- WHAT IS TRON?
In Their Words:
“TRON is a blockchain-based decentralized protocol that aims to construct a worldwide free content entertainment system with the blockchain and distributed storage technology.”
In Our Words:
TRON are aiming to create an entertainment platform that allows content creators full control over their content.
Think of a decentralised combination of Netflix, YouTube and the App Store.
- HOW DOES TRON WORK?
The TRON project is an incredibly complex one, we will aim to highlight its key features but encourage you to read their whitepaper and complete further research if you want to learn the more technical details of the project.
We will first discuss the TRON token.
The TRON Token
There are in fact three different tokens involved in the TRON project: TRONIX, TRON Power and the TRON 20 Token; we’re going to quickly outline all three and their uses below.
TRONIX (TRX) – This is the token available for purchase/trade on the exchanges; it is required to access the TRON platform and is also used to buy and sell content upon it.
TRON Power (TP) – This is essentially locked up TRONIX; users volunteer to lock up their TRX and receive TP in return, as well as voting rights and other privileges in the TRON ecosystem. TRON Power is not tradable and would of course be a long-term commitment. TRON Power is similar to Steem Power used on the Steemit platform.
TRON 20 Token – TRON 20 Token allows content creators to create and issue their own tokens, similar to Waves and NEM.
The Platform
At its simplest, content creators will be able to list their content on the TRON platform and make it available for purchase; this could be music, films, images etc. These transactions will be completed using the TRX token and without the involvement of any fees.
The TRON system will also offer incentives to content creators to encourage them to place their content on the platform and help stimulate the TRON ecosystem.
Other crypto platforms will also be able to host on the TRON platform while offering their own tokens.
Users would be able to transfer these tokens into any other on the platform using TRX as a bridge currency.
- ARE TRON SOLVING REAL MARKET PROBLEMS?
#1 Problem – Censorship & Centralization
In many countriesm internet censorship and restriction is rife; government intervention means users are regularly unable to access certain websites.
In China, for example, people are unable to access Facebook or Snapchat, while the Iranian government have prevented access to both Instagram and Telegram.
TRON’s Solution
The decentralized nature of the project means it should be free from censorship or interference.
#2 Problem – High Channel Fees
One problem experienced by content creators when trying to distribute their content is the high fees or commission rates charged by media platforms like the App Store and Google Play.
TRON’s Solution
Content creators will have sole control of their product as well as direct access to their consumers and, without the involvement of the middlemen, these costs are vastly reduced.
- WILL THE TRON TOKEN INCREASE IN PRICE?
This is another incredibly important point that people often overlook when investing in Cryptocurrencies – is the token price truly linked to the platform usage?
Investing in Cryptos is not the same as traditional investing – when you buy shares in a company, you’re buying ownership. As the company makes increased profits, the share price will increase and your investment value will rise also.
With the majority of Cryptocurrencies, the tokens don’t represent shares.
Therefore, it’s possible for the company to be successful (i.e the CEO and employees get rich) and yet the token prices may actually fall if they aren’t correctly linked to platform usage.
The ONLY factor determining token price is supply and demand on exchanges.
Obviously, supply and demand are affected by many factors but the price all comes down to the combination of these two. Because of this, it is essential to ask yourself the following two questions:
Demand – Will there be token demand on the exchanges?
Supply – Will there be excessive inflation hindering prices?
Let’s first look at demand:
What Are The Sources of Demand?
Users will be required to hold TRON tokens in order to access the platform and, on top of this, all transactions will also be completed using TRX.
As more content is listed on the TRON platform and users convert to the platform, the demand for the token will increase and the price should also.
The Result?
The price of the TRON token is sufficiently linked to the demand for the platform.
TRON has passed this test.
What Is The Likely Inflation Rate?
TRON created a fixed supply of tokens (100 billion TRX) meaning a zero inflation rate but that doesn’t mean that new tokens won’t enter the market though.
A total of 40% of the tokens were sold during the ICO, meaning 60% of the tokens will enter the market at some point so how will they be distributed?
35% – TRON Foundation/Ecosystem – It was recently announced that all of these tokens will be locked until January 1st 2020.
15% – Private Offering – No further details provided
10% – Peiwo Huanle Technology Ltd – No further details provided but CEO Justin Sun is also the founder of Peiwo. A question could potentially be raised here about where these tokens have in fact gone.
Coin Market Cap currently lists TRON as having a circulating supply of 65 billion; this would mean that all of the tokens that could enter the market have already done so.
As a result, we can assume that no more tokens will be entering the market until at least January 1st 2020 when the Foundation’s lock-in period expires.
Sun also announced on Twitter that TRON have a coin burn planned during Q1 of 2018, this would of course decrease the circulating supply and an increase in token price should be felt as a result.
TRON has passed this test.
- THE TRON TEAM & ROADMAP
The TRON Team
TRON possess what looks to be a very strong and well-rounded team. As a project overview, we will providing our opinions on a few key players and we recommend that readers check out the TRON website for further details on the team.
First up is Founder and CEO Justin Sun; formerly involved with Ripple as chief representative for their Greater China Region, Sun was also the founder of Peiwo (A Chinese social media platform with over 10m users).
He has also twice been listed as one of Forbes 30 under 30 (2015 & 2017), showing the strong reputation he has within the business world.
Chief Technology Officer Lucien Chen possesses a large amount of experience with a number of first-tier internet companies while Product Supervisor Deuce Yu has extensive experience in the gaming industry, something that could be very beneficial to the TRON project when they reach the latter stages of their roadmap.
A final member we would like to highlight is Operation Supervisor Charles Zhang; he is the former co-founder and COO of Elegance Space and also served as Secretary-General of their Chicago branch.
Charles offers a vault of business knowledge outside of crypto and has been invited to give lectures more than one hundred times by Peking University, highlighting how well respected he is within the business world.
The TRON Roadmap
Another standout aspect of the TRON project is their extensive roadmap; a detailed six-stage, ten year plan. We will highlight each stage and their focus below.
Exodus – August 2017 to December 2018 – Content distribution platform
Odyssey – January 2019 to June 2020 – Focus on economic incentives and content empowerment to encourage growth.
Great Voyage – July 2020 to July 2021 – ‘Personal ICO’ implementation – content creators will be able to create their own tokens and host their an ICO in order to allow them to produce more content
Apollo – August 2021 to March 2023 – Building the full decentralised trading platform for tokens
Star Trek – April 2023 to September 2025 – Creating a decentralised gaming platform for users to create their own games
Eternity – September 2025 to September 2027 – Users will be able to build their own gaming platforms
- SELLING POINTS
Partnerships
Operating in an industry that was worth $1.8 trillion in 2016, TRON are also able to boast a number of impressive partnerships already.
Through these partnerships with companies such as Baofeng, Peiwo and Obie, TRON are able to provide themselves with over 200 million potential users already.
When this is combined with the recently announced project with game.com (TRON Dogs- Similar to Crypto Kitties), then the potential user numbers are already impressive for the platform.
A side note surrounding the TRON Dogs project is that 2018 is the Chinese year of the dog; this is rather trivial but may help to drive uptake and is an extra point to consider.
Chinese Endorsement
Recently, the parent company of Peiwo APP (The first app to host on the TRON platform) was identified as one of Beijing’s high-tech enterprises of 2017.
The National High-tech Enterprise is a policy set by the Chinese government to promote the rapid development of high-tech enterprises. There are strict standards for inclusion.
‘After being included, companies will enjoy a series of concessions in technology research and development, tax relief and personnel policies so as to help enterprises devote more energy and ability to independent research and development and to enhance their core competitiveness.’ – Tron Foundation’s Medium Page.
Considering China’s negative stance towards cryptocurrency, this news is somewhat surprising and is a good sign for the long-term potential of the project.
- BARRIERS TO SUCCESS
Overambitious?
There is no denying that this is an incredibly ambitious project; TRON themselves highlight nine different types of risks involved in the project and while a ten year roadmap will be applauded by many, you also have to question likelihood of them reaching that goal without a few hiccups.
- RECENT CONTROVERSIES
Copied Whitepaper?
TRON recently came under fire after analysis of their whitepaper found a large percentage of it to be copied, almost word for word, from the IPFS and Filecoin whitepaper. The diagram below shows just how much was alleged to have been copied and details the lack of references.
TRON Controversy
Sun responded to this by saying that the original Chinese version of their whitepaper featured a number of references but since the alternative versions (English, Korean etc) were translated by volunteers, they had missed a number of important details as well as the references.
The TRON Foundation also released a statement saying: “The design of TRON is based on it’s own system and the realization of codes, some codes of Ethreum were used as reference, we didn’t note related license, from now on we will note the copyright ownership and promise this won’t happen again.”
While we are of course not in a position to say anything with outright confidence, this is something that would worry us.
TRON have since removed all versions of the whitepaper from their website and have promised the release of a new whitepaper some time soon. This is something we certainly look forward to reading.
Justin Sun Sells 6 Billion TRX?
TRON also came under scrutiny recently when a post on Reddit alleged that CEO Sun had sold 6 billion TRX, this was proven not to be the case but did create some fear.
The post highlighted a wallet that they believed to belong to Sun due to the high volume of TRX, as well as the wallet also being linked to a CryptoKitties account called ‘justinpets’.
The wallet in question had sold over 6 billion TRX for ETH over a three week period. Even Litecoin founder Charlie Lee got involved, calling out Sun over this on Twitter.
Sun would respond to the allegations on his personal Twitter account by stating that the wallet in question actually belongs to a private investor and market maker who buys and sells TRX tokens in order to provide liquidity.
He also said that when it comes to any form of registration, he uses his Chinese name of Yuchen, as opposed to Justin. Upon learning the facts, Charlie Lee would apologise and delete the tweets accusing Sun.
While the project has certainly had some flaws, this episode proved to be a poorly researched accusation as opposed to anything untowards on TRON’s behalf. An example of what many in crypto refer to as FUD.
- WHERE TO BUY & STORE TRON TOKENS
Where To Buy TRON Tokens
In our opinion, the best exchange to purchase TRON tokens from is Binance: http://bit.ly/cryptomoney2018 it is also available on a number of smaller exchanges but in our opinion Binance will offer the best prices and liquidity.
- THE CRYPTOGURUS CONCLUSION
While there is no doubting the potential size of the TRON project, there are a number of red flags that have arisen during our research.
We do hold a small amount of TRON in our portfolio but this was acquired in an attempt to access the TRON platform. We hoped this would allow us to offer an ever more detailed review but we were unable to access the platform in the end; potentially another red flag.
We are looking forward to reading the new whitepaper when it is released in the hope that it can alleviate some of the worries people have around the project.
If the project hits all of its targets then it could become one of the largest on the market but, as it stands, there are currently just too many questions around the project for us to consider a serious investment.
On top of this, the project is already priced very highly in the market – number 13 – so the upside potential is relatively small when compared to the considerable associated risk.
That’s the end of the article! Thanks for stopping by and don’t forget to check out our other articles for regular Crypto/ICO reviews and market updates.
Buy and hold tron on binance: http://bit.ly/cryptomoney2018
Disclaimer: None of the above is financial advice. Always do your own research.
