Grin blockchain
Although most blockchains are anonymous, they remain open and allow the entire transaction history of users to be tracked. Therefore, it is possible to compute users in many cases, and this practice is improving.
In contrast to transparent, decentralized protocols, developers are creating solutions focusing on the confidentiality of transactions that cannot be traced to identify senders and receivers. One such protocol has become Grin.
What is Grin?
Grin is an open and scalable privacy-focused Tier 1 blockchain. The Grin blockchain is powered by the Mimblewimble protocol, which utilizes another popular blockchain, Beam.
As with Bitcoin, the Grin blockchain was developed by independent developers worldwide; no foundation or organization backs it. Like the first blockchain, the protocol was launched with a fair distribution of coins, i.e., no tokenization (ICO) or pre-mining. The Grin protocol was launched in January 2019.
How does Grin work?
As already written, the Grin blockchain is developed based on the Mimblewimble privacy protocol. This protocol hides information about the sender and receiver of cryptocurrency and the amount of transactions: in most blockchains, this metadata is stored in blocks. Among other things, removing metadata reduces the block size, improving blockchain performance.
The Mimblewibmle protocol is one of the main differences between Grin, bitcoin, and other early blockchains. Grin lacks the usual public addresses that Bitcoin uses to transfer cryptocurrency. However, users can still use public addresses for GRIN coin transfers using third-party relays like Grinbox.
However, the Grin blockchain only processes up to 10 transactions per second (TPS), making it slightly more productive than the Bitcoin protocol, which has a throughput of up to 7 TPS.
Like Bitcoin, the Grin blockchain is powered by a Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus mechanism using the Cuckoo Cycle mining algorithm, which aims to make the protocol as simple as possible. The algorithm was designed to become resistant to ASIC devices, which has led to a rapid increase in the hash rate of the Bitcoin network. However, some developers still managed to create a device for mining cryptocurrency GRIN, but the project's creators assumed that everything would come to this.
Grin cryptocurrency
GRIN is a proprietary cryptocurrency of the Grin network, used as the main asset for paying commissions and making transfers. This is where the functions of the GRIN cryptocurrency end. GRIN is an analog of the BTC cryptocurrency. GRIN cryptocurrency is mined in the same way as bitcoin: by mining. GRIN coin can be mined using ASIC devices.
However, there are still some differences between the two. First, GRIN is an inflationary cryptocurrency with no limit on the coins' maximum number (issue). Currently, over 98 million GRINs are circulating on the market.
New coins are generated linearly, and Grin's inflation rate is high: one GRIN coin is generated every second. However, it should fall below 10% per year over the next ten years and gradually decline to zero. According to the issuance schedule, GRIN coins will reach 500 million in about 10 years and more than 2.5 billion by 2100.
With a market capitalization of just $7.9 million, the GRIN cryptocurrency ranks 1034th on CoinMarketCap's list. At its peak in April 2021, GRIN's capitalization reached $84 million, which is also a tiny figure even by the standards of the crypto market. After that, the capitalization began to decline rapidly and reached a low of $2.5 million in October 2023.
The price of cryptocurrency GRIN at the time of writing was $0.08, more than 99% lower than the all-time high (ATH) reached at $14.87 in January 2019. Despite a booming crypto market in 2021, the GRIN cryptocurrency exchange rate has never been able to even come close to its ATH, with its price only reaching $1.2 in 2021.
There are few exchanges where GRIN cryptocurrency is traded. Among the well-known ones is only Gate.io. The rest are little-known or have almost no liquidity, so there may be problems when buying or selling cryptocurrency.
Does the Grin blockchain have any prospects?
In many ways, the Grin blockchain is similar to Bitcoin: it is almost entirely exposed to the community. The project has virtually no social media accounts, and there is only a community hub on Reddit and Discord, which you still have to look for. There are mainly a few enthusiasts and miners there.
The project is barely evolving, and its code is only updated a few times a year, with no fundamental protocol updates on GitHub. It looks more like the project is geared towards crypto-punks.
There is not much growth in demand among investors compared to even other privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies such as:
The project remains virtually invisible against the background of leading blockchains in general and its segment. Meanwhile, GRIN cryptocurrency continues to be constantly generated, but miners are likely to sell it immediately, unlike Bitcoin miners.
The Grin project lacks a roadmap, and competition in the crypto market keeps getting stronger. It is unlikely that Grin will ever rank alongside the currently leading blockchains. At best, the project may see short-term growth, but Grin has little chance of survival without the support of a large community and growing demand, as statistics show that more than 92% of blockchain projects become "ghosts".
