Stellar experienced a significant value increase of 11.5% between September 2nd and September 8th, which is noteworthy considering the decline of Bitcoin and most altcoins this week. The increase came after Stellar tested the support level of $0.113, its lowest point in the past eight weeks. The price increase followed a pre-announcement made by the Stellar team on social media.
Increasing Possibilities of Partnerships for Stellar
More recently, on September 7th, Stellar further raised expectations by mentioning a potential partnership. However, similar to the previous announcement, no specific details were provided, only suggesting a possible transition towards real-world assets such as stocks, bonds, and real estate, using terms like “brand” and “real world.”
Caroline Pham, one of the five commissioners of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, emphasized that recent court decisions regarding the classification of cryptocurrencies will eventually lead to regulatory clarity. Pham also highlighted the importance of real-world assets (RWA) and emphasized the opportunities for modernizing financial markets through blockchain technology.
Unlikely Partnership with Elon Musk and XLM
Rumors circulated about Elon Musk potentially integrating XLM after his social network, X, received a currency transmitter license from regulators on August 28th. It is worth noting that X had received approval from six other states prior to this recent announcement.
Furthermore, even if X decides to integrate multiple cryptocurrencies, it should be noted that XLM’s current market value of $3.4 billion falls short of placing it among the top 20 competitors. A similar analysis using Messari Crypto‘s “real volume” ranking positions XLM at 20th place in terms of trading volume, behind competitors such as Bitcoin Cash, Sui, Litecoin, and Ripple‘s XRP.
In mid-August, the Stellar Development Foundation (SDF) became a minority investor in payment provider MoneyGram International, using its cash reserves. SDF, the organization behind the development of Stellar’s native token, had previously established a commercial partnership with MoneyGram in 2021. According to Denelle Dixon, CEO and Executive Director of SDF, this investment will contribute to MoneyGram by exploring blockchain technology. The following statement was made on Stellar’s website:
“Your application can now seamlessly connect to MoneyGram’s retail network through a single integration, enabling users to deposit or withdraw cash from their digital wallets via Stellar USDC without requiring a bank account.”
Stellar’s Announcement to Include Soroban
Stellar is preparing to establish a smart contract platform called Soroban on its main network. In October 2022, the company launched a $100 million adoption fund to incentivize developer activities on the Futurenet test network. Apart from the unfounded speculations about price movements this week, all indications show that Stellar positions itself to compete in the $37.8 billion decentralized application market. According to DefiLlama, the current market leader Ethereum holds a dominant market share of 56.6% despite its average transaction fee of $4.
The undeniable potential of real-world assets in decentralized finance, as demonstrated by the increase in MakerDAO’s protocol revenue and the effective reduction of the demand for Dai stablecoin in USD Coin, cannot be denied. XLM investors will continue to eagerly await the announcement on September 12th, but the likelihood of surpassing the price of $0.14 seen on August 10th by gaining 12% or more remains weak until concrete evidence emerges regarding what this payment network can bring to the table.
