Why has Litecoin declined?

Litecoin was once hailed as 'Bitcoin Silver', being the first successful Bitcoin altcoin in history. It was created in 2011 by former Google engineer Charlie Lee, with the initial vision of becoming a 'lightweight alternative to Bitcoin', focusing on faster transaction confirmation times and lower fees. In an era when there were few altcoins, Litecoin surged to the forefront of cryptocurrencies with slight improvements over Bitcoin and was even regarded as the 'King of Altcoins' for a time.

However, over time, Litecoin's influence has gradually waned, and this process is not difficult to understand. The decline of Litecoin was almost destined.

As the pioneer in the blockchain space, Bitcoin has first-mover advantage and a strong belief system, possessing the broadest consensus and the strongest network effect. It is the 'original', the foundation and symbol of the entire crypto world. Litecoin merely copied Bitcoin's code, made minor adjustments, such as changing the block time to 2.5 minutes, increasing the total supply to 84 million, and switching the algorithm to Scrypt to facilitate mining with CPUs for early regular users. Apart from these technical tweaks, it did not bring any fundamental innovations. Because of this, from the moment it was born, it was destined to be merely a 'shadow of Bitcoin'.

More critically, as the blockchain industry entered a period of rapid development, numerous new projects like Ethereum, Polkadot, and Solana introduced revolutionary use cases such as smart contracts, DeFi, and NFTs, promoting the diversification of the entire crypto ecosystem. These 'original' projects reaped the benefits of the times. In contrast, imitation coins like Litecoin, which lack unique application scenarios and have a barren ecosystem, gradually lost their presence.

Ironically, even founder Charlie Lee sold off his Litecoin holdings at the peak of the bull market, raising doubts about its future in the market. If the founder of a coin does not wish to hold it long-term, the market naturally loses confidence.

'Originals eat meat, imitators eat dirt'; Litecoin's glory was built from the outset on Bitcoin's halo. When altcoins proliferate and technological advancements accelerate, Litecoin, lacking core characteristics as a 'runner-up', will naturally be eliminated by the times. Its decline is not coincidental but inevitable.