Stellar, as a platform for small-amount payments, appeals to individuals rather than organizations. It is gaining popularity as a result of its simple user interface. Stellar allows for real-time transactions to take place anywhere in the world in as little as five seconds. Soroban, a new smart contracts platform, was just published in its second preview. The upgrade aims for more scalability and sensibility, as well as a developer-friendly platform.
Only recently, Ethereum transitioned from the proof-of-work (PoS) to the proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus mechanism following the Merge. The step underlines the need for cryptocurrencies to move towards eco-friendly methods. In this regard, Stellar is very promising as it has a smaller carbon footprint. Its authentication cycle is also fast, keeping energy use to a minimum.
Acting as decentralized currency exchange, Stellar helps you track all of your assets with an order book. You can sell, buy and manage all of your assets here, with XLM acting as an intermediate currency for paying transaction fees. The currency is very useful for the users because it helps you reduce transaction costs.
The Stellar network makes transactions seamless and reduces fees for micro-payments and remittances in order to make financial services affordable and accessible to the world.
Transactions on the Stellar platform are performed swiftly due to the ease of Lumens. The currency not only makes transactions seamless for the sender and the recipient but also ensures that transactions are secure.
Jed McCaleb, Co-founder, and CTO of Stellar said in an interview with CoinMarketCap that XLM is used in a fundamental way for the network.
“Maybe that affects the price, maybe price is a secondary indicator of how useful the underlying protocol is in some way… But I think that the trend is there: that where price and utility can come into play.”
XLM is listed on a number of crypto exchanges including Binance, eToro, Huobi Global, CoinTiger, FTX, and OKEx. This shows that the currency is an increasingly accepted choice of investors now.
A total of 100 billion XLMs were issued when the Stellar network was launched in 2015. In 2019, the group announced that it was burning over half of the cryptocurrency’s supply. Stellar mentions on its website that currently, there are around 50 billion XLMs in existence; 20 billion XLMs are in circulation and 30 billion XLMs are retained by the Stellar Development Foundation for project development. Nothing more will be created.
In an interview in March 2022, Stellar CEO Denelle Dixon said that despite its ongoing military conflict with Russia, Ukraine is still working with Stellar on its central bank digital currency (CBDC). The progress, however, has not been at the expected speed due to the crisis. She added that Stellar is “talking to the administration about things that we can do to help with … humanitarian aid needs.” She also commended Ukraine’s decision to accept cryptocurrency donations for aid.
Also, it was only recently that XLM got listed on the leading cryptocurrency exchange Robinhood, significantly spiking its price.
Due to its increasing adoption, XLM is among the top 30 cryptocurrencies in the world right now, with a market capitalization of under $3 billion.
Why these projections matter
Where Stellar trumps other financial platforms is its low transaction fees which have drawn a huge number of cryptocurrency users to it. It is one of the few blockchain networks that has been successful in collaborating with large tech corporations such as Deloitte and IBM. Stellar, in partnership with IBM, launched a project that enables fintech to engage in financial transactions using assets such as stablecoins.
It must be noted that Stellar is one of the large corporations that are operating in the cryptocurrency market. It is one of the most centralized cryptocurrency networks active on the internet. While the Stellar network uses decentralized nodes, it doesn’t have that many validators. Such an infrastructure gives the group a lot of control over the operations and price movement of XLM.
In 2016, Deloitte announced a partnership with Stellar, along with four other blockchain networks, to provide new technological capabilities to its global financial institution client base.
In June 2018, the Fortune reported that New York financial regulators approved Stellar Lumens to trade on the itBit exchange, the first time the state’s authorities have given it the green light.
In October 2021, IBM partnered with Stellar to facilitate cross-border payments by banks. The system uses XLM as a bridge currency for transactions and it has been successful in the South Pacific region.
The same year, Moneygram announced a partnership with Stellar. Its integration with Stellar facilitates the conversion of the USDC stablecoin into cash and vice versa. The facility aims to encourage the liquidity of cryptocurrencies and the integration of traditional and cryptocurrencies.
In October 2021, Flutterwave, a global payments technology company, also announced two new remittance corridors between Europe and Africa on the Stellar network. The step is a major step in Stellar’s expansion in the global market.
It also succeeded in receiving certification from the Islamic scholars of Bahrain in 2018, aiming to integrate the technology into the field of sharia-compliant financial products, reported Reuters.
“We have been looking to work with companies that facilitate remittances, including in the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain. It’s a huge market,” said Lisa Nestor, the then-director of partnerships at Stellar. Since the Middle East and South Asian regions are key areas of growth for the group where a lot of countries are run on a sharia-compliant system, this is a major success for Stellar.
Developing economies are the main focus of the Stellar network in the areas of remittances and loans. It primarily aims to target those who are still not part of the traditional banking system.
In June 2022, the global platform for modern money movement, Nium, and Stellar announced a partnership to enable payouts to 190 countries. “This integration truly drives home the value that blockchain-powered cross-border payment solutions bring to the current financial system,” said Denelle Dixon, CEO and Executive Director of the Stellar Development Foundation. “At SDF, we are always working to fill up the map and connect the network to more of the globe. Together with Nium, we are thrilled to expand the reach of the Stellar network so significantly.”
In an interview with Pymnts last year, Nestor said that digital assets are a tool for everyone and that this asset space will grow. Bitcoin, stablecoins, Dogecoin, and other assets can all coexist in a single interoperable network and create an inclusive financial system. “We hear from our partners around the world that the ability to save, access, and transact seamlessly across borders, with dollars, is something that draws a lot of interest and demand,” she added. Stellar aims to leverage its system in such a way that makes it both accessible and easy to use for people and businesses all over the world.
Another prominent feature of Stellar is that it gives power to the community to decide what project(s) the blockchain should focus on.
We will now briefly give an overview of the key performance indicators of XLM such as price and market capitalization. We will then summarize what the world’s leading crypto-analysts have to say about the future of this currency, along with its Fear & Greed Index.
XLM’s Price, Market Cap, and everything in between
XLM’s price has hiked significantly over the last few years. Back in 2018-2019, it kept falling below its previous ATH of around $0.93 (recorded in early January 2018). It was only in 2021 that its price again began to rise, hitting a price level of over $0.7 around mid-May. However, as the cryptocurrency market collapsed in the second quarter of 2022, XLM went into a bearish dive.
At the time of writing, it was trading at $0.1074, with a market capitalization of below $3 billion.
Alejandro O. Asharabed Trucido
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