In today’s “Crypto for Advisors” newsletter, Josh Olszewicz of Canary Capital breaks down Litecoin from its history to its growth.
Then Billy Luedtke from Institution answers questions about decentralized finance and its growth in “Ask an Expert”.
Thanks to our sponsor for this week’s newsletter, Grayscale. For financial advisors near Denver, Grayscale is hosting an exclusive event, Crypto Connect, on Thursday, October 23rd. Get more information.
–Sarah Morton
Litecoin: A robust digital asset for the long term
is one of the oldest and most established cryptocurrencies still in active use. Litecoin was created in October 2011 by former Google engineer Charlie Lee and was launched as a source code fork of Bitcoin. While Bitcoin pioneered decentralized digital money, Litecoin sought to improve upon its design by offering faster settlement times, lower transaction costs, and a larger supply. For this reason, is often referred to as “the silver to bitcoins gold.”
Key technical features
Litecoin shares Bitcoin’s proof-of-work (PoW) foundation, but differs in several critical areas. Its block time is 2.5 minutes compared to Bitcoin’s 10 minutes, allowing for faster transaction confirmations. The maximum supply is 84 million coins, four times larger than Bitcoin’s 21 million, making individual units more accessible. Instead of Bitcoin’s SHA-256 mining algorithm, Litecoin uses Scrypt, which was designed to make mining more widely available before the advent of application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs).
Since its inception, Litecoin has maintained uninterrupted network uptime, a rarity in the blockchain sector. This reliability, paired with low transaction fees that average under 10 cents, has positioned litecoin as a convenient medium of exchange rather than primarily a store of value.
Innovation and adoption
Litecoin has also been an early testing ground for key blockchain innovations. In 2017, it became the first major network to enable Segregated Witness (SegWit), a scaling upgrade that optimizes block space and addresses transaction malleability. Soon after, Litecoin helped pave the way for the Lightning Network (LN), a second-layer protocol that enables instant payments at almost no cost. The first cross-chain Lightning transaction, routing LTC to BTC, occurred shortly after SegWit activation.
Security has also been strengthened through a merged mining scheme with since 2014. By sharing hash power between the two Scrypt-based networks, both ecosystems benefit from stronger protection against potential 51% attacks.
Supply dynamics and network health
Litecoin’s issuance schedule mirrors Bitcoin’s, with rewards halved every four years. Over 90% of the total 84 million LTC supply has already been mined and annual inflation is below 2%. The next halving, expected in July 2027, will reduce inflation to below 1%, which is comparable to many traditional safe-haven assets.
On-chain activity reflects Litecoin’s constant usage. The number of transactions has grown during periods of Bitcoin congestion and spikes in Dogecoin demand. Active addresses have shown resilience over time, highlighting relative utility compared to peer networks.
Hash rate, the measure of computing power that secures the blockchain, has increased in recent years, supported by improved Scrypt ASIC efficiency and the incentive of combined litecoin-dogecoin mining rewards. Mining power remains concentrated among a handful of pools, but overall network security has never been higher.
Valuation measurements
Two widely-tracked crypto valuation tools, the Network Value to Transaction (NVT) ratio and Market Value to Realized Value (MVRV), provide context for Litecoin’s current status. NVT, which measures market capitalization relative to on-chain activity, is below bitcoins and dogecoins, suggesting that litecoin may be more fairly valued relative to its utility. Meanwhile, the MVRV, which compares the market price to the average price that coins last moved to, remains below the long-term bull market level, signaling muted speculative profit.
External sentiment indicators confirm this picture. Google Trends data for “Litecoin” has fallen steadily since its 2021 peak, pointing to reduced retail enthusiasm. However, such conditions have historically been in line with undervalued entry points in previous market cycles.
Takeaways for financial advisors
For advisors assessing the digital asset landscape, Litecoin represents a case study in durability. It has operated continuously for more than a decade, surviving several market downturns and consistently delivering on its value proposition: fast, cheap, reliable transactions. While it doesn’t command Bitcoin’s brand dominance or Ethereum’s smart contract ecosystem, Litecoin fills a complementary role within the broader digital asset market.
In portfolio construction, Litecoin can be considered as:
- A diversification tool within a crypto allocation that offers exposure to a network different from Bitcoin but with a proven security model.
- A lower beta play on transaction-focused cryptocurrencies with relatively muted speculation compared to meme-driven assets like dogecoin.
- A long-term store of utility that benefits from declining issuance and consistent usage, even amid changing market narratives.
For clients exploring digital assets, Litecoin stands as one of the most tested and resilient networks in the space. Its combination of security, innovation and practicality underlines why it continues to endure as a key component of the crypto ecosystem.
– Josh Olszewicz, Portfolio Manager, Canary Capital
Ask an expert
Q. Decentralized finance (DeFi) has seen explosive growth, hype cycles and is now pushing towards maturity. From your perspective, what is the biggest gap still holding DeFi back from mainstream adoption?
A. DeFi has proven that trustless code can automate financial services at scale. But code alone is not enough. Even in a “trustless” system, participants are constantly dependent on trust: that smart contracts are secure, that oracle data is accurate, that a counterparty is not malicious, and that audits address the right risks. Because on-chain transactions are irreversible, errors in these trust assumptions can be catastrophic.
What DeFi lacks is a trustful interaction layer to complement trustless execution. Protocols are blind to who is on the other side of a transaction and whether their information is trustworthy. There is no built-in way to verify identity, reputation or track record in a structured, verifiable format. This leaves users vulnerable, prevents protocols from assessing creditworthiness, and discourages institutions.
Closing this gap requires infrastructure that makes the information itself verifiable and composable. At Intuition, we are building exactly that: a trust and reputation layer for DeFi and the wider information economy.
Q. Many people are talking about how DeFi needs better ways to manage reputation, creditworthiness and trust. What do you see as the most promising methods to address these challenges?
Certificates have been part of Ethereum’s DNA from the start, the original white paper even highlighted identity as a core use case. For more than a decade, builders have experimented with certificates or signed statements on the chain to capture trust. Yet they have so far been limited to narrow streams: proving a single credential or confirming one fact at a time.
What is missing is to make certificates usable at scale in richer contexts. Instead of just asking, “does this address have this credential?”, we should be able to analyze thousands or even millions of claims to understand an entity’s reputation. That’s the missing layer.
At Intuition, we build exactly that: an attestation graph that makes verifiable data portable and usable. By connecting attestations in a graph, smart contracts and AI agents can reason about history, context and reputation, unlocking credit scores, unsecured loans, access control and permissionless reputation markets.
Q: What kind of DeFi applications or innovations do you think will define the next wave of growth, and how might infrastructure like verifiable data or reputation systems play a role?
The next wave of DeFi will not only be about moving capital faster; it will be about moving trust faster. Smart contracts gave us trustless execution, but the missing piece is verifiable context about who and what we’re dealing with.
When certificates and reputation can reliably exist on the chain, DeFi evolves beyond being purely security-based. Undersecured lending becomes possible, pool access can be closed by reputation rather than arbitrary whitelists, and governance can reward real contributions rather than empty token balances. Entire markets for reputation itself are opening up, where the credibility of an address or data set can be priced, traded or bet against results.
This is also what AI agents need when moving from performing swaps to making complex decisions under uncertainty. A verifiable trust and reputation graph forms the basis.
– Billy Luedtke, CEO, Intuition
Continue reading
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- Citibank plans to launch crypto custody services in 2026.
