Hi 🧑🚀,
Today, we’re taking a look at the ICON Networks’ native cryptocurrency, ICX. It is used for many types of transactions in the blockchain. ICX can be used for many different purposes like as a medium of exchange between users, a reward for contributing to the ecosystem, as a fee payment and for interacting with smart contracts.
🧑💻 Overview of ICX
ICONists can sacrifice the liquidity of ICX through staking. That way, the ICX gets locked up, which enables you to gain voting power. This voting power can then be delegated to a P-Rep. By doing so, you contribute to the security and growth of the ICON ecosystem. You will also earn new ICX every term, i.e. around 24h.
When it comes to ICX, there are three specific terms; you should be aware of:
- 📌 Staked ICX or Voting Power — this is the basic delegation unit and means of governance on the ICON Network. You can obtain Staked ICX by locking your ICX. If you like to know more about how to stake and vote in ICON, check our blog about staking here.
- 🏆 I-Score — is used to reward and quantify the contributions of ICONists in the network. After voting, you can claim your I-Score from the Public Treasury.
- 👨💼 Step — this metric is used to denote a single unit of a transaction fee payment. All transactions on the ICON Network costs a specific amount of Step. The initial Step price is approximately 1x10^-8 ICX. The amount depends on the resources required to execute a transaction. Fees are sent to the Public Treasury, where they become available to claim with I-Score.
💰 ICX is not a stable coin, meaning it isn’t backed by fiat currencies, commodities — such as gold — or other tokens. Instead, it is a stake-able crypto-asset; the ICX coin is an altcoin that can be staked.
👉 If you would like to keep up to date with ICX or other digital asset value, you can visit websites such as Coinmarketcap or Messari.
Some Additional Use Cases of ICX
🤓 The Use of ICX in Iconloop
ICONLOOP is a tech company based in South-Korea and the inventors of the ICON Blockchain network. The company wants to be a crucial part of the development of a convenient, transparent and trustworthy society, through blockchain technologies. Their biggest aim is to inspire the mass-adoption of blockchain by introducing blockchain-based services. The main services that they have introduced so far are MyID and DPASS.
- MyID 📱 is a mobile identity service that is working on a blockchain-based digital ID ecosystem, in order to resolve user inconveniences with online identification,
- D-PASS 📝 is an identification service based on an independent DID-technology (Decentralized-ID, implemented and developed by ICON). Users can safely store their data in the additional D-PASS app and use different services with it. The app also has a special ‘Vault (Distributed Storage)’ function, to safely create back-ups without having to worry about 3rd parties mining your data.
ICONLOOP connects the D-Pass app with blockchain-certificate service ‘Broof’. Which is where ICX comes in to play. Services that you use with the ICON D-PASS integration, can be paid in ICX. With ‘Broof’ for example, transaction fees and certificate creation fees are paid in ICX.
The MyID innovation has 52 organizations and corporations partners of various industries like commercial banks, security, and e-commerce. Their aim is to have 100 established partners by the end of the fourth quarter in 2020.
🔗 ICX in Chainlink Oracle Partnership
Another integration for which ICX will be used is ICON’s collaboration with Chainlink, one of the leading oracle solutions in the blockchain industry. Oracles make it possible for smart contracts to interact with data and systems outside their native blockchain. Doing so opens up interchain communication and interaction with traditional non-blockchain systems.
ICON wants to create off-chain connectivity to its DApp’s. Therefore, a collaboration with Chainlink, which specializes in allowing developers to customize their smart contracts’ way of communicating. They have implemented varying levels of decentralization, data aggregation, and oracle selection, which gives smart contracts secure and reliable access to data providers, enterprise systems and so on.
The implementation of Chainlink on ICON is planned to be an ICX/USD pricing oracle that can be utilized by any ICON DApp. Such integration will help to easily build financial products ad market places based on the USD equivalent of ICX.
Get to Know More About ICON
- Stakin P-Rep Proposal
- ICON Website
- ICON Tracker
- The Iconist (dedicated media about ICON and its ecosystem).
- Github
- ICON Official Telegram Channel
- ICON Non-Official European Community Telegram
- Stakin Medium on ICON
- Daily updates about ICON
DISCLAIMER: This is not financial advice. Staking, delegation, and cryptocurrencies involve a high degree of risk, and there is always the possibility of loss, including the failure of all staked digital assets. Additionally, delegators are at risk of slashing in case of security or liveness faults on some protocols. We advise you to do your due diligence before choosing a validator.
