At the Token 2049 event on September 13, representatives of the TON Foundation and Telegram announced their full cooperation and the integration of blockchain into the messenger. A highlight of this partnership is the @Wallet bot, which allows users to manage crypto within the Telegram. Let's take a closer look at this announcement.
Key details
The most important revelation at the event was Telegram's willingness to fully integrate TON into the messenger. This move will grant Telegram users access to a wide range of services and decentralised applications (dApps) running on the TON blockchain, facilitated by the @Wallet bot. According to the presentation, Telegram’s goal is to make "using crypto as easy as texting."
@Wallet, a custodial wallet, already simplifies buying and sending cryptocurrencies like TON, USDT, and BTC to messenger users.
Recently, developers have also launched a beta test of TON Space, a full-fledged non-custodial wallet available directly within @Wallet. Following the event, all Telegram users can activate TON Space in their settings, create a backup of their seed phrase, or import an existing one to enter the TON ecosystem.
TON Space currently enables users to manage their Toncoins, jettons (TON’s equivalent of ERC-20 tokens on Ethereum), NFTs, connect with dApps, and more. Additionally, TON’s representatives wrote on X (formerly Twitter) that we can anticipate "more use cases to come in the next weeks."
As seen in the screenshot below, @Wallet will be natively added to the Telegram menu for all messenger users starting in November, with the exception of the US residents.
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) likely accounts for this exclusion. In 2020, due to SEC’s claims of selling unregistered securities, Telegram and its founder, Pavel Durov, stopped blockchain development. They put it "in the hands" of the community, which had formed the TON Foundation and still continues to develop the ecosystem. Not that long ago, the TON Foundation actually registered as a non-profit organisation in Switzerland.
The TON Foundation plans to attract 30% of Telegram's audience to the TON blockchain in the next 5 years. According to the projections illustrated on the slide above, a potential user base stands at almost 1.5 billion.
At the keynote, TON Foundation and Telegram representatives emphasised their commitment to supporting developers who work on TON. They also promised to give them an additional promotion through Telegram ads to get more users involved in the Web3 world.
Market Reaction
The joint appearance of the TON Foundation and Telegram at the Token 2049 event had a notable impact on the market. Throughout August, despite Bitcoin’s 11% drop, TON surged from $1.197 to $1.74.
Over the past two days, its price has increased from $1.65 to $1.98. However, currently, TON is trading at $1.86.
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