Investors in Shiba Inu benefited from mind-blowing gains last year. The dog-themed cryptocurrency gained almost 90,000,000% at its highs in October 2021, but even after its price slid, it ended 2021 with a gain of about 40,000,000%. That's hard to fathom. But more importantly, since it began to lose value in November, it hasn't shown signs of rebounding. So if enthusiastic investors bought in at the height of the frenzy, they've only lost money.
There's always a chance Shiba Inu's price will rise again. Dedicated investors are working on getting more value out of the cryptocurrency, such as creating an NFT art incubator and a decentralized exchange for trading Shiba Inu called ShibaSwap. But investors, especially those new to cryptocurrency, may want to move on to other coins with greater potential. One cryptocurrency to consider that's making its mark on the scene is Waves (WAVES -1.31%).
Image source: Getty Images.
What is Waves?
Waves is another cryptocurrency offering simple solutions and scalability for building blockchain applications. It has a $6 billion market cap, putting it in the top 30 on the list of the biggest cryptocurrencies. It also supports Web 3.0 applications and other decentralized solutions.
One of the main advantages Waves offers over other cryptocurrencies is that it likes to keep things simple. Its explanatory language is simple, and it uses its own native language called Ride for development. It can process thousands of transactions per second and processes more than 100,000 transactions daily.
It has a focus on being eco-friendly and it uses a low-energy proof-of-stake validation system, where users stake their tokens to build the blockchain. The average cost per transaction is a low $0.054, as compared with the average cost of $2.33 for transactions on the leading cryptocurrency platform Ethereum.
Like many other cryptocurrency platforms, Waves was built to support decentralized applications (dApps) such as non-fungible token marketplaces and decentralized finance (DeFi). It was also created to be interoperable, meaning that it can work with other cryptocurrencies to support a broad network of applications.
Waves' price skyrocketed over the past few days after it announced the creation of Waves Labs and the decision to move operations to Miami, as well as the appointment of a new leadership team. Waves Labs is meant to be the platform's "growth engine," and it was created to integrate commercial solutions into the Waves blockchain, turning it into a platform with strong real-world utility. Some of the current projects are cross-border payment solutions and e-voting.
Will it be the next Shiba Inu?
Waves was created in 2016, so it has already been around for a while. It only become very popular last year as cryptocurrency in general exploded, and it gained 360% over the past year.
In one marked difference from Shiba Inu, Waves tokens already cost more than $50 each, whereas at their height, Shiba Inu tokens only reached $0.000089. Shiba Inu tokens (of which there are 549 trillion) aren't likely to ever reach even $1 in value, but Waves tokens, of which there are only 108 million in circulation, are already much more valuable.
For investors, though, the concern isn't about current value but potential for growth. Given Waves' recent gains, especially over the past few days, it may have gone as far as it can for the time being. However, the popularity that caused it to surge may not be over. It's implementing its "transformation plan," and this may be just the tip of the iceberg. In any case, Waves is a cryptocurrency that seems to have real use cases, and it seems to be interested in becoming more useful, which may make it worth owning. At the same time, it's highly unlikely that it will offer anything remotely like the gains that turned Shiba Inu owners into millionaires last year.
