The Best Cryptocoins for Long-Term HODLers: Beyond Passive Income (2025 Edition)

The modern DeFi ecosystem is incredibly diverse. It offers a wide range of different investment strategies that investors may use to optimize profitability and hedge against the risks associated with traditional markets. With over 25,000 cryptocurrencies to choose from, making an informed decision without insights from experts often seems impossible.

When looking beyond passive income, crypto is certainly an interesting target for capital allocation as it has the biggest potential for growth among contemporary financial instruments. In general, investors are looking for investments that are appropriate for their investment horizons. Some people are interested in assets they can hold for months, others for years or even decades.

Identifying the best asset composition for a long-term portfolio is quite difficult. Even experienced veterans find themselves struggling to pick currencies that have a strong potential for growth while looking reliable and stable.

Advantages of long-term cryptocurrency investments

The term “HODL” was coined back in 2013 on an old-school Bitcoin Forum by one of the community members who said that he was “HODLING” while explaining his intention to hold onto BTC despite prices plummeting. Today, it is a slang word among crypto enthusiasts who plan to keep their Bitcoin positions open for as long as possible.

This particular strategy turned out to be incredibly profitable for the most patient or forgetful investors from the cohort of early adopters. Over the last 13 years, BTC grew at an incredibly fast pace, reaching its first noteworthy ATH in December 2017 when it skyrocketed to $19,000. The historical profitability of this asset is incredible, with the price increasing from the original $0.05 in 2011 to over $105.6 thousand in December 2024.

Market capitalization and investment potential

The BTC market cap has been fluctuating between $1.6 and $1.8 trillion for quite some time now. The dominance of this digital asset is undeniable. The corresponding technical indicator tells us a beautiful story of a cryptocoin that consistently dominates over 61% of the market.

Market capitalization is an important metric that can be quite useful for investors who are interested in the long-term potential of certain tokens:

• The market cap is the product of the multiplication between the current circulating supply and the price per token.
• The market cap does not reflect the true value of all tokens in circulation as prices tend to collapse during massive selloffs.
• Capitalization is a strong indicator of investor confidence, showing that capital holders are willing to keep their positions open even during bullish trends.

Many hidden gems in crypto are tokens with strong growth potential and somewhat limited circulation supplies. For instance, Bitcoin is a deflationary currency due to the hard cap on the maximum supply (there will ever be only 21 million BTC). The current supply is just 19.84 million. Ethereum has an infinite supply, but the network is burning tokens regularly to keep inflation at bay.

Fundamental analysis for crypto projects

One of the key issues with the cryptocurrency market is that all digital assets are speculative. Without any tangible connection to the real world outside of some RWA projects, these tokens do not have metrics comparable to stocks. An investor cannot look at real assets, labor force, brand value, product outputs, and other numbers to evaluate a cryptocoin.

However, many approaches typically used in traditional markets are applicable to the world of crypto:

• Researching developers behind the project is incredibly important and gives you some excellent insights into the inner workings of a protocol.
• It is important to review the code, smart contract efficiency, and infrastructure of a protocol behind any token, just like you would review real assets when evaluating a publicly trading company.
• Analyze the future of cryptocurrency investments by looking at the track record of the asset, community sentiment, and investor confidence.

Unfortunately for some, the crypto ecosystem is not the best target for fundamental analytical techniques. Using technical analysis and social media sentiment is often the best approach for contemporary investors.

All of the above takes time and effort. Many investors do not have any spare room for such in-depth analysis in their lives. Luckily, Rivo is doing all the legwork for you. The yield marketplace features a variety of investment strategies that were carefully examined by professionals. Teams of dedicated specialists do all the necessary due diligence on your behalf. You only need to choose which of these showcased strategies fits your portfolio based on your preferences and risk style.

Rivo is one of the best tools and platforms that help track and manage long-term crypto portfolios effectively. Here, you can invest safely!

Choosing the right digital assets

Selecting a good target for capital allocation in the crypto market can be extremely difficult even if you have experience in trading and investing. Selecting robust and reliable “stones” that form the foundation of the most successful long-term crypto strategies is a skill that requires honing.

Here are some tips for investors looking for good investments:

• Invest in tokens with rich market history. It is hard to identify patterns and investment sentiment when you are engaging with a token that has been around for just a couple of years. Bitcoin’s market history goes back to 2011. Ethereum has been around since 2016. These are tokens that you can analyze.
• Check user confidence before investing. The beauty of the DeFi ecosystem is that everything is transparent and can be easily verified. For instance, a variety of statistics can be accessed on platforms like Dune and DeFiLlama. Unique wallet addresses, trading volumes, revenues, and other metrics tell a detailed story.
• Invest in tokens that have a defined status in the legal system. Ripple, Bitcoin, and Ethereum are already considered securities under US law. In many other nations, regulators are trying to manage the rapidly expanding crypto ecosystem. The importance of staying informed about regulatory changes affecting cryptocurrency markets remains quite high.
• Focus on tokens that have additional earning potential. Appreciation of tokens is only one of the potential sources of profits. Ethereum, Arbitrum, Solana, Cardano, and many other cryptocurrencies can be staked or loaned, generating higher returns for their holders. For instance, you can stake ETH for roughly 4% APY. Various forms of direct and liquid staking are excellent examples of how technological innovations like blockchain upgrades are shaping long-term investment opportunities.

The current landscape of the DeFi ecosystem is flexible enough to provide a wide range of capital allocation methods to users who are interested in long-term holding of digital assets. Thanks to multiple forms of passive income generation and a rich selection of protocols offering unique investment opportunities, the role of decentralized finance (DeFi) in enhancing long-term investment strategies is becoming crucial.

The main takeaway

Building a portfolio that will last for decades while providing steady returns is an incredibly challenging task. The world of crypto is still less consistent and reliable than traditional markets. However, it is also an ecosystem with many financial instruments that have a much higher potential than anything that the world of tradfi can offer.Rivo is an excellent destination for DeFi investors who want to create a robust composition of assets capable of performing under all sorts of market conditions. Securing your crypto portfolio by using the Rivo wallet and interacting with recommended investment strategies is a good way of investing in cryptocurrencies!