Key Highlights:
- Users on Telegram can now send and receive cryptocurrency, Toncoin
- Toncoin is a rebranded Gram token whose development was halted by the SEC in 2020
- Protocol states that the exchange of Toncoin on the app will streamline such transactions on other messaging platforms.
In a big move by Telegram after giving up its own token, it will now allow cryptocurrency payments on its app. Users on the app can effortlessly send Toncoin, built off the encrypted messaging app’s abandoned blockchain network. As per their post on Twitter by TON (The Open Network), Telegram will support Toncoin exchange without charging any extra fees.
Their post also included a short video detailing how this transaction would work on the platform. It asked users to add Telegram’s Wallet bot on the attachment menu and then purchase cryptocurrency by cards or via transfer from other wallets. When you want to send crypto, access your Wallet from the attachment menu in the chat option, enter the amount you wish to send (Toncoin), confirm the details, and then click on the Send button. The recipient will receive Toncoin on their chat.
This comes after Telegram halted its crypto project in 2020 after handling the heat from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Known as TON (The Open Network), it was an undertaking by the Telegram CEO, Pavel Durov and his brother Nikolai. Telegram was asked by the SEC to stop selling its Gram token, linked to the TON blockchain, saying that the company failed to register its monumental sales of $1.7 billion as a part of the pre-initial coin offering (ICO).
Although Telegram did abandon this project entirely, a few of its developers kept working on it, christening it as The Open Network and rebranding the Gram as Toncoin. Telegram CEO, Durov in December 2021 expressed his contentment with the same saying that the technology they created is alive and growing.
He said, “I’m proud that the technology we created is alive and evolving. TON is still years ahead of everything else in the blockchain realm.”
Earlier, the TON Foundation has also raised $1 billion in donations. Although the Telegram CEO has built Toncoin as a separate project and independent from Telegram, which is now enabled for crypto transactions on the app.
