Tezos(XTZ)

Created by the husband-and-wife duo Arthur and Kathleen Breitman, Tezos (XTZ) is an open-source, decentralized blockchain network that facilitates easy creation and deployment of smart contracts and decentralized applications (DApps). 

Unlike its popular peers, Bitcoin and Ethereum, Tezos has a self-amending and a more advanced protocol that undergoes modifications based on an on-chain governance system. This, theoretically, allows Tezos to evolve and improve with time, freely embracing developments in the blockchain space, without facing the risk of a hard fork. 

While the Tezos whitepaper was released in 2014, and its Initial Coin Offering (ICO) — one of the more successful token offerings — took place in 2017, the Tezos mainnet went live much later, in September 2018. 

Commonly referred to as ‘Tez’, XTZ is the native coin of the Tezos blockchain which is used to - pay fees on the network, interact with the DApps running on it, secure Tezos network (via its staking mechanism) and to provide a basic accounting unit for the overall Tezos ecosystem.

XTZ price

XTZ was trading at a little under $3 in early July 2018, a month after the Tezos testnet launch. XTZ price dropped under $2 by the time its mainnet launched and the cryptocurrency ended 2018 trading around $0.5. 

While the price of Tezos surged briefly in May 2019, it continued to trade around $1 for most of 2019, ending the year at around $1.4.

According to our XTZ live price chart, 2020 proved to be a great year for Tezos price in USD terms as it touched a couple of noteworthy highs of almost $4 and $4.5 in the months of February and August, respectively. This was after the Tezos network had undergone multiple on-chain upgrades in the previous year, as well as in 2020, including Athens, Babylon, Carthage and Delphi upgrades. However, by late 2020, XTZ price had retraced to around $1.5, returning to life only a couple of months later, buoyed by a market-wide crypto boom. 

XTZ coin began its next notable ascent around February 2021, breaching the $8 mark in May 2021. It was in the same month that Tezos was announced as the official blockchain partner of Red Bull Racing Honda F1 team. However, a corrective phase followed, with XTZ plummeting down to $2 by late July 2021. Later that year, with the crypto market witnessing yet another bull run, XTZ coin registered its all-time high of $9.17 on Oct. 4, 2021. The coin’s price has since retreated to under $3.5, a range it failed to break by Q2, 2022.

How XTZ works

Tezos employs a variation of the Nakamoto-style Proof-of-Stake consensus algorithm, called Emmy+. It features two main entities:

Bakers: These are network participants responsible for block creation activity on the Tezos network. They must own at least 8,000 XTZ to quality, but the more XTZ coins a baker holds, the higher will be the probability of them getting a chance to bake the next block. Bakers earn 16 XTZ coins for adding each block to the Tezos blockchain.

Endorsers: These network participants are responsible for verifying the blocks created by the Tezos bakers, and normally earn an endorsement award of 2 XTZ per verification.

If an XTZ owner doesn’t have the required 8,000 XTZ coins to qualify for block creation activity, or simply isn’t interested in setting up the expensive computing infrastructure required, they can choose to delegate their Tezos coins to a baker. This ability to delegate is also why the Tezos consensus system, Emmy+, is also referred to as a type of Liquid Proof-of-Stake (LPoS) system.

Notably, bakers also get the right to vote on governance proposals floated for suggested changes to the Tezos blockchain. Any baker that behaves dishonestly stands to lose their deposit as a penalty. This ensures honesty among network participants and enhances its security.

In Q2 2022, Tezos had a throughput of around 200 transactions per second and positioned itself as an energy-efficient blockchain. It has witnessed rapid adoption over the years, with some of the leading brands like Red Bull Racing Honda, Ubisoft, McLaren Racing, Societe Generale and others becoming a part of its ecosystem.

XTZ news, updates and highlights

Just months after its successful ICO, Tezos was embroiled in a lawsuit by some of its investors, who alleged that the offering was an unregistered securities sale. The lawsuit was eventually settled for $25 million in 2020.

In a major Tezos news development, video game publishing giant Ubisoft selected the Tezos blockchain to launch in-game NFTs via the Ubisoft Quartz platform. The move was announced in December 2021 and was followed by a surge in XYZ price, but the gaming community criticized the use of NFTs due to various concerns, including but not limited to their perceived environmental impact.

In more recent XTZ news, it was announced in February 2022 that Tezos' year-on-year transactions and smart contract activities had surged significantly owing to the rising demand for NFTs. As per Coin Metrics’ “State of the Network” report, smart contract transactions on the network had increased to a noteworthy 50,000 per day, compared to less than 10,000 per day a year earlier, in January 2021. 

Frequently asked questions about XTZ

• Is it possible to mine or stake XTZ?

Though you cannot mine XTZ, it’s possible to stake your XTZ holdings and earn staking rewards in the form of more XTZ coins.

• Which are some of the best wallets for XTZ?

Some of the crypto wallets recommended by the official Tezos site include Kukai, AirGap, Guarda, Trust Wallet, Galleon Wallet, Tezos CLI, Trezor and Ledger.

• What can you do with XTZ coins?

You can use your XTZ coins to pay transaction fees on the Tezos network, stake them for staking rewards or use them on DApps deployed on the Tezos blockchain.

• Which is the best place to buy XTZ?

Most crypto investors and traders buy XTZ on reputed trading platforms like Binance, Coinbase, OKX and others. You can buy XTZ with fiat currencies, or exchange your BTC, XRP, SOL, ADA, MATIC and other coins for XTZ.