Toncoin TON

TON (The Open Network) has an unusual history. In 2018 Telegram conducted one of the largest ICOs in history — raising $1.7 billion from 175 investors. The project was called Telegram Open Network. In 2019–2020 the US SEC blocked the launch, accusing Telegram of conducting an unregistered IPO. In May 2020, Telegram officially abandoned the project. However, a developer community continued the work under the name Free TON, later TON Foundation. In 2023, Telegram returned to the project and declared Toncoin its official blockchain.

TON's integration with Telegram is an unprecedented event in the crypto industry. Telegram has over 900 million active users. What is already working: Telegram Wallet (built-in wallet for Toncoin and USDT-TON directly in Telegram); Fragment — NFT marketplace for buying anonymous numbers and Telegram usernames; Stars — built-in currency for paying for content in bots; TON-based mini-apps (over 900 million potential users). This is the largest built-in audience in Web3 history.

Hamster Kombat is a clicker game in Telegram launched in 2024 on TON. Within months it attracted over 300 million players — a record for any Web3 game. The game conducted a token airdrop among active participants. Despite being criticized as "farming," it became the most mass crypto onboarding event in history. It was followed by dozens of similar games (Notcoin, DOGS, BLUM and others) — all on TON, significantly increasing the network's transaction activity.

This is one of the main debates around TON. Critical arguments: 1) Telegram effectively controls the ecosystem and can determine its development; 2) Up to 70% of TON's initial launch went to Telegram-related structures; 3) Pavel Durov's arrest showed regulators can pressure through the founder. Counter-arguments: 1) TON Foundation is an independent organization; 2) Open-source protocol; 3) Hundreds of independent validators. Reality: TON is significantly more centralized than Bitcoin but offers unprecedented audience reach as a trade-off.

TON was designed for scale. Thanks to dynamic sharding technology, the network can theoretically process over 1 million transactions per second (TPS). For comparison: Bitcoin — 7 TPS, Ethereum — ~15 TPS, Solana — 65,000 TPS. In practice real TON transaction volume does not reach the maximum, but the network has already handled peak loads during major airdrops. Transaction finalization time is about 5 seconds. Fees are fractions of a cent, making TON attractive for micro-payments in Telegram.

Toncoin has no fixed maximum supply — it is an inflationary token. New TON are created as validator rewards. The inflation rate varies but is generally low. As of 2024 approximately 5.1 billion TON are in circulation. The original 5 billion were distributed in 2020 by the community that continued the project after Telegram's withdrawal. Since this is not a deflationary token, the long-term price depends on growing demand (primarily through the Telegram ecosystem) rather than built-in supply scarcity.