Verge
Verge aims to provide individuals and businesses with fast, efficient and decentralized transactions, which was bitcoin’s original purpose, but wants to improve on bitcoin by maintaining personal privacy, using anonymity-centric networks such as Tor, obfuscating IP addressees and making transactions "completely untraceable," according to its website. Verge, with a market cap of $1.07 billion, is up more than 1,000 percent in the past week.
Tron
Tron, operated by the Singapore-based Tron Foundation, wants to build a “worldwide free content entertainment system” based on the blockchain, according to its website. The protocol allows users to freely publish, store and own data, enabling them to decide how the content gets distributed and at what cost. Payments would be made in cryptocurrencies including tron’s coin. Tron, with a market cap of $3.1 billion, is up 340 percent in the past week.
Qtum
Qtum wants to be the public ledger for business. The open-source blockchain project wants to combine the reliability of bitcoin’s blockchain with the flexibility of smart contracts of the ethereum network, according to its website. That combination will allow it to provide stability for business applications. Qtum Foundation, which develops the project, is based in Singapore. Qtum has a market cap of $5.1 billion and is up 262 percent in the past week.
Cardano
Cardano, backed by the Zug, Switzerland-based Cardano Foundation, is a decentralized public blockchain that aims to protect user privacy, while also allowing for regulation. Cardano is a multi-layer protocol; the settlement layer will have a unit of account, while the control layer will run smart contracts and will be programmed to recognize identity, assisting compliance, according to its website. The system is designed to be upgraded so that it can evolve quickly. Cardano has a market cap of $14 billion, and is up 348 percent in the past week.