We all have been at a point where we want to commit to a new project or do research about it. Especially with social media shilling crypto 24/7 a lot of interest in alt coins exist.

But how exactly do you do your own research on alts? Without getting stuck in a biased shill post?

There are actually some fundamentals that fit pretty much ALL crypto projects out there.

Disclaimer: This is a simplified educational purpose only. No financial advice involved around used crypto names.

Whitepaper

The main source of information. Bitcoin white paper is a good way to summarize the point of the project and how it works. All crypto projects SHOULD have a public white paper where you can gather as much information as possible. Coinmarketcap and some exchanges offer good service to explain crypto as well but they are sometimes outdated so be aware.

development & activity

Very important for the health of a project is how much development is going on behind the scenes and how active the system is. A project that has constant downtimes ( insert joke about specific crypto here ) or without any development are not great signs. An active roadmap to see where things are going and, most importantly, developers actually hitting the deadline is key for the long term growth of a project. Also always ask yourself:

What makes this project unique?

What are the pros and cons and how will that play out in the long term?

How secure is the project?

tracking whale wallets

This is a bit more focused on the price potential of a crypto but generally speaking it’s not a great sign if 30-50% of the crypto is owned by only a couple individuals. There is a high chance they haven’t cashed out yet or will continue applying sell pressure to fund the project ( or their new yacht )

​

Bitcoin top wallets list

​

social media / publicity

Advertisement is everything in the real world to bring your project closer to the average person. A non active community or barely active social media in general is not a great sign. Shilling is easy and doesn’t take a lot of work but the impact can be huge looking at some top 100 cryptos. The lack of interest or purely understanding marketing is not healthy for the long term with competing crypto out there.

the price

Market cap:

There’s key factors that will help you out understanding where the price can go. A crypto market cap is basically calculated by circulating supply x price. The smaller the market cap compared to the top crypto the higher the price can potentially go. That being said it doesn't automatically promise good returns. Statistically, majority of crypto never made it even close to the top 50-100 range when it comes to market cap. Some alts also had great rallies and fell out of that high market cap within weeks again.

Top market cap crypto reaching from 374Bn -> 7bn in just top 12.

Liquidity:

When it comes to every-day price movement liquidity can be very important. If there's not a lot of supply being sold the price can go up quickly with rising demand. Imagine you own carrots that are worth only 0.1$. But because you own all the carrots in your country and the demand is high you can pretty much control the price selling them each for 1$. That's a 10x until some other carrot-whale jumps in and undercuts you. You can read more about so called Supply shock here

​

Staking:

Arguably another indicator for price movement can be the staked amount of a crypto. If let's say 80% of a project is already being staked ( staking ratio 80% ), and using what I wrote earlier about liquidity, you can guess how that could potentially drive up the price. Investors feel confident that prices will go higher, they don't sell and rather stake, demand will push prices higher without sell pressure. But this doesn't apply to all the time. It's a generally saying but sometimes project have really high staking counts yet keep falling especially during a bear market. One of the reason is inflation that exists for pretty much all crypto. Some have an annually inflation rate of 10-20% so you can imagine how it'll be harder to reach All-time-high level again after a year of bear market.

​

Staking Ratio of top staked crypto based on market cap