Cardano (CCC:ADA-USD) has been slogging through a downturn. A cursory look at its price chart reveals as much. It has been in bear territory since the beginning of September.
But, if you’re like me, you believe Cardano is one of the altcoins with solid long-term prospects. These are still the early days of cryptocurrency. One of the most important things to do is to simply understand projects, decide you believe in their goals and stick with them if you do.
In time, many altcoins will multiply in value. The problem is that it’s difficult to separate the Ponzi schemes from the legitimate early blockchain champions. However, one of the most useful things to do is to understand the philosophy and goals behind projects. Separating the wheat from the chaff has a lot to do with communicating purpose early on.
Cardano Shines With Its Plan for Success
Cardano is arguably the most philosophically complete crypto project there is. If you’ve ever asked yourself what cryptocurrency and blockchain really are, look to Cardano.
The purpose and roadmap laid out on its website actually communicate a project that you, me and everyone else can understand. By that standard, the entire project is by far the best-communicated altcoin venture in my eyes.
It doesn’t necessarily say anything new — in fact, you could argue that it deals in the same sort of platitudes that make many wary of crypto in the first place:
“Cardano is built by a decentralized community of scientists, engineers, and thought leaders united in a common purpose: to create a technology platform that will ignite the positive change the world needs. We believe the future should not be defined by the past, and that more is possible — and, through technology, can be made possible for all. We measure the worth of a task not by its challenge, but by its results.”
That probably sounds as vague to you as it does to me. But the more I read about Cardano, the more confident I am that it has a great chance of success in the long run.
I continue to return to that roadmap as I try to wrap my head around the cryptocurrency revolution. Basically, you can’t get anywhere if you haven’t laid out a plan for how to get there. Cardano’s roadmap is exactly that: A plan for success.
It’ll continue to waver along the way, but it’ll also continue to move forward. Cardano entered the third of five stages — the Goguen era — very recently. And that’s all about smart contract functionality.
Smart Contract Functionality
It was only a few months ago that Cardano entered phase three of its five-phase plan. It completed the Alonzo hard fork on Sept. 13, which introduced Plutus-powered smart contract scripts. However, despite enthusiasm for the addition and a successful hard fork, ADA has basically decreased in value since.
The decline correlates broadly to a few things. First, Bitcoin has been volatile over the past few months. Cardano generally moves with Bitcoin prices, but that doesn’t explain the overall downturn.
Cardano has had other problems as well. In late November, Israeli cryptocurrency exchange eToro announced it would delist Cardano by the year’s end. That was another factor serving to bring Cardano lower following the Alonzo hard fork.
My point here is this: Cardano is in a bearish phase. However, it remains one of the most fundamentally solid cryptocurrency projects out there.
What to Do With Cardano
Long term investors interested in cryptocurrency are going to struggle to find a more logically constructed crypto project than Cardano.
That won’t change despite the current bearishness surrounding it. If anything, there’s a great buy-the-dip narrative in Cardano right now.
On the date of publication, Alex Sirois did not have (either directly or indirectly) any positions in the securities mentioned in this article. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer, subject to the InvestorPlace.com Publishing Guidelines.
After given up early mornings and late nights as an analyst for a life of sweatpants, Aaron Levitt has been an investment/personal finance writer for nearly fifteen years. Aside from contributing to InvestorPlace, his work can be found on Investopedia, Kiplinger’s Personal Finance and Mitre Media’s family of websites. You can follow his picks, pans and general market musings on Twitter via @AaronLevitt.
