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The TON ecosystem has certainly grabbed everyone’s interest over the last few months. As the entire crypto industry yearns for breakout applications and mass adoption, Telegram’s 900 million users present an eye-watering potential opportunity for the TON ecosystem to realise that grand vision.
Is this just another trending narrative that crypto-natives/speculators jump on for the sake of price action, or does TON offer a genuine chance for crypto to cross the chasm? We took a quick ecosystem scan to understand the opportunities and the risks.
The TON team frequently explores the idea of a SuperApp, similar to China's WeChat, designed to combine services like instant messaging, social networking, DeFi, and e-commerce, all underpinned by TON's blockchain technology. Their vision is to make this app a gateway to Web3, aiming to attract hundreds of millions of users and enable billions of transactions within Telegram's user-friendly and seamless environment, leveraging its existing user base. The ultimate goal is to use TON's established distribution channel to gradually introduce and familiarise Telegram's captive audience with the on-chain workflow.
While we think it’s a tall order to think that TON will follow Wechat’s footstep to become a SuperApp, given the unique circumstances that has enabled Wechat’s growth such as China government’s backing, seamless integrations with all the banking infrastructure in China, the lack of competition in the early days of the growth of Wechat etc, We definitely thinks that the TON ecosystem is building up momentum to be the biggest Web 3.0 user onboarding channel in the short to medium term.
The growth metrics within the TON ecosystem are remarkable. Daily active users on-chain have grown from 200,000 to 400,000 in just six months, while wallet numbers have surged from less than 10 million to over 46 million.
For any blockchain ecosystem to flourish, stablecoin has emerged as an essential primitive to enable proven use cases such as fund transfer, DEX swap and Perp trading, hence we look to stablecoin integration and growth as a key indicator of ecosystem growth. Notably, in April 2024,, Tether announced direct integration within TON, enabling native minting and redemptions. This allows for deeper DEX liquidity and the onboarding of further capital. Stablecoin liquidity has grown to over 600M USDT in only 3 months.
TON has attracted significant investment from both Eastern and Western tier 1 funds over the last two years. Notable investments include:
Additionally, TON has secured undisclosed amounts from major players like KuCoin, Animoca, MEXC, Mask Network, CoinFund, Kenetic Capital, and Hypersphere etc. According to unverified sources, the terms generally involve a 50% discount from the market price with a one to four years' vesting period.
The number of developers in the TON ecosystem has grown from 100 to 300 in the last twelve months, with significant contributions from the Chinese and Russian communities. Unique integration with the Telegram app allows for the creation of small applications called Telegram mini-apps, which are cross-platform and sync across all devices running the Telegram app. This integration facilitates easy interaction with the TON blockchain directly within the app.
Some leading ecosystem projects include:
As of 9th of August, Toncoin (TON) is also listed on Binance. This listing will potentially leads to an increase in TON trading volume as well as much better accessibility for people who want to hold TON.
Below is a non-exhaustive scan of leading ecosystem projects that are developing in the TON ecosystem across minigames, trading bots, onramp/offramp infrastructure as well as wallets and EVM layer 2s.
Illustrative screenshots of CATIZEN
Illustrative screenshots of Hamster Kombat
$TON supply is quite concentrated since the top 100 wallets hold over 93% of the supply.
What gives us some degree of comfort is that of the notable large wallets, Top 1 Wallet address EQDtFpEwcFAEcRe5mLVh2N6C0x-_hJEM7W61_JLnSF74p4q2 holds 25% of total supply and is the TON Believers Fund which is a community driven program to pool together rewards and deposits and distribute them after a 2 year lockup period over 3 years starting, Oct 12, 2025; The TON Believer Fund allows any TON holder to lock their coins for five years before oct 2023. As of this article, 1.3 billion Toncoin (>20% of the total supply) is locked in this contract. Top 2 Wallet address Ef8zMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzMzM0vF holds 13% of supply and is a smart contract responsible for validator selection and reward distribution called the elector contract; The TON foundation also deactivated ~1.1bn TON held by large early miner wallets. Pavel Durov, the CEO of telegram, said in a post on his TG group that telegram will be limiting itself to 10% of supply and will be selling the excess reserves to investors with a 1-4 year lockup and vesting plan.
Reliance on the Telegram platform poses a significant risk. Any changes in Telegram's policies or its user base could directly impact the TON ecosystem.
Regulatory uncertainties surrounding cryptocurrencies and blockchain technologies could affect the growth and adoption of TON. This includes potential crackdowns or stringent regulations by governments worldwide.
The TON network's technical architecture, while innovative, presents certain risks:The use of a custom programming language, FunC, and the TON Virtual Machine (TVM) could be a barrier for developer adoption compared to more widely used languages like Solidity (EVM) or Rust.
We definitely think there is ample room for TON ecosystem apps to improve the overall UX/UI experience. Our research analyst tried out various apps and reported several issues as below:
The TON blockchain, though still in its early stages, shows substantial promise. Its integration with Telegram's 900 million users offers a unique opportunity for mass adoption. The rapid growth in on-chain metrics, strong backing from major funds, and the success of various ecosystem projects underscore its potential.
However, challenges remain. TON must address concentration risks, platform dependencies, regulatory uncertainties, and technical hurdles. Improvements in user experience and interface are also necessary for broader adoption.
Despite these challenges, TON’s ability to leverage Telegram’s extensive user base positions it as a powerful onboarding and user acquisition channel.
https://t.co/umzw7VBFoL" / X (twitter.com)
A TON of Gaming Hype - Delphi Digital
Folius Ventures Catizen-TON Report v6-27-2024 (1).pdf
https://members.delphidigital.io/reports/a-ton-of-gaming-hype