This is not my first time buying Bitcoin or investing in cryptocurrency, but it's the first sizable investment I have made in a long time.

I purchased over a Bitcoin back in late September of 2016, and traded and played with it for several months in short term and speculative positions before deciding to keep virtually all my investments in long term positions more recently. I was successful as a day trader for some time, but at some point it just started to interest me less and less while the true power of the underlying technology really started to harness my attention. The longer and more involve din cryptocurrencies that I have become, the less I seem to be interested in speculative positions for short term profit. I fully endorse individuals that choose to take short term and speculative positions, because these traders are incredibly important in providing the market with sufficient liquidity. I actually earned much of my Steem Power in late 2016 and early 2017, when the price of Steem was often less than 10 cents, so the amount of SP that I held became much more valuable than it ever was previously. My account value went from 400 USD all the way to over 3000 USD over a 2 week period in late May/ early June, and really showed me once and for all that a long term position will have the best chance for the incredible returns that are possible. It may be nice being able to make 5% a day by playing spreads, but I have come to the conclusion that long term positions are generally safer and maintain the same possibilities of returns.

http://cdn.pymnts.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Investment-feature.jpg

While it was originally brought me to the cryptocurrency and blockchain community, as time has gone on I have also become increasingly less interested in holding and interacting with Bitcoin. Everything from its transaction and network issues to its relative lack of use cases has led me to become increasingly interested in networks and projects that not only seek to achieve a desired use case, but also have the means to realistically do so. This ultimately has lead me to becoming deeply interested in Graphene blockchain systems, and the DPOS consensus mechanism that these blockchains provide. While these systems are not perfect, I believe that they have proven themselves to be able to operate reliably, effectively, and effectively through networks and platforms in the past. If you keep up with my posts it shouldn't be any surprise that much of my investment will likely be going into Graphene based tokens, but I intend to offer a specific argument for all projects I intend to acquire stake in.

Let's take a look at the first project that will receive the majority of my investment..

The first project that I am intending to acquire stake in is the upcoming EOS platform, and will likely invest approximately 60% of my total investment in the EOS ERC-20 tokens. While I was originally intending to take part in the distribution on the Ethereum network directly, I think that I will choose to purchase second hand off of Bitfinnex rather than through the distribution contracts. The reasoning behind this is that the distribution contracts have constantly been reaching a level of over 1.50-1.90 per token, and purchasing at a median price of 1.70-1.80 from an exchange seems safer. The other aspect is that due to the fact that I reside within the USA, I technically cannot directly participate in the distribution, and while this was not going to stop me, it could make things more complicated into the future.

https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/700/1*Hjzcm79y_IET2KSp5V-_aA.jpeg

I don't intend to go into extreme detail on the reasoning behind the EOS investment, but I was written numerous articles about it on my feed, such as this post. I believe that the level of investment that the EOS distribution has been seeing is justifies, because a smart contract platform capable of handling mainstream adoption and activity is clearly in extremely high demand within the cryptocurrency market. Ethereum's price and support rise over the past year are clear indicators that the market is actively searching for a more platform with a wider range of use cases, but Ethereum has still been unable to provide any use cases that have reached serious success, with the exception of ICO contracts. EOS is being developed in order to execute on Ethereum's promises and goals, and I think that the development team has shown that they are capable of creating efficient and successful platforms in the past. The sheer amount of use cases that the EOS platform could support leads me to believe it could really be at the forefront of the cryptocurrency market by the time it launches, and could be the platform that finally gives businesses the ability to utilize the advantages of blockchain technology. I will elaborate on the potentials for return on investment later on in this post, but I think there is still tremendous potential for serious returns to be made, even with the level of investment that the platform is seeing.

The second platform is a clear decision for me, and could be even more lucrative that EOS in the long term..

The Peerplays network and platform launched in the early summer, and has been running smoothly and efficiently for the duration of its time online. The platform is planning the first wagering DApp to be released shortly, and there will likely be many more Dapps and features added for end users over the next year. The total distribution of PPY tokens is currently just under 5.5 million tokens, so the total token distribution is much lower than any other Graphene networks. This will allow the tokens to reach a much higher price per token, and will likely allow the tokens to become much more valuable compared to networks such as Steem or Bitshares, simply because the total token distribution is so much lower. There was a PPY:BTS gateway added to Bitshares several weeks ago, and over the last week the market has been seeing huge amounts of capital investment into the network. The PPY:BTS market on the DEX currently has a volume of nearly 500,000 USD, which is incredibly for the DEX and considering that just a week ago the average daily volume was under 10,000 USD.

http://www.peerplays.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/Peerplays-crowdsale-is-now-open-383x242_c.jpg

The price of PPY tokens remains under 10$, which is only double what the price was under the initial token distribution phases. Not only does the network have a low distribution of tokens, but users also need to acquire tokens in order to utilize the wagering applications on the platform, which will allow the tokens to achieve a significant level of end user demand. Instead of investors and individuals simply investing in the future of the token and network, many individuals will likely be purchasing the tokens for present day use on the platform, which is something that is still pretty rare within the cryptocurrency industry. The Peerplays network has huge potential for growth in the near future, as the tokens aren't listed on any major exchanges other the the DEX and some small exchanges at the moment. As DApps begin to come to the platform over the following months, I have no reason to believe that the price and level of investment in Peeerplays would soar. I already have been able to acquire some stake in the platform, but I know that every token will likely be so much more valuable into the future.

How much potential for growth is the in the current cryptocurrency market?

While it may seem like the cryptocurrency market is already very big, the true size of the market after the adoption of the technology by a wider range of end users and businesses is so much bigger than what we are seeing right now. The idea of a 1 trillion dollar market capitalization of the cryptocurrency community as a whole is completely realistic over the following years, which could be a level of growth that gives even small holders of cryptocurrency a whole new level of financial security. If the EOS platform is able to accomplish the goals that it sets out to achieve, the market capitalization could easy exceed 100 Billion dollars, which would give each token a price of over 100 USD. This obviously is just one possability, but the potential returns outweigh any potential chances of failure in my mind. Of course I am only investing money that I can afford to loose in any cryptocurrency investment, but my gut feelings have seldom failed me in the past.

http://www.marketintelligencecenter.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/160905-Growth.jpg

The feelings are not purely based upon faith, but rather by an investigation of what the project actually hopes to achieve and the probability that the platform will be able to achieve that goal. Both EOS and Peerplays are seeking to improve efficiency for businesses and individuals by offering practical use cases to real world problems, and both seem to have the technical ability and capacity to actually make it happen. There are other projects that will be receiving some smaller investments as well, including MUSE, Steem, and Decent. While I do believe in all of these projects, I believe that the greatest options for my first series of capital investments are the projects I outlined, but I always maintain the ability to switch positions and stake in positions as the situation calls for.

Please note that everything listed in this post is solely my personal opinion, and shouldn't be used as investment or financial advice in any context. Always conduct independent and thorough research prior to opening any new investment position.

I really hope that you enjoyed this post, and I urge you to leave any comments, questions, input. ect. in the comments below! Here is the link to the EOS website, and the Peerplays Website. Thanks for reading!

image sources:1-2-3-4