TON blockchain claims sub-second finality with Catchain 2.0 upgrade

The Open Network (TON), an independent layer-1 blockchain that has integrations with the Telegram messaging application, said it has slashed block times to 400 milliseconds with the release of its Catchain 2.0 consensus upgrade.

Payment transactions now settle in about 1 second, while trades settle in “real time,” and decentralized applications will now operate at speeds comparable to traditional apps, according to TON’s announcement on Thursday.

Faster block times produce more validator rewards, as the number of blocks added to the chain increases. TON’s annual inflation is projected to increase six-fold, to 3.6% from about 0.6% following the update, TON said. Inflation represents the continuing minting and burning of Toncoin within its ecosystem.

“More blocks mean more validator rewards, which create stronger staking incentives and bring more TON into the network,” according to TON’s announcement.

The update builds on TON’s Catchain consensus algorithm, first proposed in 2020, and brings near-instant settlement to the blockchain network integrated into an application with more than 1 billion users worldwide.

TON was trading up 2.3% to $1.28 at last look on Thursday, data from CoinMarketCap showed. Volume was $130.1 million, up more than 35%. The token’s market cap was $3.17 billion.

Related: Dynamic adds embedded wallet infrastructure to TON for Telegram apps

Telegram provides users with a lifeline to communicate and send crypto worldwide

Pavel Durov, the co-founder of Telegram, said that despite government bans in Iran and Russia, significant numbers of people in both countries still use the application.

Telegram bans have backfired, as users circumvent national firewalls and state-imposed online restrictions by using virtual private networks (VPNs), which mask IP addresses, allowing users to bypass banned content online.

“The government hoped for mass adoption of its surveillance messaging apps, but got mass adoption of VPNs instead,” Durov said.

The integration with TON enables Telegram users to send crypto payments directly within the messaging application to other users, including businesses.

In February, the in-app crypto wallet in Telegram introduced self-custodial vaults that allow users to earn yield on Bitcoin (BTC), Tether’s USDt stablecoin (USDT) and Ether (ETH). 

Earlier this month, the wallet launched perpetual futures trading for users directly in the Telegram application.

The integration was launched with perpetual decentralized exchange Lighter, and supports perpetual futures trading across multiple asset classes, including crypto, equities, commodities, precious metals and energy.

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