This week, three leading altcoins in the cryptocurrency market and the favorites of Turks will go through a significant unlocking process. The governance token of the liquid staking protocol, Lido DAO, LDO, the native asset of the Avalanche Blockchain, AVAX, and the YGG token of Yield Guild Games DAO will increase their circulating supply with important unlocking events happening this week.
Millions of LDO, AVAX, and YGG to be Unlocked
The governance token LDO of the liquid staking platform Lido DAO is scheduled to unlock 8.5 million LDO tokens worth $14.2 million, which represents approximately 0.97% of the supply, on August 26. According to TokenUnlocks data, all 8.5 million tokens will be distributed to investors who already hold over 300 million tokens. Price data shows that LDO token of Lido DAO decreased by 8.5% last week and has been relatively stable in the past 24 hours.
The native asset of Avalanche Blockchain, AVAX, will also go through an important unlocking process with the release of 9.54 million AVAX coins worth $102.86 million, which represents 2.77% of the circulating supply, on August 26. The unlocking process for AVAX in May received a positive response from the market and did not cause a significant price drop.
During the AVAX unlocking process, strategic partners will receive 2.25 million AVAX worth $24.21 million, Avalanche Foundation will receive 1.67 million AVAX, the AVAX project team will receive 4.5 million AVAX worth $48.42 million, and Airdrop participants will receive 1.13 million AVAX. According to current market data, the price of AVAX decreased by 13% last week and is experiencing a 1.8% decrease in the intraday trading.
Furthermore, this week an important token unlocking event will take place for Yield Guild Games’ DAO token, YGG. On August 27, 12 million YGG tokens worth $2.87 million, which represents 6.6% of the circulating supply, will be released. Currently, about 30% of the token supply is unlocked.
Current market data shows that the price of YGG token decreased by approximately 59% last year, despite a temporary 49% increase last month. The token lost 30% of its value last week and is experiencing a 2% decrease in intraday trading.
Coin/token unlocks involve gradually releasing frozen coins/tokens into the market to prevent early investors or project team members from selling their coins/tokens all at once and causing downward pressure on the price.
Impact of Coin/Token Unlocking Process on Market Prices
The impact of coin/token unlocking events on market prices is a controversial topic and there is no definitive answer. Generally, unlocking events, which are considered as triggers for price drops, are believed to have an influence on market trends.
Analytical firm The Tie, which examined over 350,000 unlocking events, found that on average, coins/tokens tend to show a downward trend before the unlocking process. However, when the unlocked amount exceeds 100% of the average daily trading volume, the price tends to recover rapidly before dropping again within two weeks.
