The much-awaited Filecoin mainnet launch is once again garnering headlines. After suffering a delay of 36-months, the dormant ICO is readying for launch next month. All eyes are once again now on the biggest ICO of 2017 as the resurrection news has generated another round of interest among the crypto enthusiasts.
#Filecoin is expected to launch a new network Calibration
on July 21st during the two-week calibration period, miners
can perform debugging and calibration in a real
competition environment and see how their results affect
the competition ranking. pic.twitter.com/2bPxD7y3xc
— Huobi Research (@Huobi_Research) July 21, 2020
The mammoth $250 million ICO was partly attributed to the 2017 crypto bubble. However, the ‘Initial Coin Offering’ then went into a dormant phase raising the investor’s concern. Now, the Filecoin mainnet launch is scheduled to happen before August 21, and hopes are high this time around.
Filecoin mania catching up to the investors
The 2017 crypto-mania saw many ICOs collect a considerable amount of funds from the investors. Unfortunately, most of the small and medium scale ICOs vanished in the crypto crash later that year. Filecoin ICO is the sixth biggest ICO ever recorded, and hopes were high that it would not fizzle out. Big names such as Sequoia Capital and Andreessen Horowitz support the project.
Now, Chinese miners seem to have taken charge and are driving the latest buzz around Filecoin. Even though it is based out of the USA, the recent excitement is courtesy of Chinese speculators and miners who are looking for an alternative to the current DeFi trend.
James Wo of Ethereum Classic Labs mentions that it is challenging to buy tokens in China compared to mining machines. So, Chinese miners are pushing ahead with Filecoin mining. Currently, the majority of the Filecoin testnet mining crowd comes from China. Crypto mining is a big thing in China, and this trend can continue for a while.
Filecoin mainnet launch getting nearer
Besides the mining, Filecoin Futures is also generating big hype. Crypto investors awaiting the Filecoin mainnet launch are betting on its futures to the tune of $50 million per day as per CoinGecko.
Major crypto exchanges have launched Filecoin Futures products, thereby boosting the speculative market associated with Filecoin. Retail participation is also contributing towards the buzz around Filecoin as more storage space is being added to the network.
Presently, Filecoin holds 20 petabytes storage capacity and is under the testnet phase. Rumors about Filecoin mainnet launch began as the firm entered the ‘calibration period’, which is usually a precursor event before the actual mainnet launch. Still, there’s no official word about the launch date.
