Algorand Update: Where is ALGO Headed in 2022?!

One of the reasons why cryptocurrency Has evolved so quickly is because of Competition and nowhere is this Competition more intense than in the Smart contract crypto niche algorand is One of the few smart contract Cryptocurrencies that has continued to Raise the bar and its algo coin is Gaining popularity among crypto users And institutional investors alike Today I’m going to give you a bit of Background about algorand bring you up To speed on some of the Project’s most Important updates and tell you why algo Might have some long-term potential [Music] Now I know you want me to cut to the Chase but I need to tell you a bit about This place If you’re under the impression that I am A financial advisor I assure you this is Not the case education and entertainment Are the only things you’ll be getting From my face Please contact a financial advisor if Your portfolio is a disgrace If this is the first time we bump into Each other my name is guy and Fiat Currencies make me shudder that’s why I’ve made it my mission to research Cryptocurrencies and share what I Discover Coins tokens news reviews and other Topics that will make both of our brains

Buffer if this is what you’re after Subscribe to the channel and ping that Notification Bell to see just how much This channel has to offer so now that You know where I stand let’s get on with Algorand If you’re unfamiliar with algorand Here’s what you need to know Algorand was founded by MIT Professor Silvio McCauley in 2017 and built by Algorand Inc a software company based in The United States Algorand’s development is coordinated by The algorand foundation a non-profit Based in Singapore Algorand raised over 126 million dollars Across various token sales in 2018 and 2019. A substantial amount of this money was Subsequently returned to Ico investors As part of a buyback program Thankfully algorand has since raised Hundreds of millions of dollars more From various crypto VCS more about that Later Algorand’s mainnet went live in June 2019 and though the project is still in Development all core features and Functionalities have been completed Under the hood the algorand blockchain Uses a novel proof of stake consensus Mechanism called Pure proof of stake Which makes it possible to process Around 11 000 transactions per second

The algorand blockchain is currently Secured by around 120 validator nodes Which select one of algorand’s many Participation nodes to propose blocks Pseudo-randomly based on stake It’s not clear how many participation Nodes algorand has as this information Is not currently available but it is Likely in the thousands as it is quite Easy to become a participation node By contrast becoming a relay node Requires coordination with the algoran Foundation as well as more advanced Hardware Note that only around 20 of algorand’s Relay nodes are run by entities not Directly affiliated with the algoran Foundation but the algorand foundation Is actively onboarding additional Unaffiliated relay nodes and around 20 More are scheduled to spin up any day Now Now algo is the native cryptocurrency Coin of the algorand blockchain it’s Used for staking governance and to pay For transaction fees Participation nodes must take a minimum Of one algo to participate in consensus And there is no lock-up or unlock period Nor any slashing risks Note that relay nodes do not stake any Algo According to the algo Explorer Algos Taking rewards are currently just 0.06

Percent per year though Algos taking Rewards increased to around seven Percent with active governance Participation according to the algo Rewards calculator Algoran’s governance mechanism is Outside the scope of this video but I Will note that tens of thousands of Algorand users are participating in its Governance process You can learn more about the ins and Outs of algorand’s governance using the Link in the description Transaction fees on algorand cost a Fraction of ascent but because relay Nodes do not earn these transaction fees This makes it possible to use these fees For other purposes and algorand is Currently exploring using a portion of All transaction fees to purchase carbon Credits more on that in a moment Algoran’s ecosystem can be accessed Using the pera algo Mobile Wallet the my Algo wallet or the algo signup browser Extension wallet According to the algorand ecosystem Website there are about 300 projects Building on algorand around 10 of these Dapps are D5 protocols which currently Hold around 150 million dollars in total Value locked according to D5 llama On that note if you’re interested in Exploring algorand’s rapidly growing Ecosystem you can check out my algorand

Tutorial video using the link in the Description Now it’s been almost eight months since I last covered algorand and it’s safe to Say that this video would have been a Very long one if I’d waited any longer Because algorand has been very busy Shortly after my last update went out Algorand announced the release of the Algorand virtual machine opening the Door to the next generation of dapps and D5 protocols In October the algorand foundation Announced that accelerated vesting for Algo had completed For those who don’t know accelerated Vesting made it possible for early Investors to sell lots of algo whenever It’s price pumped so the end of this Program was obviously very good news for Algo holders In November the algorand foundation Announced the first relay node running Program featuring 20 new relay node Candidates that are unaffiliated with The entities behind algorand An algorand project called algomint also Created a bridge between the Bitcoin and Ethereum blockchains bridging BTC and Eth2 algorans ecosystem Shortly afterwards a former Citibank Executive established a 1.5 billion Crypto fund with algorand as its first Partner foreshadowing some serious cash

Flow into algorand’s ecosystem During algorand’s decipher conference in Miami at the end of November algorand Saw some big announcements such as a Partnership with the city of Miami to Monitor air quality Algorand’s head of Engineering also did A keynote about algorand’s upcoming Quantum security via State proofs If you’ve watched my video about the Crypto projects that could benefit from Cbdc’s you might recall that the Federal Reserve was planning on testing Quantum Resistance for its digital dollar this Year coincidence I suppose we’ll see I digress In early December borderless Capital Announced that it would be pouring an Additional 500 million dollars into Algoran’s ecosystem that is another Level of bullishness The algaran foundation also announced That it would be expanding its relay Node program to the algorand community In mid-December the algorand foundation Announced a liquidity mining program for Algoran’s D5 protocols as part of its 300 million dollar viridis fund A few days later a highly anticipated Algorand project called algophy finally Launched and it has since become Algorand’s top D5 protocol with over 90 Million dollars in total value locked In January the algorand foundation

Confirmed the issuance of the first Round of governance tokens to algoran’s Governors a drone racing company also Partnered with algorand to create an Up-and-coming play to earn game on the Algorand blockchain As a cherry on top grayscale revealed That it was considering the creation of An algorand trust which would make algo More accessible to institutional Investors In early February the algoran foundation Announced a proposal to establish an Exclusive group of algorand Governors Called expert Governors who would table Proposals The algorand foundation also announced That it had selected Stacey Warden a Former JP Morgan executive to be its CEO At the East Denver conference Stacy Announced that the algorand foundation Would be allocating 10 million dollars To algoran’s ethereum compatibility The algorand wallet also announced it Had rebranded to the pera wallet and Released a roadmap that includes stuff Like nft support a Fiat on an off-ramp D5 protocol Integrations and access to Algorand’s governance interface In early March algorand underwent an Upgrade that expanded its smart contract Functionality making it possible to Create more complex dapps and setting The stage for algorand’s post-quantum

Features In mid-march a famous former Peer-to-peer music platform called LimeWire also announced it would be Relaunching as an nft Marketplace on Algorand The algorand foundation also announced It would be phasing out its algo grants Program and replacing it with various Ecosystem funding programs going forward Two days later the algoran foundation Announced it had issued a grant to an Algorand project called the algorand Name service which will make it possible To create human readable nfts that can Double as wallet addresses the day after That the algoran foundation announced it Had issued a grant to an our ground Project called algo launch an initial Dex offering Launchpad for other Up-and-coming algorand projects At the end of March grayscale announced The launch of its smart contract Platform X ethereum fund which includes Algorand though algo only accounts for About 4.4 percent of the fund’s current Allocation of 2.6 million dollars Anyhow in mid-april the algaran Foundation brought up almost all the Billboards in New York City’s Times Square for Earth Day to send the message That cryptocurrency can be Environmentally friendly As I mentioned earlier the algoran

Foundation also announced that a special Smart contract would be created that Will see a portion of all fees on the Algoran blockchain redirected to the Purchase of carbon credits as part of The Project’s 2021 pledge to be carbon Neutral At the end of April algorand partnered With flair Network to build additional Bridges to other cryptocurrency Blockchains Now this is interesting because flare Network is a crypto project that’s part Of xrp’s ecosystem and you can learn More about it using the link in the Description now where was I oh yes April Updates Another thing algorand announced at the End of April was another proposal to Further modify algorand’s governance Process by introducing extra quote Governance seats that would be filled by Active participants in algorand’s Ecosystem including select users Developers and relay node runners Earlier this month algorand announced That it would be sponsoring the upcoming FIFA World Cup in Qatar for an Undisclosed amount but I imagine it’s a Lot The sponsorship announcement included a Long-term partnership between algorand And FIFA which of course includes the Issuance of FIFA nfts on the algorand

Blockchain at some point in the future More recently algorand announced that it Had purchased another famous former Peer-to-peer music platform called Napster with the help of hive mind Capital This makes me wonder if decentralized Music streaming services will lead the Next wave of crypto adoption you should Check out my video about audience just In case that will be in the description Anywho as amazing as all algorand’s Announcements updates developments and Upgrades have been algo is more than 50 Below what it was when I last covered The project This is for a few reasons for starters The crypto Market has been taking a Beating since November and as many of You will know this is because of the Federal reserve’s ongoing fight against Inflation which involves aggressively Raising interest rates and of course as I record this the markets are in free Fall following the Terra Luna and UST Debacle it sure is chilly out there Unfortunately there are additional Factors specific to algorand that are Holding down the price of algo 2. As you might have gathered from my Earlier comments accelerated vesting has Historically suppressed the price of Algo because it allowed early investors To sell large amounts of it whenever it

Pumped this is why algo only briefly Surpassed its Ico price of two dollars And forty cents before being beaten down Although accelerated vesting ended in Early October last year structured Selling from the algorand foundation Seems to have continued and I suspect That algorand Inc has been offloading Some of its algo as well I’ll leave Details to the algoran foundation’s Structured selling methodology in the Description but the short explanation is That the algorand foundation can Essentially sell as much algo as it Wants so long as algo’s price doesn’t Crash by more than 10 percent within 24 Hours I wanted to find out exactly how much Algo the algoran foundation has sold Since September but it looks like it Hasn’t published any transparency Reports since that time What I did find however is that algo’s Circulating supply has increased by more Than 1.1 billion since September According to coin Market Cap’s Historical data and by more than 900 Million according to coing gecko’s Historical data So if we take the middle amount of 1 Billion and assume an average price of Around one dollar per algo during that Time it’s possible that around 1 billion Dollars off algo has been sold since

September While it’s unlikely that all this algo Was actually sold it seems more likely Than not especially with all the money The algorand foundation has been Spending on expanding algorand’s Ecosystem Case in point the 300 million dollars in The viridus fund is actually made up of 150 million algo that must be sold for Fiat I don’t imagine that the FIFA Sponsorship and partnership or the Napster acquisition were particularly Cheap either As basic economics dictates all this Algo selling wouldn’t be a problem if There was sufficient demand for algo Coming from elsewhere but the problem is That the demand for algo seems to be Lacking For example the algo sign up browser Extension has just 20 000 downloads to Be fair this is a 3X increase since my Agarand tutorial in October last year Which is not too shabby at all However the pera algo wallet is still Sitting at 100K downloads since October And this suggests that the algorand Blockchain has fewer than 100 000 active Users According to DAP radar algorand’s top Daps have only seen around 50 000 users Over the last month

This is actually consistent with the Number of algo holders who are actively Participating in algorand’s governance And I reckon there’s quite a bit of Overlap here Now the last demand indicator I want to Discuss is total value locked which is Again sitting at around 150 million Now I find it hard to believe that all This money is coming from the few Thousand users of algorand’s D5 Protocols I suspect much of this money Is coming from the algorand foundation’s Liquidity incentive fund which has Allocated 200 million dollars worth of Algo to attracting tvl As such it’s possible that most of the Tvl in algoran’s D5 protocols is just There to passively collect algo rewards I will stress that this is just Speculation on my part and if the imf’s Recent crypto report is anything to go By it is quite possible that all this Tvl on algorand is actually coming from Just a handful of whales more about that In the description Now whether algo can reclaim its All-time highs and head to new ones Ultimately depends on algorand’s Upcoming Milestones the timeline here is Obviously going to be a lot longer now That the bear Market is set in The introduction of algorand’s Governance structure last Autumn means

It doesn’t technically have a road map But upcoming Milestones can be found in Interviews with and presentations by Members of the algorand team notably Algorand founder Silvio McCauley in October last year algorand’s Chief Operating Officer Sean Ford mentioned That it is in talks with central banks Around the world to provide the Infrastructure for their Central Bank Digital currencies though he didn’t Specify which ones nor when these Announcements will be officially made Sean also mentioned that algorand will Soon be scaling to 10 000 transactions Per second thanks to Next Generation Scaling technologies that I detailed in My previous algorand update that’s in The description by the way In December last year algorand’s head of Ecosystem Addie wagonect mentioned that The goal is to get the total value Locked in algoran’s D5 protocols to at Least 200 million dollars and that the Algorand foundation is planning on Spending 500 million dollars to expand Algoran’s ecosystem I managed to find an additional Milestone in the algoran foundation’s FAQ section and that’s that Participation rewards for algorand Governors will be removed in just a few Days time possibly before this video Hits the tube

It’s not entirely clear how much this Will affect algo’s additional staking Rewards I also went looking for any upcoming Proposals in algoran’s governance for Additional Milestones but according to Algoran’s governance Forum there Currently aren’t any measures that will Be voted on in algoran’s next voting Session So this brings me to some of the Challenges I foresee for algorand The first one is algoran’s apparent lack Of user adoption almost every smart Contract cryptocurrency I’ve covered Recently has seen exponential growth in Its user base over the last few months Alone but this exponential growth isn’t As apparent on algorand I reckon that This can be chalked up to the fact that The algorand wallets used to interact With its dapps aren’t nearly as familiar Or as user-friendly as other browser Extension wallets like metamask It also doesn’t help that algo’s price Has consistently underperformed and that Ties into the Second Challenge Algorand’s tokenomics still aren’t all That terrific and it seems that the end Of accelerated vesting for algo’s early Investors hasn’t helped with algo’s Price action at all To make things worse Supply continues to Hit the market in fact in a January

Presentation the algorand foundation’s Former CEO Sean Lee actually celebrated The fact that algo’s Supply had Increased from 1.4 billion to over 6.3 Billion in 2021 alone I honestly Couldn’t believe my ears I’ve left a Link in the description if you don’t Believe me Again all of this selling wouldn’t be an Issue if there was sufficient demand for Algo and if you ask me the main reason Why there isn’t much demand for algo is Because algorand has focused its Attention on catering to institutions And institutional investors instead of Retail users and investors as far as I Can tell algorand has been trying to Increase its institutional catering to Michelin star levels with its overtly Aggressive push to be green now I say Overtly aggressive because the algorand Team has pulled no punches criticizing Bitcoin over its proof of work consensus Even though bitcoin’s energy use and Emissions amount to a rounding error on The global scale more about that in the Description In some therefore algorand has quite a Few things to work on but if it’s focus On institutional adoption proves to be Fruitful it could create the demand algo Needs to definitively surpass its Previous all-time highs rest assured That I’ll be keeping a close eye on

Algoran’s development because there’s no Denying that it has cutting-edge Tech And I will never forgive myself if I Don’t get my hands on some algo before It starts to fly And that’s all for today’s algorand Update take a second to smash that like Button if you thought it was great Remember to subscribe to the channel and Ping that notification Bell as well Because prices move quickly in this Crypto bear Market Hell Speaking of which you can get more Immediate crypto Market updates on coin Bureau Clips if you’re here for the long Term tune in to the coin Bureau podcast To learn you can also follow me on Twitter tiktok and Instagram for memes And such and join my telegram channel For daily updates that make for a great Crypto crutch If you’re wondering which cryptos I hold As part of my portfolio My Weekly Newsletter is where you should go I also Tell you about the topics I’ll be Discussing in upcoming videos And I’ll quickly remind you all that It’s not too late to participate in that Free giveaway of one whole Bitcoin on FTX you can find the details about that In the description and all the rest As always thank you so much for watching And I’ll see you all soon I know the Markets are full of Doom and Gloom but

Stick together and we’ll all make it Through [Music]