IOTA was developed by a German team and created to support the Internet of Thing…

IOTA was developed by a German team and created to support the Internet of Things (IoT) revolution, using an innovative blockchain system called “tangle”. It was created to enhance communications, transactions, and payments between machines (i.e. M2M interaction).

Considering the speed with which artificial intelligence is gaining global adoption, IOTA is and was ahead of its time when it was conceived. Part of IOTA’s unique features is that it is one of the few altcoins that cannot be mined, has no blocks, and has no chains. It comes with infinite scalability and very fast transaction times, which give it an advantage over the Bitcoin blockchain, for instance.

Still, IOTA has been held to the same whims as the rest of the cryptomarkets; a big swing up in 2017 and early 2018 and then a big fall down for the last four months. The team continues to add partners and use cases which make IOTA a popular headline on our site and others. And there are a lot of bullish technologists that see IOTA’s tech as superior to many others on the market.

Still, for IOTA’s price to truly recover from its 2018—where it started around $3.61 and now trades for just over $.5—more time is needed. The partnerships need to coalesce, and the chain itself needs to showcase its ease and speed through millions of transactions.

With IOTA still tied to Bitcoin, and partnerships in their nascent stage, IOTA’s price is not likely to have an upswing on its own in 2018. Beyond this year, it could make the kind of changes to the world of logistics and IoT processes that it purports to be able to do. But that’s looking down the road.

In 2018, we don’t see IOTA gaining much room on its BTC ratio—and staying within a 10-20% line of its Satoshi ratio. So IOTA’s year-end price will be up to the market’s reaction and trading with Bitcoin BTC. At a current satoshi value of 8,500–IOTA should trade within 7,000 and 10,000, a number that would, if BTC stays at current prices through 2018, put a year-end IOTA price prediction between $.4 and $.62.