Cosmos, ATOM

Cosmos is an ecosystem with three main components. Cosmos Network is a decentralized network for concurrent operation of independent compatible blockchains. In the ecosystem, these sidechains are called zones. They could be an individual entity or become a hub by uniting other zones. Cosmos Hub is the main hub with its own blockchain and payment system based on the Atom cryptocurrency. Tendermint is an environment for blockchain development.

The project was established by Jae Kwon who worked as an engineer in Alexa, a leading developer in Yelp, and a developer in Flywheel Networks. In April 2014, he created Tendermint Inc (officially All in Bits Inc.), where he became CEO and chief developer. Based on Byzantine fault tolerance and Proof-of-Stake, Mr Kwon developed his own consensus algorithm called Tendermint BFT. In late 2015, Jae Kwon met Ethan Buchman and offered him a position of CTO in his Californian company. In January 2016, they wrote a White paper ‘Cosmos: A Network of Distributed Ledgers.’

Cosmos achievements

In March 2017, Jae Kwon and Ethan Buchman established Interchain Foundation, a nonprofit organisation, in Zug, Switzerland. The foundation conducted ICO on 06/04/2017 and raised 4870 BTC and 247 thousand ETH for a total equal to $16.5 million. In exchange, it gave all participants 75% of tokens, or 168,475,963 ATOM. After that, Interchain Foundation attracted investment from venture capitalists who received 5% of tokens. The Foundation gave another 10% to a development company (Tendermint, or All in Bits Inc.), and the remaining 10% were saved as a reserve.

For almost two years, the cryptocurrency was not listed on exchanges, so its holders conducted over-the-counter deals when necessary. The executives did not negotiate listing because they wanted to enter the market with a completed blockchain with coins, not with a test version. Only on 13/03/2019, the team launched the mainnet on the first hub — Cosmos Hub, generated a genesis block in the blockchain, and the ATOM coin appeared on exchanges. The long wait had a negative effect on the Cosmos price: a slight growth occurred only on the first day of listing — from 6.53 to 7.50 US dollars. Then in a week, the price went down to 3.45 US dollars. However, by summer 2019, an uptrend of bitcoin helped the new coin to strengthen its position on the market.

Besides improving the network and updating the protocol of the Cosmos ecosystem, Tendermint Inc helped to create other projects and applications:

• a blockchain for the Binance DEX exchange;
• software products for Oasis Labs;
• a protocol for the Terra crypto project;
• a hub for IRIS Network;
• a blockchain for Regen Network.

Cosmos features

Each of the three components of the ecosystem has additional elements or functions. In the development environment, there is Tendermint Core — the core as a replicated state machine, and separately Cosmos SDK — a set of development tools as a modular framework. The native application interface supports Go (fully compatible), Erlang, Java, JavaScript, and OCaml.

Cosmos Network has the Inter-Blockchain Communication protocol for connecting zones and creating hubs. It is a unique protocol that acts as a layer for other decentralized networks. Cosmos Hub supports not only Atom but also any other coin of integrated blockchains. Besides trading, the coin has three options for application, and all of them directly or indirectly affect the Cosmos exchange rate to the US dollar:

1. Staking with a reward for the block.
2. Voting with coins as a way of decentralized management of the Cosmos Hub blockchain.
3. Payment for internal operations, or just a way to prevent spam transactions.

Developers recommend using the Lunie wallet for ATOM coins. It is an independent project with its team supported by the Interchain Foundation. Atomic Wallet and Math Wallet are suitable as well.

Cosmos prediction, perspectives, and dynamics

In April 2019, Atom started recovering its price against the backdrop of a market rise by going three times in a month beyond 5 USD. Although the Cosmos chart shows such a spiking rather like a wide flat. Strong growth occurred only at the end of May — from 4.42 to 7.02 USD, and lasted less than a month. A meetup in Amsterdam and a hackathon in Berlin helped as well as the main cryptocurrency.

Having experienced a long downtrend, the ATOM price slightly recovered in the first half of September 2019 — up to 3.45 USD. With a little more certainty, the coin went up to 4.36 USD in early November. This could have been facilitated by an AMA interview about Game of Zones.

Unfortunately, ATOM did not come close to the 7-dollar mark or the historical maximum. However, in 2020, it reached 5 USD several times: on 16 January — 5.08 USD; on 11-14 February — 5.10 USD. Here BTC helped again, not otherwise. The final step in the development of the project should be the transfer of control to validators. It is still unknown when this will happen and how it will affect the price.

Here are the ATOM price predictions for 2020 from technical analysis experts: