Just like with your familiar pension or savings plans you were no doubt asked by the person entering you in to the investment what proportions of your contributions you'd like to split between low risk blue chip companies and high risk Asian startups etc.
A great way to understand cryptocurrencies is to remove the word currency and replace it with the word share.
In the case of Bitcoin, litecoin, and the like they are using the underlying block chain technology as a vehichle for electronic tokens (shares / coins) to be used as currency.
However the blockchain technology can, will, and is being used for alternative possibilities.
When an idea is brought to market via an initial white paper an ICO is introduced to capture investment. This new industry has 'coined' a new acronym from the words Initial Coin Offering.
In the case of Etherium with its coin 'Ether', the use of blockchain isn't for financial transactions but for Smart Contract Management. Thus Ether can more readily be thought of as shares in the company.
What gives cryptocurrencies value?
Quite simply, market capitalisation. The more FIAT (quite often via Bitcoin) is put into the blockchain the higher the price of coins / shares.
So, which Crypto to invest in? My current view.
Bitcoin. The grandaddy. Household name. Huge market cap. Historical acceptance by various different market sectors i.e. you can book a hotel room with it. It also is used as the middle man on exchanges between FIAT and other cryptos. In my view it's only going up and dramatically from now to the end of 2018. Perfect for use as a currencie is the impotant fact that built into its design is the limit of 21 million coins.
Etherium. Really the second of any note major crypto. Again household name and its use for Smart Contracts is an idea that's going places. It's had a pull back but so it should have. As it's understood and adopted by the legal industry its value will grow.
Dash. Due to the nature of the open ledger being passed to all nodes on a peer to peer blockchain network and updated for every transaction, transaction speed is king. The way information being distributed to all nodes via network packets governed by TCP and UDP has to be optimised for efficiency. Bitcoin is suffering from slow transaction speed due to its increasing popularity making room for other contenders. Dash is the largest present contender.
Litecoin. See Dash
Bytecoin. See Dash
EOS. Dan Larrimer who was involved in the creation of Etherium and Steemit has launched a new crypto 'EOS'. This may go places.
The remaining 800+. Like with your pension plan. There's steady Bluechips and risky volatile crazy Asian startups. Do your research.