Fantom's Native Token FTM Rises 8% On USDC.e Stablecoin Launch

The native token of Fantom, FTM, is up 8% today, making it the best performing crypto among the Top 100 coins by market cap today following the announcement of its USDC.e stablecoin launch and an upcoming network upgrade.

Fantom is a directed acyclic graph (DAG) smart contract platform. FTM has been jockeying with Toncoin for preeminence, with TON leaping into the Top 10 earlier today.

Fantom focuses on providing decentralized finance (DeFi) services to developers using its bespoke consensus algorithm. Recent developments have contributed to its bullish momentum.

The Sonic upgrade, which will transition the network from testnet to mainnet in the spring, is expected to significantly boost transaction processing speeds of up to 2,000 transactions per second (TPS) with a time to finality of 1.1 seconds. The Sonic mainnet will replace the existing mainnet called Opera, which currently has a throughput of just 3.2 transactions per second.

This upgrade has fueled optimism among investors, driving the price of FTM from $0.90 to $1, pushing against a psychological resistance level.

Stani Kulechov, the founder of Aave and Avara, was meanwhile revealed as a major investor in the Fantom protocol, further bolstering market confidence. The coin has demonstrated strong performance, with a 13.3% increase over the past seven days and almost 25% growth in the last 30 days, outperforming many top 10 currencies.

Andre Cronje, Fantom's lead developer, has also been actively working to boost the platform's meme coin ecosystem, contributing to Fantom’s hype.

In an official blog post, Cronje invited meme coin developers to contact him directly to launch their coins in Fantom. His initiative aims to allocate up to 10% of tokens for marketing-related expenses, up to 5% for supporting the meme team, and the remaining 85% to be put up in a FTM/token Liquidity Pool in the foundation multisig.

But perhaps the most influential news behind today’s spike is the launch of USDC.e, a native stablecoin that enables bridging Circle’s USDC stablecoin from Ethereum to Fantom. Native USDC is not directly compatible with Fantom, But USDC.e, a bridged version of native USDC, opens the doors to that possibility.

Native USDC is issued by Circle, a regulated fintech company, and is backed by U.S. dollars, ensuring that it is always redeemable 1:1. In contrast, USDC.e is created by a third party, such as Fantom or Wormhole, and is backed by native USDC on another blockchain that is locked in a smart contract. Users can redeem their USDC.e only for USDC, which can then be redeemed for real USD.

Fantom explains that once USDC.e reaches significant supply, adoption, and dApp integrations, Circle and Fantom/Wormhole may decide to transfer ownership of the USDC.e token contract to Circle. Upon obtaining ownership, Circle can then upgrade USDC.e to native USDC, seamlessly retaining the existing supply, holders, and dApp integrations.

Fantom certainly looks bullish in the near term. It bounced after touching the EMA55 (the average price of the last 55 days) shows that growth is still in play, even after a correction that took place between late March and early April.

The coin has some space to grow, but the $1 price line is a strong level to beat. If it retains its momentum, it could continue going up another 30% to near $1.30. But if bears take over the markets again, the coin could start trading sideways and retreat to $0.90 as a first support with a stronger floor near $0.80.

Edited by Ryan Ozawa.