During the second full week of Q4 2020 several cryptocurrency projects are making advancements and upgrades to their protocols. As always, the increased attention usually translates to increased amplitude of the price movements due to higher trading volumes. If the testnets and the rolled-out features prove to be successful, the tokens associated with these projects should appreciate.
1. Zilliqa (ZIL)
Zilliqa is a high-performance and very secure blockchain platform which aims to solve the scaling issues that most of the popular blockchains are facing. Zilliqa supports the creation of smart contracts and dApps and incorporates sharding technology, which means nodes are broken down into groups of 600, i.e. shards. A unique consensus algorithm, a combination of Byzantine Fault Tolerance (BFT) and the standard mining algorithm Proof of Work (PoW) is used.
Zilliua to Test ZilSwap and Release Non-Custodial Staking
The Zilliua project is set to release its decentralized exchange feature named ZilSwap on testnet this week. The decentralized trading pool, which was build by Switcheo will allow users to trade ZIL for several other tokens. In addition, ZIL non-custodial staking is set to roll-out on Zilliua mainnet on October 14. The October 14 mainnet upgrade will also readjust payment transaction fees and smart contract transaction fees to address the issue of disproportion of gas fees between both types of transactions. As described in ZIP-9, the costs for payment transactions will double, while the costs of smart contract transactions will be slashed by a factor of 4. More details regarding the mainnet upgrade and the ZilSwap feature can be found on Zilliua blog.
2. Kava (KAVA)
Developed by Kava Labs the Kava blockchain boasts with the title of the first multi-blockchain DeFi platform. For depositing various cryptocurrencies to Kava’s multi collateral CDP system users get rewarded in Kava tokens. The Kava blockchain utilizes the Tendermint consensus and is secured by 100 validators.
Kava 4 Gateway Scheduled to go Live on October 15
The Kava project recently announced the launch of the Kava 4 Gateway Testnet 11k, which is set to take place on October 12 at 14:00 UTC. The Testnet 11k is an exact replica of the Kava 4 Gateway Mainnet release which will go live on mainnet just a few days later, on October 15 14:00 UTC. The testnet will allow validators to try out their set-ups prior to mainnet launch, in order to ensure a smooth mainnet upgrade. Furthermore, Kava Labs announced that the Harvest V1 will launch alongside the Gateway mainnet upgrade on October 15. Harvest is a cross-blockchain money market that allows users to earn interest on their crypto deposits, and to borrow funds from the platform. At launch, it will only support BTC, BNB, BUSD, USDX, XRP, and HARD deposits. HARD token is a governance token for Harvest, which will also be used as incentive to attract platform users to participate in the project’s decentralized governance. Kava is a promising DeFi platform and Harvest will likely drive the further growth and usage of the Kava platform. You can read more on Harvest V1 here.
3. Elrond (EGLD)
Elrond is a highly scalable, fast and secure blockchain platform for aApps and enterprise use cases. The EGLD token, also referred to as eGold is Elrond’s native token. It represents a medium of exchange between developers, who pay to use the network, and validators who get payed in fees for the services they provide. The Elrond network currently offers services such as general staking and delegation, and various DeFi options.
EGLD Incentivized Delegation Queue Will Open Up on October 14
While the Elrond network does offer EGLD staking, the number of tokens that can be staked is very limited. The project’s team recently decided to unlock more EGLD staking slots by launching the Phase 1 of the Incentivized Delegation Queue. Starting October 14 at 14:00 UTC, new users will be able to reserve their spot in the queue, which ultimately leads to them being able to delegate and stake their EGLD tokens and consequently enjoying an amazing APR of between 6.95% and 20%. You can read more on EGLD staking in the October 6 announcement. In addition, the Elrond team recently disclosed that already 50,000 EGLD (currently worth $400,000) have been staked in the Centaur Launch Pool. The EGLD stakes and CNTR rewards will be distributed to participating users no later than October 16 at 09:00 UTC.
