The Rise of Stellar Lumens XLM: We have a new altcoin in our top 10 largest cryptocurrencies by market cap which is making a buzz in the market. Stellar Lumens or XLM have been soaring up since last Christmas day. Many argue it could be the next Ripple. Here is a quick overview.
What is the Stellar Blockchain?
Stellar aim to be a one-stop shop in the financial world, where with just one integration into the Stellar Network, everyone including, payment networks, banks and market participants have equal economic access economic.
Stellar operates a network with the blockchain technology behind bitcoin. But unlike Bitcoin, Stellar's transactions settle in 2 to 5 seconds and allow users to quickly exchange government-backed currencies, such as turning U.S. dollars into euros.
What Are Stellar Lumens XLM?
Stellar coins are officially called lumens or XLM for short when traded in the crypto exchanges.
Lumens are technically the native asset of the Stellar network. Native means that lumens are built into the network. Asset is how the network refers to an item of value that is stored on the ledger.
One lumen is a unit of digital currency, like a bitcoin.
Could Stellar Be the Next Ripple?
Some analysts argue that Stellar could be the next Ripple.
In 2014, one of Ripple’s key management members, McCaleb, left Ripple to join Stellar.
Ripple and Stellar have many similarities. For example, they both employ a native cryptocurrency. Also, both Ripple and Stellar conduct fast and cheap cross-border payments.
However, they do have some differences as well. The biggest one is in their respective intended use cases. In which Ripple is going after big banks, while Stellar is going after individuals.
If Stellar can follow Ripple’s footsteps and prove that its alternative use case can survive the markets, there’s no reason XLM can’t catch up to XRP this year.
Stellar Lumens XLM Price Action
The native asset of Stellar, Lumens (XLM) has been soaring up since last Christmas day, and only in the past 24 hours, it’s been up another 65%, approaching the $1.00 level versus the USD.
However, just like all other cryptocurrency surges, we could see a temporary pullback towards key Fibonacci retracement levels in the near future.
*This article was originally published here