The following cryptocurrency list is based off of the balance in both criteria below.

1. safe bet
2. bull run

That being said, other altcoins may have an even bigger bull run but these top 5 are what seemingly will most likely make a run for your buck while not compromising safety.

1. Electroneum (ETN)

As opposed to majority of critics, Electroneum is my safest bet, at least in 2018. It is completely private coin being a Monero fork, but with a viral twist.

The goal behind ETN is mass adoption and mobile presence. Everyone is laughing about the mobile mining thinking is does not do what "Proof-of-Work" consensus mechanism does, when in fact it is intended to be a mass adoption vehicle. Its sole purpose is introduce the layman into the crypto-space. A feat that no cryptocurrency has ever tried to do except Electroneum.

Currently sitting at $0.07, what does it take for Electroneum to go x10? Run the numbers and tell me it's impossible for a viral cryptocurrency to be on that range. If you bought in during the ICO where it's $0.01 a coin and some bonuses, then you've already made profit!

And add to that, privacy coins are increasingly more and more popular as the regulations kicks in and will drive their value higher. Governments and banks may not simply watch while their beloved fiat is slowly slipping away.

2. Cardano (ADA)

If you have invested time on Cardano and understood what it tries to convey, then I'm willing to bet and without a doubt you are a firm believer of the project.

There has been not much advertising spent and should there be any, it's really just a form of information what Cardano truly stands for - which is to be the 3rd generation cryptocurrency. Their team is well-funded and well-founded; big names in the cyrptocurrency space. Time and research were invested in this project. Everything is well thought through to prevent the same mistakes Bitcoin and Ethereum has. How many cryptocurrencies are doing what Cardano team does? Not many.

Cardano is like Bitcoin and Ethereum but on the early stages.

3. IOTA (IOTA)

IOTA is a thing of its own. Using Tangle, it does not use blockchain and will likely be an overall contender against cryptocurrencies in the Proof-Of-Work and Proof-of-Stake or the combinations of both. When they can prove they can remove coordinator node, then believe you me, this guy is going to sky rocket to the moon. I mean, free fees!?!? Anyone?

4. Ethereum (ETH)

Ethereum, despite its failures is already a father of many successful coins and many more will come. Cardano might take its place, but it will not be this soon in 2018. That said, Ethereum will still be one of the safest bets.

5. Bitcoin (BTC)

Bitcoin? 5th? One cannot argue that in order for you to gain 10x your money, Bitcoin will need to be on the $170,000 range, which is a lot to expect even for this big guy. But even so, I believe this is quite possible. Here's why:

When it comes to charts, cryptocurrency tend to do a "hurry-up and wait" behavior. By that, I mean a bull run that occurs on a short period (hurry-up) and a following correction that occurs in a span of days or weeks, and even months (wait). We can scale this analogy up to a grander point-of-view; in terms of years.

Based on the logarithmic BTCUSD chart below, Bitcoin has just started on the "hurry up" stage. As you can see on the chart projection in 2018 almost coincides the bull run in 2013-2014. If true then we may see $200,000 in the 2018. Then the long "wait" occurs, which essentially is a crash, much of what happened in 2014-2016 in the chart.

This is all but speculation. No-one truly knows what will happen to the Bitcoin price. Make no mistake, cryptocurrencies will bounce back as it always have. Should this happen, you are already prepared for and able to leverage the gains.

If this blog post has entertained or helped you, please consider to follow, upvote, resteem and/or consider buying me a beer:

BTC: 1GNqY5CsYrkHvDf9Jj3bwSXhHogbvmXBmF
ETH: 0x6c2F7128363332965b92A6c71eee0276FF27E0cD
LTC: LbLb9DcNvKzp2ywtYCctiv5NfpzvSwg7Ve

Legal Disclaimer: Everything in this post is of my personal bias. Make of it what you wish. It is not an advice nor recommendation to buy or sell anything. It is meant for informative and entertainment purposes only.