Near Protocol price surges over 22% today: what is fuelling the uptrend?

Near Protocol price surges over 22% today: what is fuelling the uptrend?

By Charles Thuo - min read

Near price has been rising since February 27 and the bullish trend seems to be gaining momentum by the day.

At the time of writing, NEAR is trading at $18.67 up 22.72% in the last 24 hours. It has hit a daily high of $19.64 which is still below the all-time of $20.42 that it set in January this year.

In this article, we will focus on the factors causing the price of NEAR to rally.

What is Near Protocol (NEAR)?

Near Protocol is a community-built blockchain launched in May 2020 with advanced network operability and a faster transaction speed to solve the bottleneck processes experienced in the crypto space. It launched its mainnet on April 22, 2020.

NEAR is the native token of the NEAR protocol.

Near Protocol uses a proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus mechanism that ensures the blockchain offers low transaction fees and high transaction speed.

Why is the Near Protocol price rising?

Several factors have contributed to the current NEAR price hike. Let’s take a look at some of the main factors.

1. More funds to expand the ecosystem

To some extent, the current price hike can be attributed to the new funding round that saw NEAR Protocol net $350 million from Dragon Capital, FXT Ventures, and other organizations to expand its ecosystem.

In January, Near Protocol also managed to raise $150 million for the same course.

2. Barry Silbert announcement

Another reason for the uptrend is the announcement by Barry Silbert, the founder of Digital Coin Group, that NEAR will be the Group’s third-largest crypto holding after Bitcoin and Ethereum. 

https://twitter.com/BarrySilbert/status/1512203884063772675?s=20&t=lobJBTrUdXFzITnSz58skQ

3. NEAR’s native stablecoin launch

After a recent newsletter from crypto swing trader, Zoran Cole, there were rumors that NEAR Protocol was planning to launch a native stablecoin, USN, which is another reason for the uptrend.

Speculations are that USN will offer ~20% APR leading to an increased DeFi activity which is beyond Cole’s claims, however, Decrypt is yet to receive a Near protocol response about the accuracy of these rumors. Perhaps, this is another reason for the uptrend.