What is NEM – The Full Guide

NEM

NEM is a blockchain written in Java, the double-layer blockchain supports multiple ledgers on its cryptocurrency layers. NEM’s ecosystem is built in such a way that seamlessly connects and transfers any type of digital assets between private and public blockchains. A collective growth mindset, made NEM to abdicate the POS consensus and introduce the POI. NEM is the world’s first practitioner of POI (Proof-of-Importance) consensus. Although it is similar to Proof-of-Stake which requires locking of certain amounts of coins in the ecosystem, there are several major differences.

The key difference between the POS and POI consensus is that in the POS consensus the amount of coins staked does matter, whereas a staker allocating 10% of the staked amount will be able to mine only 10% of blocks in the network. The POI consensus is used to determine network participants which are eligible enough to add blocks to the blockchain, in NEM’s ecosystem adding blocks to the blockchain is called “harvesting”.

In POS the more coins one stakes, the higher the reward and the reputation, however in POI mechanism, there are three key factors which build the reputation of the node: vesting (holding of 10000 XEM in the wallet), transaction partners, number of transactions within 30 days.

Symbol

Symbol is NEM’s project mainly focused on Enterprise. Symbol is a hybrid blockchain, which means that the blockchain is not fully accessible by anyone although it still bears features of a blockchain such as transparency, security and solidness. The hybrid blockchain is fully customizable and blockchain nodes can decide which transactions should be verifiable, who can participate in the blockchain and which transactions can be public.

The interoperability of public and private chains from what it seems like allow a cost-efficient, seamless data transfer between these two chains, avoiding third party bridges, which are used in interconnection of public and private chain protocols. Just like other blockchains built nowadays, Symbol is interoperable, which means no intermediaries needed for data transfer and token swaps between any blockchain and Symbol.

As NEM commented, the launch of the mainnet of Symbol is scheduled on March 15, after a long 4 years of developments. On March 12, the project will pre-launch Opt-in and snapshot phase at a block height of 3,105,500.

The Opt-in means that any NEM’s proprietary token – XEM holders can receive Symbol’s proprietary token – XYM upon the mainnet launch. Basically what that means is that during the block height of 3,105,500 the system will read all wallets that have participated in the Opt-in and will allocate XYM to the Symbol account created during the Opt-in, which is exactly the same as the balance of one’s XEM wallet. In other words, hold your XEM in your NEM wallet (note: the wallet must be updated to the latest one), apply for Opt-in, create a Symbol account, for each 1 XEM in your balance you will receive 1 XYM, the XEM balance will remain intact, according to the announcement on NEM’s official website.

How is it going to impact XEM?

The Symbol is a promising project, it already made partners with some big names in the industry. The XYM token is already listed in Poloniex, Bitpanda, Gateio and others, and listing of the XYM is already on the task list of giants such as Binance, Huobi, Kucoin and 17 other exchanges. Some exchanges will support the snapshot of wallets for XYM allocation, among such are Binance, Kucoin, and recently announced Coinex.

While the excitement in this airdrop is heavy, XEM price seems to be silent and waiting for an alert to trigger. While the cryptocurrency market is in an uptrend today with Bitcoin gaining almost 4% today only according to the data of the cryptocurrency trading platform Overbit,

XEM/USD lies low like a leopard before a jump.

Based on the technical chart analysis, XEM/USD is currently in a corrective 5-wave ABCDE formation, which formed a symmetrical triangle. Based on the technical analysis, the chart pattern and the MACD indicator, XEM/USD will probably break the upper edge of the triangle and move upwards. The resistances to watch here are $0.7530 and $0.8000. Closing below the lower edge might lead to a drop to $0.6100 and $0.6000.

One should bear in mind that in most cases listings of new coins and airdrops led to massive sell-offs among the token investors. In case of NEM and Symbol such might not be the case or the so-called “dump” might not be as heavy as during the boom of ICO’s.

The first reason is that in the emerging ecosystem of NEM, many might consider becoming network participants, the overall crypto market sentiment still remains bullish and tokens of cross-chain networks such as Polkadot are among the top investment appealing, enterprises are going blockchain and are integrating blockchain into their existing network another example of a project which allowed enterprises to connect their external data to blockchain is Chainlink, whose token LINK is along-side Polkadot’s DOT is an outperforming coin and still is appreciated by long-term investors.

As the crypto-adoption is growing, more stores are tend to accept cryptocurrencies as payment, projects like Symbol will assist in bringing the crypto and blockchain to the IoT we got used to.