Tezos (XTZ) Coin Review

When it comes to early crypto projects that stood out from Bitcoin, you need not look any further than Tezos. Tezos was one of the first altcoins to break the mold set by coins like Bitcoin and Litecoin, by employing an entirely different model and consensus mechanism than anything we had seen at the time. Most impressively, Tezos seems to be developing its protocol and adding features to fit into the future of crypto at an accelerated rate, compared to other projects. Right now, how well a project can adapt to the evolving needs of the crypto market, may very well be the deciding factor between what makes a project sink or swim. In this piece, we will look at Tezos (XTZ).

Founders of Tezos

Tezos was created in 2017, by husband-and-wife couple Arthur and Kathleen Breitman. Before creating Tezos, the two of them already had extensive experience in a variety of fields relating to computers, investment, and cryptocurrency. Arthur studied applied mathematics, physics, and computer science, before eventually working in quantitative finance. Kathleen studied at Cornell university before eventually working for Ray Dalio’s hedge fund, Bridgewater Associates, and then later became a private consultant on her own. The two of them met at a cryptocurrency anarchists’ lunch, and married three years later.

History of Tezos

Tezos was created to be different than Bitcoin, in a time when nearly everyone in the crypto community believed that Bitcoin would be the only crypto to reign supreme, by taking on the characteristics of every other project that showed promise. This philosophy led to the Bitcoin maximalist ideology that we see today, wherein Bitcoin is already perfect and needs not evolve.

Tezos is focused around both on-chain governance and protocol evolution. The project uses a Proof of Stake consensus mechanism and can process around 100 transactions per minute. Currently there are approximately 370 active validators on the Tezos blockchain, which are referred to as “bakers.” To become a baker on the Tezos blockchain, one would need to lock up 8,000 XTZ, aka Tezzies (one XTZ is also referred to as a Tez, while multiple XTZ are referred to as Tezzies), for 14 days. For the record, this currently equates to around $40,000.

Aside from baking Tezos, users can also participate in the network by becoming validators. It is relatively easy to become a validator on the Tezos network. Validators don’t need to lock up a minimum amount of Tezos to participate, nor do they have to follow locking and unlocking schedules. They can also lock up their Tezos for any amount of time that they would like.

Tezos Smart Contracts

Tezos is indeed smart contract compatible and features over 135 dApps on its blockchain. Tezos also hosts 10 DeFi protocols, with a combined $110 Million of value locked. The most popular dApp on the Tezos blockchain is an NFT platform called Hic et Nunc, which sees around 25 thousand visitors a month.

Building on Tezos

Over the last several years, there have been some big-name projects who have chosen to use the Tezos blockchain for a variety of reasons. As an example, the gaming company Ubisoft is not only using the Tezos blockchain for their upcoming NFT platform, but they are in fact baking Tezos as well. These are some of the most predominant companies that are building on the Tezos Blockchain:

Conclusion

The price action of Tezos may not have been as impressive as other cryptocurrency projects over the course of the last year, however with the increasing demand for crypto art, games, and NFTs may very well put Tezos in a very advantageous position! Therefore, Tezos has a solid spot on the Killer Whale suggested coin list. Be sure to check out the rest of Killer Whale to see which products and services are right for you!

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