The last 24-hour period has seen several cryptocurrencies stage an impressive turnaround. The prices of Bitcoin and Ethereum have surged by 15.3% and 12.9% respectively in this period. While the top two cryptocurrencies remain solid bets for long-term investors, let’s take a look at three proof-of-stake (PoS) cryptos you can buy in March 2022.
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Cardano
The eighth-largest cryptocurrency by market cap, Cardano (CRYPTO: ADA) is valued at US$33 billion. Since the start of 2020, the ADA token has surged by 3,000% as its underlying blockchain network is extremely helpful to create robust dApps, or decentralized applications.
Developers are using Cardano’s blockchain and it can process 250 transactions per second compared to Ethereum’s 30 transactions per second. Cardano is also extremely energy efficient compared to Bitcoin and Ethereum, which results in lower transaction costs.
The Cardano blockchain recently launched smart contracts on its network. Now developers can build decentralized finance, or DeFi, applications on Cardano, which should increase demand for the ADA token. The total value locked (TVL) on Cardano stands at US$100 million, which is significantly lower than to Ethereum’s TVL of US$117 billion. But driven by lower fees, Cardano is well poised to onboard multiple projects on its network going forward.
Solana
A cryptocurrency that gained close to 11,000% in 2021, Solana (CRYPTO: SOL) should be on the radar of most investors. Valued at a market cap of US$32 billion, Solana is the ninth-largest cryptocurrency in the world.
The Solana blockchain network combines the PoS mechanism with proof-of-history. It basically timestamps transactions and creates a verifiable order of events allowing the blockchain to accelerate network throughput.
Solana’s blockchain network can execute around 50,000 transactions per second and each transaction is finalized in 13 seconds. This massive scalability allows Solana to ensure fees are just $0.0008 per transaction compared to $0.44 for Cardano and $20 for Ethereum.
Its scalable and low-cost platform allowed Solana to have already onboarded 1,300 blockchain projects in less than two years. Further, Solana is the sixth-largest DeFi ecosystem with US$8.7 billion already invested on its network.
Solana continues to expand its ecosystem with the recently launched Solana Pay which aims to eliminate the need for payment platforms.
Cosmos
The final PoS cryptocurrency on my list is Cosmos (CRYPTO: ATOM), which enjoys a market cap of US$8.85 billion. There are over 262 applications running on Cosmos and US$147 billion in assets under management, which should enable the ATOM token to add to its recent momentum in 2022.
ATOM has risen by 1,500% in the last two years due to the rapidly expanding ecosystem of Cosmos that consists of independent interconnected blockchains.
Similar to other PoS blockchains, Cosmos also allows users to derive passive income by a process called staking. Here, you lock up a digital asset such as ATOM to provide security for the blockchain.
Once the staking transaction is complete, you are rewarded in the form of ATOM tokens immediately. The average annual percentage yield for staking the ATOM token stands at an attractive 9.7%.
