Cosmos (ATOM) Things You Need To Know Before Investing

What Is Cosmos (ATOM)?

Cosmos (ATOM) In a nutshell, bills itself as a project that solves some of the “hardest problems” facing the blockchain industry. It aims to offer an antidote to “slow, expensive, unscalable, and environmentally harmful” proof-of-work protocols, like Bitcoin’s, by offering an ecosystem of connected blockchains.

The project’sproject’s other goals include making blockchain technology less complex and difficult for developers thanks to a modular framework that demystifies decentralized apps. Last but not least, an Interblockchain Communication protocol makes it easier for blockchain networks to communicate with each other — preventing fragmentation in the industry.

ATOM origins can be dated back to 2014, when Tendermint, a core contributor to the network, was founded. In 2016, a white paper for Cosmos was published — and a token sale was held the following year. ATOM tokens are earned through a hybrid proof-of-stake algorithm, and they help keep the ATOM Hub, the project’sproject’s flagship blockchain, secure. This cryptocurrency also has a role in the network’snetwork’s governance.

Who Are the Founders of Cosmos?

The co-founders of Tendermint — the gateway to the Cosmos ecosystem — were Jae Kwon, Zarko Milosevic, and Ethan Buchman. Although Kwon is still listed as the principal architect, he stepped down as CEO in 2020. He maintains he is still a part of the project but mainly focuses on other initiatives. He has now been replaced as Tendermint’s CEO by Peng Zhong, and the whole board of directors was given quite a substantial refresh. Their goals include enhancing the experience for developers, creating an enthusiastic community for Cosmos, and building educational resources, so greater numbers of people are aware of what this network is capable of.

What Makes Cosmos Unique?

A major concern for some in the crypto industry centers on the levels of fragmentation seen in blockchain networks. There are hundreds in existence, but very few of them can communicate with each other. Cosmos aims to turn this on its head by making this possible.

ATOM is described as “Blockchain 3.0,” As we mentioned earlier, a big goal is to ensure its infrastructure is straightforward. To this end, the Cosmos software development kit focuses on modularity. This allows a network to be easily built using chunks of code. Long-term, it’sit’s hoped that complex applications would be straightforward to construct as a result.

Scalability is another priority, meaning more transactions can be processed a second than more old-fashioned blockchains like Bitcoin and Ethereum. If blockchains are ever to achieve mainstream adoption, they’ll need to be able to cope with demand and existing payment processing companies or websites — or be even better.

Cosmos Interchain Accounts Upgrade

The Interchain Foundation, a non-profit organization of the Cosmos ecosystem, announced the release of the Interchain Accounts upgrades on Feb. 17, 2022. Launched in April 2021, the Inter-Blockchain Communications (IBC) protocol is the Cosmos standard for blockchain interoperability. It allows an individual blockchain to control an account on a separate chain. There are 38 projects currently utilizing IBC, notably Terra, Crypto.org chain, and Gravity bridge. The Interchain Accounts will be the largest in the ecosystem since Stargate — which enabled Cosmos blockchains to connect using the standardized protocol for IBC for the first time. With Interchain Accounts, users can stake, vote, swap tokens, and more on other blockchains. The upgrade serves to “enable composability in IBC [which] allows innovation in distinct applications to be deployed without upgrading the entire Interchain.”

How Many Cosmos (ATOM) Coins Are There in Circulation?

ATOM has a very specific total supply — 260,906,513, to be exact. At the time of writing, about 203,121,910 were in circulation. It is worth noting that these cryptocurrencies arenas mined — instead, they are earned through staking.

Two private sales were held in January 2017, followed by a public sale in April. This raised $16 million, equivalent to about $0.10 per ATOM.

About 80% was allocated to investors to break down the token distribution, while the remaining 20% was split between two companies: All In Bits and the Interchain Foundation.

Cosmos has compared ATOM tokens to the ASICs used to mine Bitcoin. As a technical paper written by the Tendermint team explained: “It is a piece of virtualized hardware (economic capital) that you need to obtain to participate as a keeper in the network.”

How Is the Cosmos Network Secured?

As we mentioned earlier, Cosmos uses a proof-of-stake consensus algorithm. Validator nodes that stake a higher quantity of ATOM tokens are more likely to be chosen to verify transactions and earn rewards. Nodes that are found to be acting dishonestly are penalized — and they can end up losing the tokens that they had at stake.

Where Can You Buy Cosmos (ATOM)?

It is now available across many major exchanges — many people choose to buy Cosmos on Binance, Coinbase, and OKEx. It’sIt’s possible to find trading pairs with many fiat currencies, and you can find more about the process of converting dollars and euros to crypto.

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