Monero
I think a majority of crypto currencies are not valuable as a currency and are run with pump and dump schemes that a lot of people end up fooling for. There are stupid things like stable coins that aren’t stable and meme coins. A lot of people don’t use crypto currencies as a currency for buying and selling things but instead trying to profit with buying when it’s cheap and selling when it’s high. People also use them for privacy but don’t take the required measures for it to serve this purpose. Almost all crypto currencies have no place to actually exist because they don’t serve much of a purpose. There are a select few that do have purpose and monero Tor is one of these few.
ASIC Resistant
The current PoW algorithm (RandomX Tor) is ASIC Resistant Tor which results in mining not being done by very few people that can combine their power to be a majority on the network and do a 51% attack. It isn’t impossible to do this against monero but it is a lot more resistant with performance being better with CPU mining unlike other crypto currencies such as bitcoin. The monero mining pools are generally divided well at the moment too to avoid this attack.
Private And Fungible
Monero is reasonably private. It makes it difficult to figure out who the sender is, the amount transferred and who the receiver is in the transaction. You can see more on the FAQ Tor. A lot of crypto like bitcoin is very easy to trace. The blockchain is entirely public and anyone who wants to can read that so trying to be private with bitcoin is a monumental task. Monero is not this way.
As it is difficult to track monero, monero is fungible. Bitcoin has this issue where if a certain bitcoin is tainted as it has been associated with bad activity, it can be treated differently. Monero being fungible means it won’t be treated differently. A certain monero may have been used previously to buy cocaine but won’t be treated any differently when that same monero is used to donate to a charity.
Criminal Uses
Due to how monero works, criminals use it. A lot of drug markets have gone monero only or at least pushing users to use monero. Monero makes money laundering easier too. This at least means the crypto is more stable than some others as there is a market using this but it is unfortunate that bad actors are doing the things they do with this crypto.
It Isn’t Perfect
There are still some issues with how monero works. Nothing is perfect and monero is no exception. Check out breaking monero.
Even if monero is very strong, it still depends on how you use it. It is not private if you use a KYC wallet / exchange where in most cases you don’t even possess the seed phrase Tor and they don’t allow you to transfer the currency to a non-custodial wallet so it truly isn’t yours.
Blockchain
If you have the storage to, download the whole blockchain locally. Remote syncing with someone else’s blockchain can be bad for your privacy.
Gas Fees
The transaction fees for monero are very low. With other crypto like bitcoin or with banks, the transaction fees are usually higher. You can look at the fees for monero.
Wallets
Be careful with the wallet you choose. I use the standard monero GUI wallet but you may want to go with something else such as for a CLI or for a cell phone. There is a page you can look at for one. Hardware wallets are probably the best if you are willing to invest in one.
Acquiring Monero
There are many places and ways to get monero but I buy mine off localmonero Tor with cash or exchange for another currency (no ID or bank). You might also want to mine some for yourself if you would like to go down that road.