A few days ago, user Indigo Nakamotoist on Twitter offered 5 LTC to anyone who could bring Ordinals NFTs to Litecoin as well.
This was followed by four more similar offers, bringing the total prize to 22 LTC.
22 $LTC to port Ordinals to #Litecoin from:
+ 5 $LTC @indigo_nakamoto
+ 5 $LTC @ryanwrights
+ 5 $LTC @MASTERBTCLTC
+ 2 $LTC @ChiefLitecoin
+ 5 $LTC @finitemaz https://t.co/7X4JfMzq97— Indigo | Nakamotoist (@indigo_nakamoto) February 16, 2023
Even though 22 LTC are worth only a little more than $2,000 in total as of today, the appeal has been answered by developer Anthony Guerrera, who says Litecoin is the only other blockchain on which Ordinals could work, thanks to SegWit and Taproot.
A few days ago Guerrera publicly announced that he had succeeded:
JUST IN: $BTC #Ordinals are now on #Litecoin $LTChttps://t.co/Ls5AGbr5kV https://t.co/6ygVvGmNLB
— Crypto Anthony (@anthonyonchain) February 18, 2023
A couple of days ago he also unveiled that he had created the first Ordinals NFT on Litecoin:
The first #Litecoin #Ordinal has been inscribed on the Litecoin blockchain.
The mimblewimble whitepaper will live within Litecoin forever Ⓜ️🕸 #MWEB!$LTC $BTC #NFT @SatoshiLite @finitemaz @ryanwrights @MASTERBTCLTC @ChiefLitecoin @indigo_nakamoto pic.twitter.com/ICLkTMjwRW
— Crypto Anthony (@anthonyonchain) February 19, 2023
It is worth noting that at the Litecoin address he indicated to receive the reward so far only 7 LTC of the 22 promised have arrived.
Motive and goals of launching on Litecoin
The goal of this initiative seems to be to make Ordinals NFTs transacted without having to pay the high fees required to pay for recording transactions on Bitcoin’s blockchain.
Indeed, as of today while the average fee per transaction on Bitcoin’s blockchain is about $1.6, on Litecoin’s blockchain it is about $0.01, less than one hundredth of that of Bitcoin.
Moreover, the biggest concern generated by the launch of Ordinals NFTs on Bitcoin’s blockchain is precisely the possible generation of a large increase in the number of transactions, which could further increase the cost.
In contrast, this risk on Litecoin is not there, both because not many transactions are now recorded every day on Litecoin’s blockchain, and because it still has ample room for expansion in this respect.
It is enough to consider that there are rarely more than 120,000 daily transactions on the Litecoin blockchain, while on the Bitcoin blockchain there are rarely fewer than 200,000.
Moreover, while typically on Bitcoin’s blockchain a new block is added every 10 minutes, on Litecoin’s blockchain it only takes 2, meaning five times as many blocks can be recorded.
This therefore could be a good solution to be able to continue to have NFTs even on Proof-of-Work based blockchains, now that Ethereum has moved to Proof-of-Stake, but without congesting Bitcoin’s already congested blockchain.
Ordinals and NFTs on Bitcoin
According to data from Dune.com, so far there are already more than 154,000 registrations, with a significant increase in Taproot usage since the project was launched.
The launch took place after mid-January 2023, which was only a few weeks ago, and has raised several controversies especially among Bitcoin maximalists.
While on the one hand there is the fear that it will drive up fees too much, there are also those who frown on a use of the Bitcoin protocol that is not inherent to the original project of creating a decentralized currency.
At this point, however, an alternative is there, which could also be a reason for Litecoin’s revival.
The price of LTC
Truth be told, in the last few days, since Guerrera announced that he had launched Ordinals on Litecoin, the price of LTC has fallen. Then again, there is no significant use of this technology yet, so it may also turn out to be just a flash in the pan.
Moreover, since November 2022, the price of Litecoin has already risen quite a bit, from $50 to $93, which is almost a doubling. This rise is probably due to the expectation of Litecoin’s halving, which is expected this spring.
Indeed, it should be noted that the annual low of 2022 the price of LTC touched it in June, at $43, while already by the end of November it had risen to $78.
In other words, it is possible that in the past few weeks some overenthusiasm had already been concentrated on the price of LTC, which then began to fade since the price had risen to almost $104 on 16 February.
This very recent small downward phase was not halted by the news of the launch of Ordinals on the Litecoin blockchain.
