What Makes Bull Market Winners So Successful?

Led by Virtual Lands, Metaverse NFT Sales Surged Past $500M This Year

Technical Analysis: MANA, SAND, RACA, STX and GALA (March. W1)

Technical Analysis: MANA, SAND, RACA, STX and GALA (Feb. W4)

Technical Analysis: MANA, SAND, RACA, STX and GALA (Feb. W3)

## Что такое Decentraland (MANA)?

Decentraland (MANA) определяет себя как платформу виртуальной реальности на базе блокчейна [Ethereum](https://coinmarketcap.com/ru/currencies/ethereum/), которая позволяет пользователям создавать, обслуживать и монетизировать контент и приложения.

В этой виртуальной реальности пользователи покупают земельные участки, по которым они могут позже перемещаться, строить на них и монетизировать их.

Decentraland была запущена после первичного размещения монет ([ICO](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/glossary/initial-coin-offering-ico)) в размере 24 миллионов долларов США, которое было проведено в 2017 году. Виртуальный мир запустил свою закрытую бета-версию в 2019 году и открылся для публики в феврале 2020 года. С тех пор пользователи создали широкий спектр возможностей на своих участках LAND, включая интерактивные игры, обширные трехмерные сцены и множество других интерактивных возможностей.

Decentraland использует два токена: MANA и LAND. MANA - это токен [ERC-20](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/glossary/erc-20), который необходимо сжечь, чтобы получить LAND - невзаимозаменяемые токены ERC-721 . Токены MANA также можно использовать для оплаты ряда аватаров, предметов одежды, имен и прочего на торговой площадке Decentraland.

### Кто создал Decentraland?

Decentraland создали Ариэль Мейлих (Ariel Meilich) и Эстебан Ордано (Esteban Ordano), которые ушли с основных должностей в проекте, но по-прежнему работают с Decentraland в качестве советников.

Ариэль Мейлих ранее занимал роль руководителя проекта в Decentraland с 2017 по 2020 год и является серийным предпринимателем, который основал несколько других стартапов, включая переводческое онлайн-агентство и платформу CRM. Он также работал аналитиком в Charles River Ventures, известном венчурном фонде Кремниевой долины.

А Эстебан Ордано является бывшим техническим руководителем Decentraland и имеет длительный и разнообразный опыт в сфере криптовалют - он работал инженером-программистом в BitPay, Inc., советником [Matic Network](https://coinmarketcap.com/ru/currencies/matic-network/) и некоторое время руководил собственной фирмой по разработке смарт-контрактов, известной как Smart Contract Solutions.

Эстебану также приписывают соучредительство Zeppelin Solutions, компании, занимающейся инфраструктурой блокчейн технологий.

Хотя Ариэль и Эстебан больше не возглавляют проект, разработка Decentraland все еще продолжается, и управлением ее развития занимается недавно созданный фонд Decentraland Foundation.

### Что особенного в Decentraland?

Decentraland разработана для создателей контента, компаний и частных лиц, которые ищут новую художественную среду, возможности для бизнеса или источник развлечений.

В общей сложности игровой мир Decentraland, называемый "Metaverse", разделен на 90 601 отдельных участков LAND, каждый из которых представлен невзаимозаменяемым токеном стандарта [ERC-721](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/glossary/erc-721). Каждый LAND имеет размер 10м х 10м (100 квадратных метров) и может быть найден по определенным координатам в Метавселенной (Metaverse).

Хотя владельцы LAND могут свободно развивать свой участок как угодно, большая часть Метавселенной в целом разделена на несколько районов, каждый из которых имеет различные размеры и тематику. Эти районы были созданы путем индивидуальных краудсейлов токенов MANA, и участки LAND в этих районах не могут быть проданы.

По состоянию на январь 2021 года тематический киберпанк-район Aetheria является самым большим районом — в общей сложности он насчитывает 8008 LAND.

Decentraland также является одним из множества проектов, использующих структуру децентрализованной автономной организации ([DAO](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/glossary/decentralized-autonomous-organizations-dao)) для принятия управленческих решений. В результате держатели токенов MANA контролируют развитие мира Decentraland путем предложений и голосования по обновлениям политики, особенностям предстоящих аукционов LAND и типам контента, разрешенным в Метавселенной.

Помимо творческого подхода, многие пользователи Decentraland в настоящее время монетизируют свои LAND за счет аренды, рекламы и платных услуг. Аналогичным образом, другие пользователи получают доход, создавая и продавая предметы на торговой площадке Decentraland за токены MANA.

#### Связанные страницы:

Узнайте о [AnRKey X (ANRX)](https://coinmarketcap.com/ru/currencies/anrkey-x/) — первой игре, объединяющей [DeFi](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/article/what-is-decentralized-finance), киберспорт и Web 3.0.

[Попробуйте Axie Infinity (AXS)](https://coinmarketcap.com/ru/currencies/axie-infinity/) — цифровую вселенную домашних животных и децентрализованную торговую игру.

Узнайте больше о невзаимозаменяемых токенах с [CoinMarketCap Alexandria](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/glossary/non-fungible-token).

Будьте в курсе последних новостей о криптовалюте и актуальных трейдинговых инсайтов с [блогом CoinMarketCap](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/categories/blog).

### Сколько монет Decentraland (MANA) находится в обращении?

По состоянию на январь 2021 года в обращении находилось чуть более 1,49 миллиарда токенов MANA. Это эквивалентно примерно 68% от текущего общего предложения в 2,19 миллиарда MANA.

Изначальное общее предложение было установлено в 2.8 миллиардов MANA, но было уменьшено, так как более 600 миллионов MANA были сожжены в ходе аукционов LAND.

Существует также ряд дополнительных механизмов сжигания для дальнейшего сокращения циркулирующего предложения MANA, включая сжигание 2,5% MANA на транзакциях на торговой площадке Decentraland.

Изначально MANA была рассчитана на 8-процентную инфляцию в первый год, постепенно уменьшающуюся с течением времени для снижения уровня инфляции. Но инфляция в настоящее время отключена. Согласно [классификатору Decentraland](https://docs.decentraland.org/decentraland/glossary/), нет никаких планов инициировать эту инфляцию «до необходимости».

В общей сложности 40% предложения MANA было продано во время первичного размещения монет (ICO) в 2017 году. Кроме того, 20% было зарезервировано для стимулирования сообщества, 20% досталось команде разработчиков и другим ранним участникам, а оставшиеся 20% остались у Decentraland. Токены ведущего проекта больше не передаются.

### Как обеспечивается безопасность сети Decentraland?

MANA - это токен стандарта ERC-20. Это означает, что он базируется на [блокчейне Ethereum](https://coinmarketcap.com/ru/currencies/ethereum/).

Ethereum защищен крупной децентрализованной сетью майнеров, которые работают вместе с тысячами узлов, чтобы гарантировать, что блокчейн Ethereum и, следовательно, токены MANA защищены от [атак](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/glossary/51-attack).

Ethereum, как один из наиболее проверенных испытаниями [блокчейнов](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/glossary/blockchain), в настоящее время является самой популярной сетью для крипто токенов, у которых нет собственного блокчейна.

### Где купить Decentraland (MANA)?

Токен MANA в настоящее время обладает отличной [ликвидностью](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/glossary/liquidity) и его можно приобрести, торговать или продать примерно на 100 различных биржевых платформах. По состоянию на январь 2021 года [Binance](https://coinmarketcap.com/ru/exchanges/binance/), [OKEx](https://coinmarketcap.com/ru/exchanges/okex/) и [Coinbase Pro](https://coinmarketcap.com/ru/exchanges/coinbase-pro/) являются одними из самых ликвидных бирж токенов MANA. Полный список доступных рынков можно найти в разделе «Рынки».

В настоящее время MANA можно торговать с [Bitcoin (BTC)](https://coinmarketcap.com/ru/currencies/bitcoin/), [Tether (USDT)](https://coinmarketcap.com/ru/currencies/tether/) и Ethereum (ETH) — и ее можно приобрести за [различные фиатные валюты](https://coinmarketcap.com/how-to-buy-bitcoin/), среди которых KRW и USD.

Вот еще несколько статей, которые могут вас заинтересовать:

* [Что такое Crypto Faucet?](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/article/what-is-a-crypto-faucet)
* [Что такое криптовалютные дебетовые карты?](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/article/what-are-crypto-debit-cards)
* [Что такое Web 3.0?](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/article/what-is-web-3-0)
* [Что такое доходное фермерство?](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/article/what-is-yield-farming)
* [Что такое криптовалютное кредитование?](https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/article/what-is-crypto-lending)

Decentraland

Ledger

Coinbase

HyperPay

Trust Wallet

MetaMask

SolFlare

Backpack

Phantom

Atomic wallet

Welcome to Decentraland's Community channel aggregated by CoinMarketCap.

Ethereum

Shiba Inu

Chainlink

UNUS SED LEO

Uniswap

Worldcoin

Blur

Axie Infinity

Tether Gold

SingularityNET

JasmyCoin

AIOZ Network

dYdX (ethDYDX)

Axelar

Ribbon Finance

Lends

Dypius [Old]

X2Y2

Dogecoin20

Bit.Store

Launched in 2011 by Pixowl, The Sandbox is a blockchain-based virtual world allowing users to create, build, buy and sell digital assets in the form of a game. By combining the powers of decentralized autonomous organizations (DAO) and non-fungible tokens (NFTs), the Sandbox creates a decentralized platform for a thriving gaming community.

According to the official whitepaper, the Sandbox platform’s main mission is to introduce blockchain technology in mainstream gaming successfully. The platform focuses on facilitating a creative “play-to-earn” model, which allows users to be both creators and gamers simultaneously. The Sandbox employs the powers of blockchain technology by introducing the SAND utility token, which facilitates transactions on the platform.

The Sandbox

Enjin Coin is a project of Enjin, a company that provides an ecosystem of interconnected, blockchain-based gaming products. Enjin's flagship offering is the Enjin Network, a social gaming platform through which users can create websites and clans, chat, and host virtual item stores.

Enjin allows game developers to tokenize in-game items on the Ethereum blockchain. It uses Enjin Coin, an ERC-20 token, to back the digital assets issued using its platform, meaning that items can be bought, sold and traded with real-world value.

Enjin Coin was first announced in July 2017, and it launched on the Ethereum mainnet in June 2018.

Enjin Coin (ENJ) is a digital store of value used to back the value of blockchain assets like non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
Every asset minted with the Enjin Platform contains ENJ, a minting resource which is locked inside NFTs and removed from circulation. Minting blockchain assets with ENJ provides a variety of benefits to creators and users:

Infuses them with a reserve value

Ensures their transparency and scarcity

Gives them instant liquidity

Provides utility in games and apps

Anti-inflationary

Enjin's "melting" functionality allows users to destroy their blockchain assets at any time to retrieve the ENJ value from within.

The Enjin blockchain ecosystem aims to offer software products that make it easy for everyone to develop, trade, monetize, and market with blockchain.

Founded in 2009, Enjin has roots in the gaming industry, with the company’s first product, a gaming community platform called the Enjin Network, growing to 20 million users over the course of a decade.

In 2017 following an ICO, Enjin established itself as a leading blockchain ecosystem developer, building a suite of software products that enable anyone to easily mint, manage, trade, distribute, and integrate blockchain assets.

Enjin’s co-founder Witek Radomski wrote the code for one of the first ever non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and is also the co-author of the ERC-1155 Ethereum token standard.

Built on top of an on-chain infrastructure, the Enjin ecosystem enables game developers and businesses of all sizes to use tokenized digital assets as part of their acquisition, retention, engagement, and monetization strategies. The Enjin ecosystem is fueled by Enjin Coin (ENJ), a cryptocurrency used to back the value of blockchain assets.

Enjin Coin

Polygon (previously Matic Network) is the first well-structured, easy-to-use platform for Ethereum scaling and infrastructure development. Its core component is Polygon SDK, a modular, flexible framework that supports building multiple types of applications.

To learn more about this project, check out our deep dive of Polygon Matic.

Using Polygon, one can create optimistic rollup chains, ZK rollup chains, stand alone chains or any other kind of infra required by the developer.

Polygon effectively transforms Ethereum into a full-fledged multi-chain system (aka Internet of Blockchains). This multi-chain system is akin to other ones such as Polkadot, Cosmos, Avalanche etc. with the advantages of Ethereum’s security, vibrant ecosystem and openness.

The $MATIC token will continue to exist and will play an increasingly important role, securing the system and enabling governance.

Polygon (formerly Matic Network) is a Layer 2 scaling solution backed by Binance and Coinbase. The project seeks to stimulate mass adoption of cryptocurrencies by resolving the problems of scalability on many blockchains.

Polygon combines the Plasma Framework and the proof-of-stake blockchain architecture. The Plasma framework used by Polygon as proposed by the co-founder of Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin, allows for the easy execution of scalable and autonomous smart contracts.

Nothing will change for the existing ecosystem built on the Plasma-POS chain. With Polygon, new features are being built around the existing proven technology to expand the ability to cater to diverse needs from the developer ecosystem. Polygon will continue to develop the core technology so that it can scale to a larger ecosystem.

Polygon boasts of up to 65,000 transactions per second on a single side chain, along with a respectable block confirmation time of less than two seconds. The framework also allows for the creation of globally available decentralized financial applications on a single foundational blockchain.

The Plasma framework gives Polygon the potential of housing an unlimited number of decentralized applications on their infrastructure without experiencing the normal drawbacks common on proof-of-work blockchains. So far, Polygon has attracted more than 50 DApps to its PoS-secured Ethereum sidechain.

MATIC, the native tokens of Polygon, is an ERC-20 token running on the Ethereum blockchain. The tokens are used for payment services on Polygon and as a settlement currency between users who operate within the Polygon ecosystem. The transaction fees on Polygon sidechains are also paid in MATIC tokens.

Polygon

Axie Infinity is a blockchain-based trading and battling game that is partially owned and operated by its players.

To learn more about this project, check out our deep dive of Axie Infinity.

Inspired by popular games like Pokémon and Tamagotchi, Axie Infinity allows players to collect, breed, raise, battle and trade token-based creatures known as Axies.

These Axies can take various forms, and there are more than 500 different body parts available, including aquatic, beast, bird, bug, plant and reptile parts. Parts from each type class come in four different rarity scales: common, rare, ultra rare and legendary — and Axies can have any combination of body parts, making them highly variable and often rare and unique.

Each Axie is a non-fungible token (NFT) with different attributes and strengths and can be entered into 3v3 battles, with the winning team earning more experience (exp) points that are used to level up an Axie's stats or evolve their body parts. These Axies can be bred together to produce new and unique offspring, which can be used or sold on the Axie marketplace.

The Axie Infinity ecosystem also has its own unique governance token, known as Axie Infinity Shards (AXS). These are used to participate in key governance votes and will give holders a say in how funds in the Axie Community Treasury are spent.

Polkadot is an open-source sharded multichain protocol that connects and secures a network of specialized blockchains, facilitating cross-chain transfer of any data or asset types, not just tokens, thereby allowing blockchains to be interoperable with each other. Polkadot was designed to provide a foundation for a decentralized internet of blockchains, also known as Web3.

Polkadot is known as a layer-0 metaprotocol because it underlies and describes a format for a network of layer 1 blockchains known as parachains (parallel chains). As a metaprotocol, Polkadot is also capable of autonomously and forklessly updating its own codebase via on-chain governance according to the will of its token holder community.

Polkadot provides a foundation to support a decentralized web, controlled by its users, and to simplify the creation of new applications, institutions and services.

The Polkadot protocol can connect public and private chains, permissionless networks, oracles and future technologies, allowing these independent blockchains to trustlessly share information and transactions through the Polkadot Relay Chain (explained further down).

Polkadot’s native DOT token serves three clear purposes: staking for operations and security, facilitating network governance, and bonding tokens to  connect parachains .

Polkadot has four core components:

Relay Chain: Polkadot’s “heart,” helping to create consensus, interoperability and shared security across the network of different chains;

Parachains: independent chains that can have their own tokens and be optimized for specific use cases;

Parathreads: similar to parachains but with flexible connectivity based on an economical pay-as-you-go model;

Bridges: allow parachains and parathreads to connect and communicate with external blockchains like Ethereum.

Polkadot

Cardano is a proof-of-stake blockchain platform that says its goal is to allow “changemakers, innovators and visionaries” to bring about positive global change.

To learn more about this project, check out our deep dive of Cardano.

The open-source project also aims to “redistribute power from unaccountable structures to the margins to individuals” — helping to create a society that is more secure, transparent and fair.

Cardano was founded back in 2017, and named after the 16th century Italian polymath Gerolamo Cardano. The native ADA token takes its name from the 19th century mathematician Ada Lovelace, widely regarded as the world’s first computer programmer. The ADA token is designed to ensure that owners can participate in the operation of the network. Because of this, those who hold the cryptocurrency have the right to vote on any proposed changes to the software.

The team behind the layered blockchain say that there have already been some compelling use cases for its technology, which aims to allow decentralized apps and smart contracts to be developed with modularity.

In August 2021, Charles Hoskinson announced the launch of the Alonzo hard fork, causing Cardano price to surge, gaining 116% in the following month. On Sept. 12, 2021, the Cardano ‘Alonzo’ hard fork officially launched, bringing smart contract functionality to the blockchain. Over 100 smart contracts were deployed in the following 24 hours after the launch.

Cardano is used by agricultural companies to track fresh produce from field to fork, while other products built on the platform allow educational credentials to be stored in a tamper-proof way, and retailers to clamp down on counterfeit goods.

Cardano

Gala is a web3 ecosystem powered by a layer-1 blockchain (GalaChain) built to power the Gala entertainment ecosystem that originally included Gala Games, Gala Music and Gala Film. More recently however, GalaChain has opened its doors to external developers and projects from any applicable industry, providing open source developer resources to simplify the process.

On a mission to empower users and creators across multiple industries throughout the world, Gala’s goal is to become the first billion user blockchain in the world. Innovators can extend the benefits of web3 to their users and communities more easily than ever before by leveraging open source tools like the GalaChain SDK and Creator Portal.

By elevating their ideas to web3 through GalaChain, developers can create custom tokens, smart contracts, reward opportunities and node networks for their communities and projects. Assets built on GalaChain can also be bridged to other blockchains, such as Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain and more. Developers who wish to learn more about getting involved with GalaChain are welcome to reach out via GalaChain.com.

The core of GalaChain is powered by its DePIN (Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Network) of Founder’s Nodes, whose operators earn daily $GALA rewards for actively providing resources to the ecosystem and enjoy governance voting rights on certain core Gala decisions. In addition to the Founder’s Node network’s foundational workload, individual projects can also create Node networks on GalaChain with more specific workloads.

Gala.com
News.Gala.com
Games.Gala.com
Music.Gala.com
Film.Gala.com

Gala

Avalanche is a layer one blockchain that functions as a platform for decentralized applications and custom blockchain networks. It is one of Ethereum’s rivals, aiming to unseat Ethereum as the most popular blockchain for smart contracts. It aims to do so by having a higher transaction output of up to 6,500 transactions per second while not compromising scalability.

This is made possible by Avalanche’s unique architecture. The Avalanche network consists of three individual blockchains: the X-Chain, C-Chain and P-Chain. Each chain has a distinct purpose, which is radically different from the approach Bitcoin and Ethereum use, namely having all nodes validate all transactions. Avalanche blockchains even use different consensus mechanisms based on their use cases.

After its mainnet launch in 2020, Avalanche has worked on developing its own ecosystem of DApps and DeFi. Different Ethereum-based projects such as SushiSwap and TrueUSD have integrated with Avalanche. Furthermore, the platform is constantly working on improving interoperability between its own ecosystem and Ethereum, like through the development of bridges.

Avalanche

Fantom is a directed acyclic graph (DAG) smart contract platform providing decentralized finance (DeFi) services to developers using its own bespoke consensus algorithm.

Together with its in-house token FTM, Fantom aims to solve problems associated with smart-contract platforms, specifically transaction speed, which developers say they have reduced to under two seconds.

The Fantom Foundation, which oversees the Fantom product offering, was originally created in 2018, with the launch of OPERA, Fantom’s mainnet, coming in December 2019.

Fantom is an open-source decentralized smart contract platform for DApps and digital assets that was created as an alternative to Ethereum. Fantom has the goal of overcoming the limitations of previous generation blockchains and balancing three components: scalability, security and decentralization. The project offers a set of tools to simplify the process of integrating existing DApps, as well as a detailed staking reward system and built-in DeFi instruments.

Fantom is a Layer-1 blockchain that uses a scratch-built consensus mechanism and independent consensus layer, Lachesis, to facilitate DeFi and related services on the basis of smart contracts. Lachesis provides security for other layers as well, including Opera, Fantom's EVM-compatible smart contract chain. The long-playing mission of the project is to “grant compatibility between all transaction bodies around the world.”

One of Fantom's key strengths is its performance and efficient transaction processing, namely thousands of transactions per second, where transactions are settled in 1-2 seconds, and the cost is fractions of a cent per transaction. As a result, Fantom provides higher scalability but at a lower cost.

The ecosystem is based on two main technologies: Lachesis protocol and Opera.

The Lachesis protocol is the core consensus layer that secures the Fantom network by providing both transaction speed and security.

Lachesis is an aBFT consensus engine that uses a directed acyclic graph (DAG) algorithm. How it works: network data can be processed at different times, and the network filters the participants, allowing only one third, which are allocated due to erroneous or malicious behavior, without compromising network processes.

Fantom's Asynchronous Byzantine Fault Tolerant (aBFT) Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus mechanism maintains the efficiency of the entire network, its design provides security at maximum speed. Fantom developers emphasize that the PoS mechanism is a leaderless phenomenon — there are no leaders of blocks and participants, and anyone can join (or leave) the network of nodes at a convenient moment.

The key qualities of Lachesis are: asynchronous, leaderless, Byzantine fault-tolerant, and near-instant finality.

As for Opera, it's an application development layer or Fantom's mainnet deployment platform, permissionless and open-source hosting DApps. Thanks to EVM integration and support for the Solidity programming language, Fantom has a full set of smart contract capabilities, which allows users to seamlessly interact with Ethereum platforms while maintaining the advantage of Fantom's transaction efficiency.

The Fantom Foundation concluded that removing block leaders improves network security, so Opera uses a PoS model and leaderless validators (validators do not determine which blocks are valid).

In addition to being a fast, secure and cheap payment platform that enables to make fast and secure payments at minimal cost, Fantom also features on-chain governance where users vote with FTM tokens (one token equals one vote). Of the features: users have the right to express the degree of agreement / disagreement on a scale from 0 to 4.

FTM is the native utility in-house PoS token of Fantom that powers the ecosystem and is applied for payments, network fees, staking, and governance. FTM forms the backbone of transactions, and allows fee collection and staking activities, along with the user rewards the latter represents.

Fantom

VeChainThor (VET) is a versatile enterprise-grade L1 smart contract platform whose origins began in 2015. VeChain is known as a pioneer of real-world enterprise applications, and built a distributed platform powered by Internet of Things (IoT) technologies, NFC chips and blockchain to help various industries solve data-related challenges.

VeChain solves major blockchain adoption hurdles. The platform uses an intelligent two token model, VET and VTHO, separating the protocol's Store of Value and gas fee payment mechanisms, ensuring costs can be kept low and stable. Fee delegation allows smart contracts to pay gas fees on behalf of business users, and an advanced transaction model allows data to be packaged more efficiently while ensuring finality of data.

VeChain is focused on delivering a wave of incentive-based sustainability dApps through its new platform, VeBetterDAO, working closely with Boston Consulting Group to achieve adoption across enterprise and individual users, and helping  onboard the next billion users to Web3 over the coming decade.

From supply chains to sustainability, VeChain has continuously demonstrated its leading role as a driver of blockchain in business, and is dedicated to its role as a pioneer of driving real world adoption of blockchain technology.

VeChain

Founded in 2017, Chainlink is a blockchain abstraction layer that enables universally connected smart contracts. Through a decentralized oracle network, Chainlink allows blockchains to securely interact with external data feeds, events and payment methods, providing the critical off-chain information needed by complex smart contracts to become the dominant form of digital agreement.

The Chainlink Network is driven by a large open-source community of data providers, node operators, smart contract developers, researchers, security auditors and more. The company focuses on ensuring that decentralized participation is guaranteed for all node operators and users looking to contribute to the network.

To learn more about this project, check out our deep dive of Chainlink.

Algorand is a self-sustaining, decentralized, blockchain-based network that supports a wide range of applications. These systems are secure, scalable and efficient, all critical properties for effective applications in the real world. Algorand will support computations that require reliable performance guarantees to create new forms of trust.

The Algorand mainnet became live in June 2019, and was able to handle almost 1 million transactions per day as of December 2020. Algorand transaction metrics can be viewed here. Algorand initial coin offering (ICO) was held in June 2019, with the Algorand price of $0.24 per token.

Algorand

Solana is a highly functional open source project that banks on blockchain technology’s permissionless nature to provide decentralized finance (DeFi) solutions. While the idea and initial work on the project began in 2017, Solana was officially launched in March 2020 by the Solana Foundation with headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland.

To learn more about this project, check out our deep dive of Solana.

The Solana protocol is designed to facilitate decentralized app (DApp) creation. It aims to improve scalability by introducing a proof-of-history (PoH) consensus combined with the underlying proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus of the blockchain.

Because of the innovative hybrid consensus model, Solana enjoys interest from small-time traders and institutional traders alike. A significant focus for the Solana Foundation is to make decentralized finance accessible on a larger scale.

Solana

In a nutshell, Cosmos bills itself as a project that solves some of the “hardest problems” facing the blockchain industry. It aims to offer an antidote to “slow, expensive, unscalable and environmentally harmful” proof-of-work protocols, like those used by Bitcoin, by offering an ecosystem of connected blockchains.

The project’s other goals include making blockchain technology less complex and difficult for developers thanks to a modular framework that demystifies decentralized apps. Last but not least, an Interblockchain Communication protocol makes it easier for blockchain networks to communicate with each other — preventing fragmentation in the industry.

Cosmos’ origins can be dated back to 2014, when Tendermint, a core contributor to the network, was founded. In 2016, a white paper for Cosmos was published — and a token sale was held the following year. ATOM tokens are earned through a hybrid proof-of-stake algorithm, and they help to keep the Cosmos Hub, the project’s flagship blockchain, secure. This cryptocurrency also has a role in the network’s governance.

Cosmos

Chiliz is the leading digital currency for sports and entertainment by the eponymous Malta-based FinTech provider. It operates the blockchain-based sports entertainment platform Socios, which enables users to participate in the governance of their favorite sports brands. Multiple fan tokens by Socios.com are an example of that. For sports clubs and associations, fan tokens offer a way of connecting with their fans and unlocking new revenue streams.

For instance, fans can participate and influence club-related decisions through surveys and polls, such as messages the captain should wear on his armband. The company aims to bridge the gap between being an active and a passive fan. Chiliz has developed partnerships with some of the biggest sporting institutions in the world: FC Barcelona, Manchester City, Juventus Turin, and Paris Saint-Germain. It also boasts partnerships with the UFC and gaming organizations. By purchasing CHZ, fans get access to various fan tokens and literally have a stake in their club.

Chiliz

Terra is a blockchain protocol that uses fiat-pegged stablecoins to power price-stable global payments systems. According to its white paper, Terra combines the price stability and wide adoption of fiat currencies with the censorship-resistance of Bitcoin (BTC) and offers fast and affordable settlements.

Development on Terra began in January 2018, and its mainnet officially launched in April 2019. As of September 2021, it offers stablecoins pegged to the U.S. dollar, South Korean won, Mongolian tugrik and the International Monetary Fund's Special Drawing Rights basket of currencies — and it intends to roll out additional options.

On May 28, 2022, the genesis block of the new chain was launched to conduct future transactions under the name Terra (LUNA), and the original Terra Chain was rebranded as Terra Classic. The original native token — LUNA has also been renamed as LUNA Classic (LUNC). Moreover, all network stablecoins (UST, KRT, EUT) have been renamed to Terra Classic stablecoins (USTC, KRTC, EUTC). There will be no Terra stablecoins on the new chain.

There is a theory that the additional term “classic” is a reference to the Ethereum / Ethereum Classic split in 2017. According to CEO, Do Kwon, the collapse of UST in the spring of 2022 is the equivalent moment of the Ethereum’s DAO hack that took place in 2017.

Terra Classic

Launched in 2021, the XRP Ledger (XRPL) is an open-source, permissionless and decentralized technology. Benefits of the XRP Ledger include its low-cost ($0.0002 to transact), speed  (settling transactions in 3-5 seconds), scalability (1,500 transactions per second) and inherently green attributes (carbon-neutral and energy-efficient). The XRP Ledger also features the first decentralized exchange (DEX) and custom tokenization capabilities built into the protocol. Since 2012, the XRP Ledger has been operating reliably, having closed 70 million ledgers.

Cronos (CRO) is the native cryptocurrency token of Cronos Chain — a decentralized, open-source blockchain developed by the Crypto.com payment, trading and financial services company.

Cronos Chain is one of the products in Crypto.com’s lineup of solutions designed to accelerate the global adoption of cryptocurrencies as a means of increasing personal control over money, safeguarding user data and protecting users’ identities. The CRO blockchain serves primarily as a vehicle that powers the Crypto.com Pay mobile payments app.

In the future, Crypto.com plans to expand the reach of the CRO platform to power its other products as well.

CRO went live in November-December 2018.

Cronos

Ethereum is a decentralized open-source blockchain system that features its own cryptocurrency, Ether. ETH works as a platform for numerous other cryptocurrencies, as well as for the execution of decentralized smart contracts.

Ethereum was first described in a 2013 whitepaper by Vitalik Buterin. Buterin, along with other co-founders, secured funding for the project in an online public crowd sale in the summer of 2014. The project team managed to raise $18.3 million in Bitcoin, and Ethereum’s price in the Initial Coin Offering (ICO) was $0.311, with over 60 million Ether sold. Taking Ethereum’s price now, this puts the return on investment (ROI) at an annualized rate of over 270%, essentially almost quadrupling your investment every year since the summer of 2014.

The Ethereum Foundation officially launched the blockchain on July 30, 2015, under the prototype codenamed “Frontier.” Since then, there has been several network updates — “Constantinople” on Feb. 28, 2019, “Istanbul” on Dec. 8, 2019, “Muir Glacier” on Jan. 2, 2020, “Berlin” on April 14, 2021, and most recently on Aug. 5, 2021, the “London” hard fork.

Ethereum’s own purported goal is to become a global platform for decentralized applications, allowing users from all over the world to write and run software that is resistant to censorship, downtime and fraud.

The Graph is an indexing protocol for querying data for networks like Ethereum and IPFS, powering many applications in both DeFi and the broader Web3 ecosystem. Anyone can build and publish open APIs, called subgraphs, that applications can query using GraphQL to retrieve blockchain data. There is a hosted service in production that makes it easy for developers to get started building on The Graph and the decentralized network will be launching later this year. The Graph currently supports indexing data from Ethereum, IPFS and POA, with more networks coming soon.

To learn more about this project, check out our deep dive of The Graph.

To date, over3,000 subgraphs have been deployed by thousands of developers, for DApps like Uniswap, Synthetix, Aragon, AAVE, Gnosis, Balancer, Livepeer, DAOstack, Decentraland and many others. The Graph usage has been growing at over 50% MoM and hit over 7 billion queries during the month of September 2020.

The Graph has a global community, including over 200 Indexer Nodes in the testnet and more than 2,000 Curators in the Curator Program as of October 2020. To fund network development, The Graph raised funds from community members, strategic VCs and influential individuals in the blockchain community including Coinbase Ventures, DCG, Framework, ParaFi Capital, CoinFund, DTC, Multicoin, Reciprocal Ventures, SPC, Tally Capital and others. The Graph Foundation also successfully completed a public GRT Sale with participation from 99 countries (not including the U.S.). To date as of November 2020, The Graph has raised ~$25M.