The crypto sphere has over 5000 projects today that give rise to different blockchains and digital currencies, each striving to provide their own unique application and solution. In this article, we select 3 cryptocurrencies whose arrival could have a significant impact on the entire financial industry. Multiple factors such as technology, scope, utility proposal and expectations were considered in order to identify these few. Discover more about these eagerly anticipated cryptocurrencies that are due to arrive in 2020.
GRAM: The Cryptocurrency of Telegram Offers a ‘Ton’ of Potential
One of the most popular applications in the instant messaging niche has shown a huge interest in the crypto market. Over a year ago, they decided to create their own decentralised network, which they later called TON (Telegram Open Network). This adds the functionality of value transfer using GRAM, a cryptocurrency that has generated great expectation for its launch. Although many users expected to participate in the public sale of coins via an ICO (Initial Coin Offering), the messaging giant opted for private funding rounds.
In total, Telegram managed to raise more than 1.7 billion dollars. To put this in perspective; if GRAM were launched today with the same capital raised, it would enter 11th place in the CoinMarketCap, between Tezos and Chainlink. Telegram’s inclusion of a crypto-powered payment system would open the industry to a much wider audience. With plans for a direct integration with their messaging service, the token will become available to over 300 million users who currently have the Telegram application installed on their mobile devices.
However, the launch of cryptocurrency has been slowed by regulatory barriers. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) took emergency action to stop the launch of Gram, originally planned for the end of 2019. Now, both bodies are engaged in legal discussions that will determine the future of the token. A hearing held on Wednesday; February 19th, stated that Judge Kevin Caste must rule on the case by April 30th.
Is GRAM a lite version of LIBRA? Will it provide many of the same benefits without some of the potential dangers? Should it suffer intense scrutiny by financial regulators? Enter a discussion with us through the comments section at the bottom of the article.
Libra: The Agony of Facebook’s Stablecoin
When Facebook announced its intention to launch a stablecoin in mid-2019, the news sparked an immense amount of interest from not only investors, but the general public as well. The company has been one of the fastest growing over the last decade and has a user base exceeding 2 billion. There has been a mixed bag of opinions regarding the launch of a currency by a conglomerate as large and influential as the LIBRA Foundation.
Although its digital currency will not reinvent the wheel, the huge Facebook platform could make mass adoption of crypto a reality. The idea of Facebook is to create an ecosystem of digital currencies anchored to the value of fiat currencies, but more accessible and easier to use.
However, a group that is comprised of the world’s largest corporations with access to literally, billions of customers has the potential to provide them with financial dominion. Thus, even the president of the United States has dared to talk about it. The launch of LIBRA was scheduled for the second quarter of 2020, but today there is little clarity about whether this will happen. Facebook continues to confront dozens of authorities to clarify the legal frameworks for this project.
What are your thoughts on the launch of Libra and the impact it may have? We are keen to read your opinions in the comments section found at the bottom of the article.
Ethereum 2.0: An Upgrade that could Change the Future of Ether
Scalability issues in the current Ethereum network have been the main criticism of the leading project in decentralized development. However, ETH continues to be consolidated in the niche and no alternative project has managed to dethrone the Ether in terms of capitalization or usability. The numbers demonstrate a transcendence of the ecosystem. Of the 5000 cryptocurrency projects currently in existence, almost 1200 tokens reside in ETH’s decentralized platform and leverage its intelligent contracts for their functionality, launch, distribution and exchange.
To overcome the limitations of its own transaction processing capability, the development team continues to evaluate the launch of ETH’s 2nd definitive version, which would include elements such as sharding or blockchain fragmentation. The expectation is that this will radically change the future of this leading platform. Although it is not a new launch in 2020, it is definitely worth following up on its potential output, which will undoubtedly produce a hard fork to its network.
Will the launch of Ethereum 2.0 cause division in the community, or will it be a perfect fork with the entire network happy to migrate to the new, upgraded blockchain? Have your say in the comments section below.
Bonus: Other Interesting Projects Expected for 2020
Although with a lesser impact on other countries, the digital yuan launched by the Chinese government can demonstrate the potential of decentralized technologies and take a great step toward the mass adoption of cryptocurrency.
- Polkadot: In the midst of the rising fever, this ICO arrived, raising more than 145 million dollars. After almost three years of development, the launch of this cryptocurrency is coming, which promises to be a strong competitor to Ethereum. Will it have what it takes?
- Dfinity is another major fundraiser in recent years. It wants to compete with cloud software services such as Amazon Web Services, but the launch of its mainnet has been delayed on multiple occasions. It has raised more than $100 million, according to Forbes.
- Looking at the top-rated ICOs for 2020, names like BRIDGE, AGATE and Squeezer are emerging. (Sources: ICO Bench & ICO Marks.)