Stellar (XLM) vs. Ripple (XRP)

With Publish0x's 'show your portfolio' competition, I've seen a lot of people very enthusiastic about XRP, and I've also seen a lot of hate for it. Depending on what attracts you to cryptocurrencies, XRP can truly be a polarizing subject. I've noticed, however, a great lack of attention towards Stellar, and its XLM token.

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But lets take a quick look at XRP first. XRP is the third biggest crypto in market capitalization, and receives lots of press coverage, even outside the cryptosphere - my grandpa tried to convince me to buy XRP, knowing little that I own a few more than he does!

XRP has been widely accepted by established financial institutions, has spent a lot of money on creating an ecosystem to give XRP a solid use case, and has a dedicated community using, and sometimes even prophesizing it from the rooftops.

XRP is, however, a centralized cryptocurrency, and the creators are holding on to 60% of the pre-mined tokens. If you are completely bought in to crypto philosophy - which I have very high regard for - and not just in it for the gains, it is understandable that you have some issues with XRP. In that sense, the very thing our lord and saviour Satoshi Nakamoto came to save us from, is moving into his domain, in the form of XRP.

Now, there is probably a few alternatives to XRP, but none as strong as Stellar's XLM. XLM is currently sitting at 11th in market capitalization, which is not as high as XRP, but very impressive for a currency practically still in its childhood. XLM's speed and scaleability compares favourably with XRP, and what is more, it is completely open source and decentralized.

Stellar also use a unique consensus method, which preclude the possibility of a fork, such as Bitcoin and even Etheruem already experienced. The consensus method, in the most basic of terms, consists of many computers on a network, agreeing with each other. Every computer chooses it's own mini network of trusted computers to agree with. These mini networks overlap each other to create one big network, in which an agreement is then quickly reached, and added to the blockchain.

My feeling about this competition is that both of these currencies are, if only for the sake of profit, worth holding on to.

Ripple, being centralized, are more easily trusted by established financial institutions, and are making big waves in that community. There is, undeniably, a lot of money to be made there.

Stellar, on the other hand, has a bigger chance of being the currency of the people, as it is much more people-oriented as Ripple. That still means Stellar has a lot of untapped attention, and will probably still go big.

In any case, if there's a fight to be had, it is way to early to predict the winner at the moment, and a good chance that both will increase in value before one loses, so for now, I'm keeping both my XRPs and my XLMs safely in my wallet.