The Elephant in the Room: Exploring the Development Path and Future Potential of the $TON Ecosystem
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Since the beginning of 2024, the $TON ecosystem has shown a trend of explosive growth. From May 25 to June 17, Toncoin reached a maximum increase of 79.7%, Notcoin an increase of 700%, and Fishcoin an increase of 400%. The $TON ecosystem demonstrates a strong wealth-creation effect, attracting a flood of hot money. So, how can we participate in this grand feast?
This article reviews the past and present of #$TON, its core logic, and ecosystem development.
1. Project Background
Basic Information
Name: $TON (The Open Network)
Founders: Pavel Durov, Nikolai Durov
Operating Team: $TON Foundation
Official Website: https://t.co/0AoSfgq3UK
Social Media: @ton_blockchain
$TON (The Open Network) is a decentralized first-layer public blockchain designed for billions of users, featuring scalability and sharding capabilities, aimed at solving issues such as high transaction fees, slow transaction speeds, inter-chain communication, and scalability. Currently, the main operating team is the $TON Foundation, a non-profit organization whose goal is to enable 500 million users to have their digital identities, data, and assets by 2028. The $TON blockchain, backed by Telegram, is an important means to achieve this goal. Although $Ton is currently thriving, its development history has been tumultuous.
Twists and Turns in the Development History
● In 2017, the project was launched: Telegram founders Pavel Durov and Nikolai Durov began developing a blockchain project called Telegram Open Network ($TON) and planned to launch its native cryptocurrency, Gram.
● In 2018, Initial Coin Offering (ICO): Telegram raised approximately 1.70 billion USD through an ICO, becoming one of the largest token offerings at the time, with investors including multiple large venture capital firms and individual investors. The ICO also attracted the attention of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
● In 2019, development progress: The $TON blockchain introduced sharding technology to improve scalability and processing speed, and released a testnet for developers to conduct testing.
● In 2020, regulatory issues and project turning point: Telegram announced its withdrawal from the $TON project, transferring development work to an independent open-source developer community. The project was renamed "The Open Network," and the token name was changed to Toncoin. The funds raised from the ICO were refunded.
● In 2021, community takeover and development: The $TON Foundation, founded by Anatoliy Makosov and Kirill Emelianenko, took over the project and continued to promote the development and promotion of TON.
● In 2023, a return to Telegram: Telegram officially announced that it would use the $TON blockchain as its preferred Web3 infrastructure and planned to integrate it into the user interface of the Telegram application; Telegram released its IPO plan.
● In 2024, expansion of the ecosystem: The application ecosystem of the $TON blockchain continues to expand, covering various fields such as finance, storage, payment, and domain names. Projects within the $TON ecosystem, such as PunkCity, PUNK, and HyperGPT, have begun to receive widespread market attention. In February of the same year, Telegram announced that it would exclusively use the $TON blockchain and Toncoin for all transactions and payment activities with channel owners.
From its founding to its current popularity, $TON has gone through a huge circle but has steadily improved, transitioning from initial narratives to tangible project implementations, showcasing the project’s strong vitality.
User-Centric Core Narrative
Throughout the development of $TON, the shadow of Telegram has never been far away. While most public chains promote their innovative technologies, $TON leverages its backing from Telegram, which has 900 million monthly active users, to highlight user demand and convenience.
At the same time, Telegram is no longer satisfied with merely being a communication platform. By continuously enriching its product line and bridging payments with everyday life, providing potentially powerful Bots, Telegram is attempting to transform into a comprehensive platform. This strategic shift $not only demonstrates Telegram's ambitions but also indicates the infinite possibilities for the $TON public chain in the future.
Telegram currently has over 1.30 billion registered users and 900 million monthly active users. Freedom of speech and privacy protection were the missions at the inception of Telegram, and these factors have made Telegram a hub for cryptocurrencies—almost all Web 3.0 projects have Telegram communities for project promotion, message announcements, and community interaction. The Web3 environment provided by Telegram offers tremendous support for the $TON ecosystem, laying the community foundation for projects from incubation to ICO.
Increasing Market Recognition
As of the time of writing, the market capitalization of the $TON chain has reached 187.$5.90 billion, making it the ninth largest cryptocurrency. At the same time, the TVL of the $TON chain has been growing rapidly since April, currently reaching $605.72 million USDT, ranking 15th among public chains. Clearly, although the growth rate of $TON's TVL is fast, it has $not yet kept pace with its market value, indicating significant room for improvement.
2. Financing Information
● In 2018, the first ICO raised $1.70 billion, but part of the funds was returned due to a lawsuit from the SEC.
● In April 2022, Huobi Incubator, KuCoin Ventures, and MEXC Pioneer Fund jointly invested $250 million to establish the $TON Foundation, focusing on supporting DEX and NFT projects on the $TON chain.
● In October 2023, MEXC Ventures provided tens of millions of dollars in investment, aiming to promote the Web3 ecosystem within Telegram.
● In November 2023, Animoca Brands invested in a research and analysis platform to support third-party mini-programs and game projects within the $TON ecosystem, while also becoming the largest validator.
Telegram has historically focused on protecting user privacy, without significant revenue channels, raising hundreds of millions of dollars through bond issuance to maintain daily operations. Starting in 2022, Telegram began exploring revenue models and recently announced it is close to achieving profitability. In 2023, Telegram founder Pavel Durov proposed plans for an initial public offering (IPO) within the next two years, with the company's valuation now exceeding $30 billion, and it may choose to list in the United States.
Both $TON and Telegram are currently in a phase of vigorous growth, and investing in the $TON ecosystem is tantamount to betting on the tremendous potential of the Web2 social platform Telegram transforming into a comprehensive Web3 platform.
3. Technical Features
Development Languages
The development of smart contracts on the $TON chain does $not use popular smart contract languages like Solidity, Rust, or Vyper, but instead features three programming languages: Fift, FunC, and Tact. Fift is geared towards low-level development, focusing on operational efficiency, and is more difficult to develop; Tact is a newly introduced high-level language by $TON, with syntax similar to Typescript, aiming to reduce development difficulty; FunC is close to the C language and is currently the preferred choice for developers. Given Tact's efficiency in development, mainstream developers may shift towards using Tact in the future.
Cutting-Edge Technologies
● Asynchronous Calls of Smart Contracts: Unlike public chains such as Ethereum, $TON's smart contract calls adopt an asynchronous model, which enhances system scalability. When one smart contract calls a function of another contract, the call is $not executed immediately, and it is $not necessary to complete all transaction processing within a single block. However, this asynchronous calling mechanism also increases the complexity of developing and maintaining applications, making it more challenging for developers working on the $TON chain.
● Infinite Sharding: The $TON blockchain is designed with three types of chains: Masterchain, Workingchains, and Shardchains.
The Masterchain is the core of the entire network, responsible for storing the metadata and consensus mechanism of the whole network. It records the states of all Workingchains and Shardchains, ensuring consistency and security across the network; Workingchains are independent blockchains that handle specific types of transactions and smart contracts. Each Workingchain can have its own rules and characteristics to meet different application needs; Shardchains are sub-chains of Workingchains, used to further distribute the load of Workingchains, enhancing processing capacity and scalability. Each Workingchain can contain multiple Shardchains, with Shardchains independently handling part of the transactions to achieve efficient parallel processing.
● Privacy Protection: The $TON chain uses $TON Proxy to hide the IP addresses of $TON nodes, constructing a decentralized VPN service, combined with $TON DNS and the $TON P2P network, to protect user privacy.
Relative Advantages
Although asynchronous calls of smart contracts and sharding technology have been applied in projects like Ethereum 2.0, Polkadot, and NEAR Protocol, $TON integrates various technologies and surpasses Ethereum and Solana in multiple metrics such as transaction confirmation time (Time-to-finality).
For more specific technical features, you can visit the official $TON website (https://t.co/o7ZzMZTTqd).
4. Market Analysis
Token Economics
● Token Functions: The positioning of $Toncoin is similar to the native token on Telegram, which can be used on Telegram to pay for Telegram Premium membership fees and purchase other virtual products at a better discount. On the $TON chain, $Toncoin can be used for transaction fee payments, staking, cross-chain transactions, decentralized data storage, proxy services, and more.
● Token Supply: The maximum supply of $Toncoin is 5 billion coins. As of June 28, 2022, all $Toncoin have been mined, marking the complete transition of $TON from a Proof of Work (PoW) model to a Proof of Stake (PoS) model, with an annual token inflation of 0.6% (approximately 3 million coins) allocated to reward validators who maintain network security.
● Token Distribution: Initially, 5 billion $Toncoin tokens were allocated to the team (1.45%) and miners received 98.55%. In February 2023, $TON initiated a community proposal to freeze 171 inactive early wallets for 48 months, totaling 1.08 billion $Toncoin (approximately 21% of the total supply). This move reflects the $TON community's unanimous optimism regarding the development of the $TON chain.
Secondary Market Analysis
● Market Capitalization: As of June 3, 2024, the market capitalization of $Toncoin is $18.76 billion, ranking No. 9, with a fully diluted market cap of $39.38 billion, circulating supply of 2.43 billion tokens, and total supply of 5.11 billion tokens.
● Token Distribution: As of June 3, 20246, based on Coinmarketcap data analysis, 85.45% of holders hold 0-$1,000 $Toncoin, 14.16% hold 1,000-100,000 $Toncoin, and 0.38% hold over 100,000 $Toncoin.
According to the analysis of whale holdings, whales hold 68.68% of $TON, while retail investors hold 31.32% of $TON.
Based on holding time analysis, 29.20% of holders have held $Toncoin for over one year, while 16.7% of traders have held $Toncoin for no more than one month, indicating a high proportion of diamond hands, as the public is very optimistic about the future of TON.
According to Etherscan data, the top 10 addresses hold 29.99% of $Toncoin tokens, indicating a relatively dispersed token distribution and a healthy market condition.
● Price Trend: Over the past year, the price of $Toncoin has risen from ¥12.4071 to ¥56.54, an increase of over 400%, reflecting strong market expectations and wealth effects surrounding the $TON chain.
V. Ecosystem Development
The $TON ecosystem currently has over 500 DApps and numerous Telegram Bots, covering major areas including infrastructure, development tools, DeFi, GameFi, NFTs, SocialFi, inscriptions, and almost all other popular directions. The vertical segments include Launchpads, wallets, cross-chain bridges, staking and lending, DEXs, various blockchain games, collectibles, etc.
Ecological Assistant Telegram Bot
The Telegram Bot is an automated robot running on Telegram, which can greatly enhance community building, asset management, information aggregation, project promotion, and more.
● For ordinary users, Telegram Bots provided by Telegram and others can promptly deliver the latest crypto information and market news to users.
● For general #Web3 communities, Telegram Bots can provide automated Q&A, FAQs, manage community events, competitions, and airdrops, promoting interaction among community members.
● For #DAO organizations, Telegram Bots can provide the latest governance proposals and discussion notifications, allowing DAO members to vote and participate in governance decisions through the bot, greatly simplifying the DAO governance process.
● For general project teams, the existence of Telegram Bots undoubtedly improves the efficiency of information transmission within the project community, while an engaging bot can attract users to participate in project development.
● For $TON ecosystem project teams, leveraging the Telegram APP and Telegram Bots is essential as they allow 900 million users to participate in project airdrop activities without barriers, aiding project promotion.
@telegram Bot is $not only versatile but also easy to develop. Telegram provides mature documentation and API technical support for the development of Telegram Bots. Once the functional requirements of the bot are clear, functionalities can be implemented using programming languages like Python and Node.js, combined with cloud server support to easily build one’s own bot. Meanwhile, there are already numerous Telegram Bots open-sourced on GitHub, providing opportunities for using bots with no coding background.
#DeFi Leader https://t.co/2EmbneMTjK
@ston_fi is currently the largest DEX on the $TON chain, supporting over 280 trading pairs as of now. It employs three technologies: Automated Market Maker (AMM), Request for Quote (RFQ), and Hash Time Locked Contracts (HTLC), which $not only inherit the low slippage characteristics of Uniswap but also enhance the reliability and security of transactions.
https://t.co/2EmbneMTjK Token is $STON, with a total supply of 100,000,000 $STON, and the token distribution strategy is as follows:
With the explosive growth of the $TON chain ecosystem, https://t.co/2EmbneMTjK's TVL has experienced explosive growth since February, currently reaching $262.20 million, ranking third in the $TON ecosystem.
From a comprehensive perspective, https://t.co/2EmbneMTjK is undoubtedly the top DEX in the $TON chain ecosystem, and even one of the current top ecosystems on the $TON chain, worthy of continuous attention.
#Launchpad Leader TonUP
@TonUP_io is a star asset issuance platform based on the $TON blockchain, aimed at helping project teams achieve successful asset issuance and financing.
● In August 2023, TonUP was established and completed its first IDO project token issuance at the end of the month, helping Tap Fantasy raise 80,000 $Toncoin in just 32 minutes.
● In October 2023, TonUP launched the TONversation column, delivering high-quality content. In the same month, the TonUP team officially announced the completion of a seed round financing led by TONCoin Fund, with follow-on investments from Foresight X, Waterdrip Capital, BitFund DAO, and several angel investors.
● On December 12, 2023, TonUP 2.0 was launched, and on the 20th of the same month, the IDO event for the platform token $UP commenced, followed by an IEO on the 22nd through Bitget Launchpad, marking a new development phase for TonUP.
As a phenomenal Launchpad platform on the $TON chain, TonUP has received investments from leading funds in the $TON ecosystem, including TONCoin Fund, Foresight X, Waterdrip Capital, and BitFund.DAO. Unlike other Launchpad platforms, TonUP possesses robust crisis management capabilities. During the $MC token issuance on the TonUP platform and subsequent promotional activities, Tap Fantasy had to postpone the game's launch due to technical issues, severely impacting the token price. In response, TonUP used all the commissions earned from the IDO to buy back the tokens and burned them, earning the trust of the community. Importantly, TonUP has $not yet reached its explosive growth phase; 99.66% of the tokens are concentrated in the project party's address, indicating that the project party has a solid cash reserve to maintain development and operations without the need to collect retail funds. In the future, the token price is highly likely to rise in tandem with the further development of the $TON chain, representing a strong force within the $Ton chain ecosystem.
Telegram Wallet and Tonkeeper
Compared to any platform, @wallet_tg has the greatest potential to become the interface for the flow of funds between Web2 and Web3 in the future. The Wallet itself operates on the Telegram platform, making it highly convenient for the public. The Wallet provides users in over 100 countries with the ability to purchase cryptocurrency using Visa and Mastercard through its built-in Neocrypto and collaborates with platforms such as MoonPay, https://t.co/Usy5TGv8HT, and AlchemyPay to establish efficient P2P Market deposit and withdrawal channels. Simultaneously, Telegram collaborates with Tether to develop USDT-TON exchange terms, bringing higher liquidity to $TON by introducing USDT. Before the integration of USDT-TON exchange, the TVL of the $TON network exceeded 100 million USD, and just two weeks after the launch of this agreement, that number had already doubled.
Additionally, Telegram's transfers, withdrawals, merchant fees, and virtual transactions incur zero fees, further attracting large capital users.
@tonkeeper is the simplest way to store, send, and receive Toncoin on the open network. It is a powerful new blockchain that offers unprecedented transaction speeds and throughput while providing a robust programming environment for smart contract applications. Compared to other wallets, Tonkeeper has the following advantages:
● End-to-end security. Unlike Wallet, which operates on the Telegram platform, Tonkeeper stores encryption keys on local devices without requiring files, personal information, contact details, or KYC, greatly protecting personal privacy.
● Built-in exchange function. Users can directly purchase Toncoin within the Tonkeeper app and exchange it on decentralized markets.
If you need to hold a large amount of cryptocurrency on the $TON chain, Tonkeeper is an excellent choice.
Notcoin and Catizen
@thenotcoin is a free and easy-to-use Telegram game that has gained immense popularity since its launch on January 1, 2024, with over 30 million participants and an average daily activity of 5 million.
Notcoin features a simple and fun gaming format:
● Through the interface, users can easily earn tokens, while the project sets appropriate time energy to maintain user engagement.
● The introduction of NFT vouchers allows users to trade the Notcoin they earn pre-market, further stimulating user FOMO sentiments.
● A gaming alliance system is adopted to inspire players' self-promotional activities, creating a positive feedback loop.
Thanks to the viral spread of the game, the Notcoin community has amassed a large user base, laying the foundation for its ICO on mainstream exchanges like Binance, OKX, and Bybit. After entering the exchange market, Notcoin's performance remains strong, rising over 400% within seven days, in line with the current meme coin explosion environment.
@CatizenAI is a cat game built on the $TON ecosystem, combining the metaverse, GameFi, and AI. This game has launched a revolutionary play-to-airdrop model, allowing players to earn future airdrops while playing. Additionally, Catizen is backed by $TON's official support, making it a ShowCase project for $TON ecosystem Token2049.As of May 30, 2024, the $wCATI token mining for Catizen has concluded, yet Catizen still enjoys high community enthusiasm, and its development plans are far from over.
● Catizen's seed round has received investments from $TON, Web3 Ventures, Mask Network, Y2Z, SecondLive, EMURGO Ventures, Moon Capital, and Initiate Capital.
● The Catizen team has signed contracts with 18 popular WeChat mini-games, which will gradually be launched on the Catizen game platform. Each launch of a Catizen game could reignite the community's passion for Catizen, serving as a significant driving force for the community's future development.
● Catizen will become the first application in the $TON ecosystem to support deposits using NOT. In the future, Catizen and Notcoin will surely join forces for deep ecological integration.
Hamster Kombat: Rise of the Hamsters
@hamster_kombat is a mini-game based on Telegram, where players assume the role of a CEO of an exchange, earning coins by clicking on hamsters in the images. Additionally, the game offers a card mining mechanism, allowing players to devise reasonable strategies to increase their fixed point income.
Despite its simplicity, this game has rapidly occupied the Telegram gaming space even faster than Notcoin. Since its launch in the first quarter, Hamster Kombat's Twitter followers skyrocketed to 5.10 million in just three months, while its Telegram group boasts a staggering 25 million followers. The YouTube channel surpassed 10 million followers in just 7 days. In June, according to an official announcement from Hamster Kombat, its user count exceeded 100 million, with daily active users reaching 32 million and an average concurrent user count of 6.50 million. This indicates that Hamster Kombat has become the leading meme coin on the new generation of the $TON chain, with ambitions to establish hamsters as a well-known brand in the Web3 domain beyond just being a simple game.
Whether it’s Notcoin, Catizen, or the currently hottest Hamster Kombat, they all rely on three key factors: innovative and simple game mechanics, the philosophy of fair mining, and robust institutional backing. These factors have shattered the issues of rat trading and project exits seen on the ETH chain, attracting a massive user base and creating viral community growth. Additionally, meme culture appears to be an important strategy for bringing the $TON ecosystem into the public eye, with Notcoin’s significant wealth effects likely to extend to other upcoming $TON ecosystem projects, fostering FOMO sentiments and paving the way for developments like EVAA and Tonstakers.
VI. Conclusion
● $TON, backed by Telegram's 900 million users, possesses user demand and resources that are hard for any other public chain project to match.
● The combination of $TON and Telegram presents an opportunity to create an interface from Web2 to Web3, reshaping the landscape of the Web3 world.
● With the advantages of asynchronous contracts and infinite sharding, $TON currently outperforms Ethereum and Solana in several performance aspects. However, due to its relatively low total circulation and TVL, it remains uncertain whether it has strong generalization capabilities.
● $TON features a unique ecological development architecture that can better bind a group of excellent developers and establish a complete development ecological chain.
● The $TON project adopts a fair and effective token distribution mechanism, alongside excellent community governance strategies, laying a foundation for future development.
● Whether it’s $TON itself or the recently popular Notcoin and Hamster Kombat, all demonstrate a strong wealth creation effect, providing substantial support for the future development of the $TON ecosystem.
Although $TON currently ranks as the ninth largest cryptocurrency with a market cap of $18.76 billion, there remains significant room for improvement in its TVL and ecological construction compared to Ethereum, BSC, and Solana. With the continuous release of favorable news, there are still opportunities for appreciation in the future. The path of $TON will certainly $not stop now, but whether it can ultimately become a public chain on par with Ethereum remains uncertain.