There are thousands of blockchain projects that exist, but one of the most underrated among them seems to be the Stellar Blockchain, an open-source network for currencies and payments. The project is known for constantly innovating its blockchain product, and even its native currency XLM has been one of the best performers this year.
According to the project’s Q2 report, the blockchain network has remained quite active in terms of new collaboration and investments. Furthermore, the several core network upgrades have also been finalized that are expected to enhance the Stellar network.
The Stellar Development Fund (SDF), a non-profit organization that supports the development and growth of the Stellar network, has made several major investments this year that has further boosted the project’s credibility.
Back in May, the SDF invested $550,000 in XLM in a Series A funding round for micropayments firm SatoshiPay. The investment was converted into a loan that would provide cash flow for the next 12 months.
The SDF loan will allow the company to continue operations, in a slim-downed format, until such time as it can begin a Series A in 2021. Once the funding round is over, SDF’s loan will be converted into an equity stake.
The foundation also invested $5 million in crypto investment app Abra back in May with plans to integrate the Stellar blockchain into the Abra’s platform.
Months later, Abra recently announced that its building a platform that “allows consumers, for example, people who aren’t even familiar with cryptocurrency, to store dollars and earn significant interest on those dollars.”
XLM performs
All these recent developments have been a boost for XLM prices and the token is up 4.5% from last month. The token has significantly outperformed XRP, which is one of its main competitors considering they share the same founder.
Data from analytics platform Santiment notes that Stellar’s recent rally was fuelled by a surge in activity in discussions surrounding the cryptocurrency on social media platforms. The analytics firm noted:
“XLM has decoupled from BTC today, and it has been a stand-out asset on a mostly flat day for alts. Social volume hit an 8-month high last week, foreshadowing this run-up. And we’ve seen encore spikes happen today, implying continued expected volatility.”
Perhaps the biggest push for XLM this month was the partnership with smartphone giant Samsung, integrating Stellar into the Samsung Blockchain Keystore.
The integration allowed Samsung users to store Stellar private keys in Galaxy smartphones’ inbuilt blockchain wallet. It also enables Stellar developers to build blockchain apps for Galaxy smartphones.
Soon after the announcement, the price of XLM rose more than 14 percent in 24 hours, taking the altcoin out of a year-long consolidation range. The price went up to $0.1053, the highest since July 2019.
One crypto analysts believes that XLM is set for a major rally as the recent capital flow has helped XLM/USD flip a crucial resistance. This has boosted the pair’s short term bullish bias.
Peter Brandt, a veteran trader, posted a chart on twitter, speculating that a major price reversal could be imminent. The chart shows a descending Channel, a move that typically transforms into a breakout if accompanied by a rise in volume.
It is yet to be seen whether XLM could continue its rally and become the next big performer of this season. As of now, the altcoin is sitting at $0.1019, down 2.2% on the daily.
