT), and LayerZero (ZRO), to name a few.
The project has excellent security scores of 99 and 95 based on data presented by DEXTools and Moralis, respectively.
Courtesy of the Axelar brand kit
The Sandbox (SAND): ≈$1.56B circulating market cap, ≈$0.64 per token, $8.40 ATH, approx. 81% of the max supply in circulation
This community-focused, blockchain-based online gaming network allows users to create non-fungible tokens (NFTs), buy virtual land, and share their gaming experiences and collectibles on the Ethereum blockchain.
In a Medium post on their official page, The Sandbox aims to take on well-established game creation systems, such as Roblox and Minecraft, by providing creators with genuine ownership rights for their work in the form of NFTs.
Despite being an older gaming and metaverse-themed token, I still believe this project has plenty of untapped potential. It remains one of the crypto gaming projects, with over 1.1 million followers on X/Twitter.
One of its latest partnerships is with Malaysian low-cost airline AirAsia and a multinational AgTech firm, Milk Partners. This collaboration allows AirAsia MOVE loyalty program users to earn points, Milk Coins, and SAND tokens by playing one of The Sandbox’s latest Metaverse-themed games.
Other than this, The Sandbox boasts partnerships with musicians Snoop Dogg, Deadmau5, and Steve Aoki; The Smurfs, Care Bears, and other kids’ characters; Lacoste; video-gaming giant Atari; and over 200 brands that have been involved with The Sandbox.
Play the new Top Gear Sandbox game and save ‘The Stigverse’ ➡️ https://t.co/EEMhv3rA06 pic.twitter.com/6nJrJcKHbt
— Top Gear (@BBC_TopGear) November 28, 2024
Two weeks ago, The Sandbox released a game paying tribute to the cult automotive show Top Gear.
Check out the Blockchain Council’s guide into The Sandbox and the various aspects of its Metaverse, not to mention the range of related tokens.
Source: The Sandbox press kit
Ondo (ONDO): ≈$1.56B circulating market cap, ≈$1.09 per token, $1.48 ATH, approx. 15% of the max supply in circulation
Category: DeFi (lending), real-world assets (RWAs)
Ondo (a.k.a. Ondo Finance) aims to make institutional-grade products and services universally available through the power of blockchain tech.
One of its main protocols is Flux, which allows people to loan and borrow stablecoins against short-term tokenised US Treasuries. The only collateral available on this platform is OUSG, a tokenised Treasury issued by Ondo Finance.
In June, Drift, a Solana DEX focused on providing perpetual futures and spot trading with leverage, announced a partnership with Ondo. Access to USDY marks the first RWA option on the perpetual platform, permitting its clients (who hold USDY on Solana) to use tokenised T-Bills as collateral.
https://blog.ondo.finance/rwas-you-can-use-for-collateral/
Keeping with the theme of relatively new products and tokens, ONDO launched in January earlier this year, hitting an all-time high of $1.48 during the market-wide bull run experienced in March. I expect it to surpass its ATH and work its way up the ranks into the top 50 (currently at #80) by mid-2025.
EigenLayer (EIGEN): ≈$676M circulating market cap, ≈$3.63 per token, $4.47 ATH, approx. 11% of the max supply in circulation
Category: DeFi (restaking)
It has proven popular since the beginning of this year. It allows ETH holders to boost staking rewards by utilising staked ETH (notably stETH and rETH) on protocols other than Ethereum.
Besides ETH and the abovementioned liquid staking derivatives (LSDs), you can also lock any ERC-20 tokens into EigenLayer smart contracts, according to the project’s overview.
Using Eigen Layer or similar re-staking services such as Pendle can boost one’s expected staking ROI from around 3% p.a. to 6-9%. I featured the latter in a recent piece, which is included below.
https://medium.com/@cryptowithlorenzo/11-altcoins-to-buy-for-this-bull-market-1f74967a117d
I expect the demand for liquid restaking tokens to remain strong as more people aim to compensate for diminishing ETH staking rewards in recent years due to a higher percentage of ETH locked up in the network to secure it.
Furthermore, to help diversify use cases on EigenLayer, its devs should eventually consider the demand for re-staking tokens across other distributed systems – Solana, Cardano and Polkadot come to mind.
If the latter were to increase in popularity, there could be a potential market for liquid DOT tokens, as its chain still has one of the longest unbonding periods. In Polkadot’s case, users must wait 28 days to re-access their tokens unless they opt for the Fast Unstake feature (subject to eligibility criteria).
I say “eventually” because it depends on the success of these projects and, most importantly, whether there’s a business case for this.
In the meantime, people are beginning to discover the beauty of double-dipping with ETH staking rewards; centralised exchanges are beginning to take note. Kraken started offering EigenLayer staking last month, and Bybit offers regular staking and restaking for its verified users.
Before considering re-staking, it’s important to be mindful of its additional risks compared to native ETH staking, particularly additional slashing risks (the possibility of losing some of the staked rewards) and an extra 7-day waiting period on top of that for conventional ETH staking. These resources will explain this in further detail.
Check out the EigenLayer Docs for comprehensive information about the project.
SuperVerse (SUPER): ≈$598M circulating market cap, ≈$1.33 per token, $4.74 ATH, approx. 40% of the max supply in circulation
Category: Gaming, NFTs
This Web3 gaming platform has one of the largest communities in this space, with over 820,000 followers on X/Twitter.
It currently has 14 integrations with game publishers, games, and metaverses, including Wagmi Games, Shrapnel, Avalon, BLOCKLORDS, RavenQuest, and Wilder World, to name some examples.
The last option is a racing game with a play-to-earn model, which exploded in popularity in 2021, especially for Axie Infinity, whose native token, AXS, managed to do a 500x in 2021.
I expect SuperVerse to continue building its reputation in the Web3 gaming space, which has a massive following worldwide.
Moreover, renowned trading analyst and crypto commentator EllioTrades is closely aligned with SuperVerse (at least that’s the impression I get) and regularly promotes it among his large fan base. s
Visit the project’s Tokenomics page and related Transparency Report for the latest, most accurate information about token emissions and distribution among stakeholders.
If anyone has played any games on SuperVerse, what’s your experience using the protocol? I am not a gamer, so I don’t have any first-hand experience using this.
SuperVerse also has excellent security scores of 99 and 97 based on the aforementioned token-tracking sources.
DOG•GO•TO•THE•MOON (DOG): ≈$738M circulating market cap, ≈$0.00736 per token, $0.00976 ATH, 100% of the max supply (100B tokens) in circulation
Categories: Meme coins, Runes
We’re doing two for the price of one by covering today’s meme coin and a Runes-themed crypto (more on this shortly).
DOG markets itself as the #1 meme coin on the Bitcoin blockchain. Long gone are the days when Bitcoin was “pointless because it had so no smart contracts on its blockchain.”
For better or worse, we’re getting more tokens built on the pioneering blockchain network.
How high can it go? No idea (and no one knows, for that matter). If the overall crypto market exceeds $6 trillion by the cycle’s peak, I wouldn’t rule out 10-15x. This may seem conservative to some, but remember that this market is flooded with meme coins, and it’s mostly a matter of rotating capital from larger meme coins (by market cap) to smaller ones.
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What is meant by a “Runes-themed” crypto?
Runes is a new set of fungible tokens built on top of Bitcoin. These offer a lighter, Lightning-Network-compatible alternative to Bitcoin Request for Comment (BRC)-20 tokens.
You may recall the massive popularity of Ordinals at the beginning of this year, a popular example of BRC-20 tokens, whereby metadata were inscribed into individual satoshis. I wrote a separate article dedicated to Ordinals (a.k.a. “Bitcoin NFTs”), available below.
https://medium.com/@cryptowithlorenzo/why-ordinals-and-inscriptions-are-here-to-stay-433d7cfa17a5
N.B. There is a crypto project named THORChain, which has its native asset, $RUNE. This is different from Runes-themed tokens.
Concluding thoughts
In your opinion, which cryptos should have been featured here, or ones that shouldn’t be here?
Per notable mentions, here are some other projects and coins/tokens to keep an eye on in the coming months:
– Beam ($BEAM): Another popular gaming ecosystem, I was about to feature $BEAM in the main list but chose The Sandbox instead.
– Ampera ($AMP): A DeFi protocol built on Ethereum that helps facilitate payments and uses its native token, AMP, as collateral for making digital letters of credit (LOCs). Click here to learn more.
– Ronin ($RON): An EVM L1 network primarily involved in blockchain-based gaming projects.
Various sources regard it as one of the best Web3 gaming ecosystems around.
– Sologenic (SOLO) and Coreum (COREUM). These operate on the XRP Ledger and have had an exceptional November due to rapid gains in XRP since the US Elections. If XRP continues its strong momentum, expect these tokens to pump even harder.
– Pixels (PIXEL): A blockchain-based open-world farming game built on Ronin (and tradable on Ethereum), with over 320,000 followers on X/Twitter.
– Last but not least, Livepeer (LPT), “the world’s open-video infrastructure”, is another popular AI crypto to follow.
I should have featured at least a few DePIN projects here, but I can only include so many in one piece. On this note, I covered Render (RENDER) and Helium (HNT) in previous posts.
Another crypto sector to pay attention to is RWAs. I will cover these in a separate piece soon, so subscribe to stay in the loop.
https://cryptowithlorenzo.medium.com/subscribe
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Let’s not forget something important here: When to take your profits and how to do so. If any of these were to achieve a 30, 40, or even 50x at some point, you need to think about how much profit to take and how to take it (i.e., fiat à USD, EUR, GBP; stablecoins; convert into BTC or ETH, etc.).
Read my article to learn about my approach to profit-taking, which will become increasingly important as we gradually approach this cycle’s peak.
I get that many people will bank on meme coins to generate life-changing gains. However, for every success story, 80-100 holders probably lost money.
Ultimately, many reputable and secure crypto protocols that continue to build major partnerships, boost scalability, and offer user-friendly dApps running on their network for cheap transaction fees will still thrive.
Anyhow, let all of that sink in.
<div class=”tenor-gif-embed” data-postid=”26995443″ data-share-method=”host” data-aspect-ratio=”1.77778″ data-width=”100%”><a href=”https://tenor.com/view/let-that-sink-in-elon-sink-elon-twitter-twitter-sink-gif-26995443″>Let That Sink In Elon Sink GIF</a>from <a href=”https://tenor.com/search/let+that+sink+in-gifs”>Let That Sink In GIFs</a></div> <script type=”text/javascript” async src=”https://tenor.com/embed.js”></script>
P.S. Besides looking at a project’s security scores and community reputation, consider how concentrated token holdings are and any relationships between different wallets. Taking note of this can help identify how much influence whales have over the token’s price based on the % of the overall circulating supply.
Bubblemaps is a helpful resource for identifying token trends on top of multiple L1s and L2s.
Disclaimers
– N.B. None of this is financial advice; I am not a financial advisor. You are solely responsible for crypto investments, let alone those in any asset class.
– The opinions expressed within this piece are my own and might not reflect those behind any individual or organisation listed here. I have no affiliation with any of them.
– Please research (DYOR) before investing in any crypto assets, staking, NFTs, or other products affiliated with this space.
– Information is correct at the time of writing.
Featured Image by keksX_X at Freepik (AI-generated content; unspecified base model).