Top 10 PoW Dominance Vanishes 9 Years Later, Only Two Proof-of-Work Coins Will Remain After Merger – Blockchain Bitcoin News

The crypto community is patiently awaiting the much-anticipated upgrade of the Ethereum network from Proof-of-Work (PoW) to Proof-of-Stake (PoS) as The Merge is expected to take place in 27 days. After Ethereum’s transition from PoW to PoS, only two crypto assets in the top ten market cap will be PoW tokens, in stark contrast to the top ten nine years ago.

The PoS Era Begins: Proof-of-Work Crypto Assets Disappear from the Top Ten by Market Cap

This year, for the first time in crypto history, three stablecoins entered the top ten largest market cap positions. In the first week of May, Terra’s stablecoin UST made the top ten alongside USDT and USDC, but after UST’s depegging incident, the token fell out of the top ten coin rankings. After the implosion of UST, the BUSD stablecoin issued by Binance Smart Chain joined the top coins by valuation, and today three stablecoins remain in the top ten.

That wasn’t the case nine years ago, on August 18, 2013, there were no stablecoins in the top ten because the stablecoin trend wasn’t even dominant back then. In 27 days, Ethereum will switch from PoW to PoS after operating as a PoW chain for seven years, and when that happens, only two coins will be in the top ten PoW tokens. The last two top PoW crypto tokens in the top ten will be Bitcoin (BTC) and Dogecoin (DOGE). This trend was not widespread even nine years ago in 2013 when the top ten crypto tokens were mostly PoW coins.

On August 18, 2013, Bitcoin (BTC) changed hands at $113 per unit and Ethereum did not exist. In fact, the Ethereum blockchain only started 711 days after August 18, 2013, and Litecoin (LTC) was the second largest crypto token by market cap. Proof-of-stake crypto assets were conceived back then, and in 2013 there were a number of hybrid proof-of-work and proof-of-stake tokens, with peercoin (PPC) taking the lead. PPC was the first hybrid PoW/PoS blockchain presented to the crypto community and was created by pseudonymous developer Sunny King.

On August 18, 2013, XRP was the only coin that was not a proof-of-work token. Nine cryptocurrencies in the top ten were proof-of-work and some were hybrid PoW/PoS coins. Hybrid means the network uses both proof-of-work and proof-of-stake.

Nine years ago, PoW and hybrid PoW coins in the top ten included Bitcoin (BTC), Litecoin (LTC), Namecoin (NMC), Peercoin (PPC), Feathercoin (FTC), Novacoin (NVC), Primecoin ( XPM), Terracoin (TRC) and Infinitecoin (IFC). At this time in 2013, XRP was the only non-PoW coin in the top ten rankings, and XRP is still in the top ten by crypto market cap in 2022. Almost seven years ago, on August 23, 2015, there were fewer PoW coins in the top ten, even with Ethereum (ETH) joining the ranks as a PoW coin.

At that time, only six PoW coins existed in the top ten, including BTC, LTC, ETH, DASH, DOGE, and BCN. By the time in 2015, hybrid PoW/PoS coins were being pushed in value and pure PoS networks were starting to become more mainstream. On August 23, 2015, Banx shares (BANX) and Bitshares (BTS) were among the most valuable PoS assets. BTS still exists and is worth $0.010 per unit today, while BANX has ceased to exist after significant controversy.

Doge holds top ten position by thread

Two years later, as of August 20, 2017, six PoW coins were still in the top ten. PoW coins included at the time included BTC, ETH, BCH, LTC, DASH, and ETC. BCH, LTC, DASH, and ETC no longer appear in the top ten rankings. Additionally, some other coins that once held positions in the top ten, such as IOTA, NEM, and NEO, have since also fallen out of the top ten rankings. That was almost five years ago and today, DOGE and BTC are the last PoW coins to make the top ten.

Bitcoin (BTC) and Dogecoin (DOGE) — The last two PoW crypto assets to feature in the top ten crypto market cap positions.

In addition, it is worth noting that Dogecoin (DOGE) is in 10th place and is quite close to Polkadot (DOT) in market cap. If The Merge happens and Ethereum becomes a PoS chain, there is a chance that DOGE will not be in the top ten if prices change. When DOGE is knocked out and The Merge is complete, BTC will be the only proof-of-work digital asset among the top 10 crypto market caps.

tags in this story

2 PoW coins, 2013, 2015, 2017, 3 stablecoins, Bitcoin (BTC), Blockchain, Blockchain Consensus, BTC, Doge, Dogecoin (DOGE), ETH, Ethereum, Ethereum (ETH), Ethereum The Merge, Hybrid PoS Coins, Hybrid PoW/PoS, Peercoin, PoS, PoS Coins, PoW, PPC, Proof of Work, Proof of Stake, Sunny King, The Merge

What do you think of the top ten coins that have lost proof-of-work dominance over the past nine years? Let us know what you think about this topic in the comment section below.

Jamie Redman

Jamie Redman is the news director at Bitcoin.com News and a Florida-based financial technology journalist. Redman has been an active member of the cryptocurrency community since 2011. He has a passion for bitcoin, open source code and decentralized applications. As of September 2015, Redman has written more than 5,700 articles for Bitcoin.com News about today’s emerging disruptive protocols.

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