Stellar (payment network)
Cryptocurrency From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Stellar, or Stellar Lumens (XLM) is a cryptocurrency protocol which allows transactions between any pair of currencies.
| |
| Original author(s) |
|
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | Stellar Development Foundation |
| Initial release | July 31, 2014 |
| Repository | |
| Written in | C++, Rust, Go, Java, JavaScript, Python, Ruby |
| Operating system | Cross-platform |
| Type | Blockchain |
| License | Apache License 2.0 |
| Website | stellar |
| Denominations | |
|---|---|
| Plural | lumens |
| Symbol | * |
| Code | XLM |
| Precision | 10−7 |
| Subunits | |
| 1⁄10000000 | stroop |
| Development | |
| White paper | The Stellar Consensus Protocol: A Federated Model for Internet-level Consensus[1] |
| Initial release | July 31, 2014 |
| Development status | Active |
| Ledger | |
| Supply limit | 50 billion |
| Website | |
| Website | stellar |
The Stellar protocol is supported by the nonprofit Stellar Development Foundation (though this organization does not have 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status)[2][3] which was founded in 2014. The for profit arm, Lightyear.io, was founded in 2017.
History
Summarize
Perspective
In 2014, Jed McCaleb, founder of Mt. Gox and co-founder of Ripple, launched the network system Stellar with former lawyer Joyce Kim. Before the official launch, McCaleb formed a website called "Secret Bitcoin Project" seeking alpha testers.[4] The nonprofit Stellar Development Foundation was created in collaboration with Stripe CEO Patrick Collison and the project officially launched that July. Stellar received $3 million in seed funding from Stripe.[5][6] Stellar was released as a decentralized payment network and protocol with a native currency, stellar. At its launch, the network had 100 billion stellars. 25 percent of those would be given to other non-profits working toward financial inclusion.[7][8] Stripe received 2 percent or 2 billion of the initial stellar in return for its seed investment.[9] The cryptocurrency, originally known as stellar, was later called Lumens or XLM.[10] In August 2014, Mercado Bitcoin, the first Brazilian bitcoin exchange, announced it would be using the Stellar network.[11] By January 2015, Stellar had approximately 3 million registered user accounts on its platform and its market cap was almost $15 million.[12]
The Stellar Development Foundation released an upgraded protocol with a new consensus algorithm in April 2015 which went live in November 2015.[13] The new algorithm used SCP, a cryptocurrency protocol created by Stanford professor David Mazières.[14]
Lightyear.io, a for-profit entity of Stellar, was launched in May 2017 as the commercial arm of the company.[15] In September 2017, Stellar announced a benefits program, part of its Stellar Partnership Grant Program, which would award partners up to $2 million worth of Lumens for project development. In September 2018, Lightyear Corporation acquired Chain, Inc and the combined company was named Interstellar.[16]
In 2021, Franklin Templeton launched the first tokenised US mutual fund using Stellar.[17]
Usage
Summarize
Perspective
In 2015, it was announced that Stellar was releasing an integration into Vumi, the open-sourced messaging platform of the Praekelt Foundation in South Africa.[18] Vumi uses cellphone talk time as currency using the Stellar protocol.[19] Stellar partnered with cloud-based banking software company Oradian in April 2015 to integrate Stellar into Oradian's banking platform to add microfinance institutions (MFIs) in Nigeria.[20][21]
Deloitte announced its integration with Stellar in 2016 to build a cross-border payments application, Deloitte Digital Bank.[22] In December 2016, it was announced that Stellar's payment network had expanded to include Coins.ph, a mobile payments startup in the Philippines, ICICI Bank in India, African mobile payments firm Flutterwave, and French remittances company Tempo Money Transfer.[23]
In October 2017, Stellar partnered with IBM and KlickEx to facilitate cross-border transactions in the South Pacific region. The cross-border payment system developed by IBM includes partnerships with banks in the area.[24][25] The Lumens digital currency was ranked 13th in market capitalization at the time of the IBM partnership.[26]
In December 2017, TechCrunch announced Stellar's partnership with SureRemit, a Nigerian-based remittances platform.[27]
On January 6, 2021, the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine announced cooperation and partnership with Stellar in development of Ukraine digital infrastructure.[28][non-primary source needed]
Ecosystem
Stellar has an active community ecosystem and supports projects that utilize the Stellar Network with the Stellar Community Fund.[29]
Overview
Stellar is an open-source protocol for exchanging money or tokens using the Stellar Consensus Protocol.[1] The platform's source code is hosted on GitHub.
Servers run a software implementation of the protocol, and use the Internet to connect to and communicate with other Stellar servers. Each server stores a ledger of all the accounts in the network. 3 nodes are operated by the Stellar Development Foundation, in conjunction with 22 other organizations, providing for a total of 77 validator nodes.[30] Transactions among accounts occur not through mining but rather through a consensus process among accounts in a quorum slice.[31]
See also
References
External links
Wikiwand - on
Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.