These days, there is a seemingly uncountable number of different crypto-based projects out there. Truth be told, it can be difficult to differentiate ones that have huge potential from those that are simply, well… Not as attractive. In this article, however, we’re going to talk about the NEO coin - a crypto project that can be considered among the most interesting ones out there right now.
At first glance, NEO might seem like just another cryptocurrency that’s backed up by a smart contract-driven blockchain system. However, looks can be deceiving - once you start to look deeper below the surface, and learn about the technology behind NEO, you might just get as excited about the coin as I am.
We’ll get to that, though. First and foremost, I’d like to tell you in advance that, if you already know what is NEO, and have come to this review to enforce your positive opinions even further, before actually buying the coin, make sure to find a high-end, secure wallet to keep it in. While Ledger Live doesn’t yet support NEO, you can still store the coins on that device.
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Pros
- Strong community support
- Smart contract technology
- Average price volatility
- Regulatory compliance-oriented
- Constant updates and development
Cons
- Still far from its ATH price
- Not offered by many exchanges
Table of Contents
- 1. What is the NEO Coin: The Fundamentals
- 1.1. Smart Contracts: The Golden Ticket to a Blockchain-Based Future?
- 1.2. NEO and Digital Identity (the Story of Onchain)
- 2. NEO Coin: What Does the Market Say?
- 3. Is NEO a Good Investment?
- 4. Storing Your NEO Coins
- 4.1. The Ledger Nano X
- 4.2. Binance
- 5. Where to Trade NEO?
- 5.1. Binance
- 5.2. Bitfinex
- 6. Conclusions
What is the NEO Coin: The Fundamentals
Now, before we get into some price predictions and industry-specific terminology, let us first lay the groundwork for the review, and discuss what is the NEO coin from a very basic standpoint. A great place to start would be to look into the inception point of the project.
When it first came to be, NEO wasn’t actually called “NEO”. It was actually founded as “AntShares”. The company’s inception dates all the way back to 2014, China - AntShares was formed by Erik Zhan and Da Hongfei.
The company rebranded to NEO in 2017, and has kept the name ever since. As you’ve probably gathered already, the NEO coin is named after the company (instead of having a different name, such as in the case of Ethereum and Ether).
Now, from a very basic standpoint, NEO offers blockchain functionality not too different from that of Ethereum. The project focuses on smart contracts, and their execution on the blockchain - simple, right?
Well, not quite. NEO differs from Ethereum quite a bit, and is aimed at a completely different audience of crypto enthusiasts. In fact, you could as far as to say that NEO is one of the most unique cryptocurrencies on the current market, given its background.
In order to understand NEO completely, though, and look into the NEO future prospects, we should first quickly run through smart contract technology, just so that we’re both on the same page.
Smart Contracts: The Golden Ticket to a Blockchain-Based Future?
While I admit that the heading is a bit flashy, bear with me - if you aren’t already, I might be able to make you a fan of the smart contract technology in the paragraphs ahead!
As eluded to a few times already, the NEO coin utilizes smart contract technology. However, this technology was first created and popularized (to put it lightly) by Ethereum - the second-biggest cryptocurrency in the world, right after Bitcoin.
I could go off on a whole different tangent on how amazing ETH truly is, but worry not - I won’t. Instead, I want to tell you how smart contracts on the Ethereum blockchain work. The same idea stands behind the NEO coin, so do read carefully!
Consider this simple example below:
Tod wants to sell Stacy a house - Stacy’s in the market to buy one. In some dated circumstances, both parties would have to utilize the services of third-party brokers, banks, real estate agents, and so on - while some of these are unavoidable, others appear to simply take your money and that’s it.
With smart contracts, however, Tod and Stacy could both save a huge sum of money, and also make sure that there’s absolutely no foul play involved.
You see, objects such as like real estate can be tokenized - in other words, they can be represented on the blockchain as a set of specific ERC-20 tokens (or others - ERC-20 simply refers to Ethereum’s token model). Thus, the transaction - Tod selling Stacy a house - can be written in a smart contract.
The contract would sound something like this: WHEN Stacy sends Tod an X sum of money, ONLY THEN will Tod send Stacy the rights to the house. Tod created a smart contract beforehand, and the rights to the property are stored on the blockchain - they will be transferred ONLY if the set conditions are met, and in no other scenario.
To add to that, smart contracts are irreversible and impenetrable - once they’re set, they’re set.
Now, you can probably imagine the vast possibilities of smart contracts in both the day-to-day lives of common, working-class people, and large corporate entities, too. However, as mentioned above, the NEO coin is different - and anyone whos looking to learn what is NEO should keep this in mind!
How is NEO different, you may ask? Well, its smart contract functionality comes with a twist - regulatory compliance.
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NEO and Digital Identity (the Story of Onchain)
In the Ethereum smart contract example discussed above, one clear distinction should be made - the smart contracts created on ETH have no way of being checked or configured to be regulation-compliant. While this does fall in line with the decentralized nature of the crypto, it also poses a lot of issues as far as any regulatory purposes are concerned.
The NEO cryptocurrency, however, is the opposite in this regard - the “digital identity” feature makes sure that this is the case.
NEO’s digital identity works in a rather simple manner - everyone who participates on the NEO blockchain has a specific type of digital identity that is verified. Following that, you can expect every other party that you transact and interact with on the blockchain to be a verified user of NEO, and not some anonymous party that might have potential malicious intentions.
What is Onchain, and what does it have to do with any of this?
Onchain is a Chinese company that is concerned with making blockchain technology more approachable to large businesses and various financial institutions. One of the main concerns of Onchain is to solve both the regulatory issues of blockchain technology - it’s an especially-prominent issue once you consider the fact that China was never favorable towards crypto[1], in general.
As you can probably imagine, the NEO coin and Onchain make up an amazing pair - NEO provides the technology and space for users to come and buy, sell, and trade their assets in a semi-centralized, yet safe and regulated environment, while Onchain focuses on making the aforementioned technology an attractive prospect to major businesses.
Thus, as the wheels start spinning and the cogs fall into place, you have yourself an innovative, blockchain technology-based, yet still regulation-compliant and partially-centralized smart economy. If you were wondering what is NEO coin, that’s the best answer I can give you!
NEO Coin: What Does the Market Say?
Now that we’ve discussed the main aspects of NEO, and you have a bit of a better idea of what the NEO cryptocurrency is, let us move on to the second part of the review and take a look at some historical price charts, how has the crypto been doing in the past few years, and what can we expect from the NEO coin future.
Looking at Coinmarketcap, it would seem that NEO has had a pretty standard run, as far as the more well-known cryptos are concerned. People who are wondering is NEO a good investment should first look at the all-time high (ATH) of the coin that was reached early in 2018 - back then, the coin cost over $161.
Now, to the uninitiated, it might seem odd - a cryptocurrency that used to cost $161 now costs around $20. That’s a bad sign!
However, let me tell you - no, it’s actually quite normal.
If you’ve spent any time in the crypto world, you’ve probably heard of the famous 2017/2018 crypto price crash. Most coin prices reached their ATHs, and then crashed down, completely.
Back then, there was a lot of market manipulation going on. Combine that with some prominent DeFi-based scams (DeFi was very new back then, and it seemed like every single project could raise millions of US dollars with their ICOs, no sweat), and you have yourself some pretty sad results.
However, when compared to some other, somewhat similar coins, NEO is actually doing rather well! It has managed to retain a significant price that has recently been going up, too.
Now, one golden rule in the world of crypto is that a project is only worth as much as the community behind it is. It has proven to be true time and time again, and the NEO coin is no exception - a vast part of the success that the project has been able to retain and maintain is due to the fact that it still possesses an active and thriving community. A single look at their subreddit will prove this to be true.
Following that, it’s also worth mentioning that the team (company) behind the NEO cryptocurrency isn’t slacking, either. There are constant and timely updates being enacted on the platform, everything’s growing both from the business and the technological perspectives, and NEO appears to only be moving forward!
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Is NEO a Good Investment?
As you can probably imagine, the topic surrounding the NEO coin future and its investment opportunities is a pretty popular one, especially with the semi-recent boom of the cryptocurrency industry, in general.
So… Is NEO a good investment? Or should you avoid the coin, and turn your sights to some other cryptos on the market?
Well, let’s try to answer those questions. First things first, though - we need to take a look at the core aspect when analyzing crypto project potential.
Many people think that finding out whether or not the crypto is a good investment is simply a case of looking at its price charts, and checking to see what its ATH was. Other resort to glancing at a price chart and making the decision solemnly based on the fact of whether the coin’s price is increasing or crashing at that point in time.
Both of these methods are absurd, for a lack of a better word.
No, if you want to truly analyze the NEO coin and all of its potential, you need to take a look at one, single indicator - its market cap.
At the time of writing this review, the market cap of NEO is around $1,56 billion. That’s a strong market presence! Now, some individuals might insist that you compare this market cap with that of Bitcoin, and find out is NEO a good investment that way.
DO NOT DO THAT. It’s a very wrong way to go about it.
For starters, Bitcoin is the #1 cryptocurrency on the market - it will always and forever be that way, too. There’s no point in comparing NEO’s market cap with that of BTC, since it will most likely never even come close.
Instead, however, you should find a cryptocurrency that is much bigger than the NEO coin, yet offers a similar type of technology. Now, what could that coin be..?
Yes, I’m only teasing you - of course, it’s Ethereum.
Taking a look at Coinmarketcap once again, you would see that ETH has a market cap of around $125 billion. That’s around 82 times larger than the market cap of NEO.
Now, is it logical to think that NEO will one day reach Ethereum’s market cap? Well, while it’s possible, it’s highly unlikely. However, even if the crypto project manages to reach half of ETH’s market cap, it will be able to increase its current price around 40 times (yes, that’s a very rough estimate).
If something like that was to happen, 40 times $20 would then be equal to around $800 per a NEO coin.
Obviously, that’s a very optimistic assumption, and even if NEO did manage to reach this point, it would be a very, very long time from now. However, there’s also another factor to consider, too.
As I’ve eluded to in the previous chapter, NEO has a very strong community, and the company behind the NEO coin is constantly improving the platform, too. This is a crucial factor for anyone who’s asking is NEO a good investment - without the potential for the future, a crypto project is doomed to be forgotten, sooner rather than later.
All of that said, though, what does the NEO coin future look like? Well, the coin has managed to maintain a decent price, has a strong community and tech-savvy company behind it, and solves a specific problem. All of these factors would seem to indicate that NEO is definitely worth keeping an eye on.
Storing Your NEO Coins
Now that we’ve discussed all of the main points of the NEO coin, let’s take a turn and mention something that isn’t directly related to the cryptocurrency in question, or the technology behind it.
Let’s, for the sake of the argument, imagine that you’ve decided that the NEO coin is a good investment, and you want to purchase it. Your priority right now should be to find a reliable, high-end cryptocurrency wallet.
I’ll give you two great options for where you could store your NEO coins - an industry-leading hardware (cold) wallet, and an online (hot) wallet.
The Ledger Nano X
Without a single doubt, Ledger is one of the core leaders of the cryptocurrency wallet market.
Ledger offers users a couple of different wallet options, with the newest and most-notable one being the Ledger Nano X. The X comes with a bigger screen than the older S model, has more-intuitive button placement, and is a bulkier device, in general.
Having said that, though, it’s also worth mentioning that the Ledger Nano X supports over 1000 different cryptocurrencies and crypto tokens, including NEO.
Now, to be fair, Ledger Live (the app that is used to track your cryptos on the device) does not yet support NEO. However, you are able to connect your Ledger device to a specific hot wallet, and then still have Ledger-grade security.
The Ledger Nano X wll cost you €119, and you can find it here.
Binance
Binance is one of the most popular cryptocurrency exchange platforms on the planet - it’s also a great wallet that you could keep your NEO coins in, too!
The beauty of Binance here is that it offers easy access to your crypto coins if you do decide to participate in some day trading activities, or would even like to access your cryptos on the go.
One of the main complaints that people have about hardware wallets is that it takes a lot of time having to transfer your coins from the wallet into an exchange, if you do decide to trade or exchange them. Binance nullifies this issue, altogether, and provides users with top-notch security features while also being a top-of-the-line excange.
If you’d like to visit Binance, you can find it here.
Where to Trade NEO?
Once you have your wallet sorted, you’re probably going to want to look into buying, selling, or trading NEO coins, right? Well, there are a few ways you could do this - that said, your best bet is to utilize the services of a reliable cryptocurrency exchange.
Let’s mention a couple of the best options, shall we?
Binance
A name that is probably familiar to you by now, Binance truly is the best place to buy, sell, or simply trade NEO online. Once you’ve figured out what is NEO coin, you’d do well to go directly to Binance!
The exchange in question offers users some amazing advanced features, an unparalleled number of different cryptocurrency trading pairs, high-tier security, decent fees, and so on.
Binance is considered to be an industry leader, and there’s a good reason for it! If you’re interested, do check out the platform here.
Bitfinex
While finding multiple crypto exchanges that would both allow you to trade NEO and also be reliable from a security perspective might prove to be a difficult task, Bitfinex is definitely one of the better options.
As far as NEO is concerned, Bitfinex is actually one of the top exchanges, NEO trading volume-wise! Huge amounts of NEO pass through the exchange every single day.
The exchange is reliable, has a good name in the industry, and offers some rather decent fees for its users. You can visit it here.
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Conclusions
Now, then - we’ve reached the end of our NEO coin review. Let’s sum things up in a few sentences, shall we?
The NEO coin is part of the NEO blockchain-based crypto platform. The project is concerned with smart contracts, and aims to bring a regulation-compliant method of smart contract issuance both to common, everyday people, and also high-profile companies and financial institutions. It is truly a unique project with some very unique ideas.
It’s not smoke and mirrors, either - with a market cap of approximately $1,5 billion, NEO has a strong team behind it, and an even stronger community. The company itself states that it’s a “community-driven project” on their homepage.
Does that make NEO a good investment? Well, it’s definitely something that each individual person should decide for themselves, after consulting with their financial advisor. With that, though, it’s still worth noting that, by the looks of things, NEO is here to stay.
Finally, what is the NEO coin future? Truly, only time can tell! If you’re interested in the cryptocurrency or the project behind it, and would like to see that future while being a proud holder of some NEO coins, do make sure that you purchase them on a reliable and safe crypto exchange!
Also, if you care about the security of your coins, it would be a good idea to invest in a hardware cryptocurrency wallet, too. The Ledger Nano X is surely the leader in this area.
All of that being said, thanks for reading, and best of luck!
The content published on this website is not aimed to give any kind of financial, investment, trading, or any other form of advice. BitDegree.org does not endorse or suggest you to buy, sell or hold any kind of cryptocurrency. Before making financial investment decisions, do consult your financial advisor.
Scientific References
1. Shen Wenhao: 'China: Regulation Of Cryptocurrency In China'
About Article's Experts & Analysts
- + Strong community support
- + Smart contract technology
- + Average price volatility
- + Regulatory compliance-oriented
- + Constant updates and development
- - Still far from its ATH price
- - Not offered by many exchanges
Ethereum-like technology with an emphasis on regulation compliance.
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