LUNA Coin Latest News

The Luna coin news latest reveals that Do Kwon, the founder of collapsed Luna and TerraUSD tokens, and his company Terraform Labs problems are far from over.

In Singapore, 350 investors impacted by the collapse of UST consequently issued a lawsuit against Kwon seeking $57 million in compensation.

In South Korea, prosecutors have frozen assets worth $92 million affiliated with the Terra tokens. The seized assets were taken from Kernel Labs, a tech firm closely related to Terraform Labs.

South Korean authorities issued an arrest warrant for Do Kwon on charges including fraud and market manipulation. His location is still unknown.

Luna coin's history

Before looking at the Luna coin news latest, let's take a look back. The coin’s history begins in 2019 when it was launched by Terraform Labs, a company founded by Do Kwon and Daniel Shin.

It was created to be the native token of the Terra blockchain. It had several use cases in the Terra network. Holders could use it as a method of payment and vote on network changes. It could also be staked for staking rewards.

It entered the crypto market worth $1.31. A year later, its value was still below $10. However, things would quickly take a turn for the better in 2021.

On 4 October, after the launch of the Columbus-5 Mainnet upgrade, it reached its first all-time high of $49.45. On 27 December, it recorded its highest value of the year, trading at $103.33 per coin.

It began 2022 on a high note reaching a new all-time high of $119.18 on 5 April. However, it would suffer a substantial loss on 6 May, dropping to trade at $82.94 per coin. By 13 May, it had fallen to trading at an all-time low of $0.00001675.

May marked the end of the cryptocurrency, once one of the most successful decentralized finance coins. It was a coin that had been ranked as the seventh largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization by Coinmarketcap.

TerraUSD (UST)

TerraUSD was a stablecoin operating on the Terra blockchain. Unlike other stablecoins, it was an algorithmic stablecoin that used LUNA coin to maintain its peg to the US dollar. It was not backed by an actual dollar, but by an algorithmic stablecoin.

UST coins were created by burning LUNA coins. They could also be swapped for LUNA. How the two coins worked was if the value of UST went above $1, the equivalent value of LUNA would be burnt, therefore minting more UST, making it less valuable. However, if the price of UST dropped below $1, they would be swapped for LUNA, making UST valuable. The two coins relied on each other for stability.

The relationship between the two cryptocurrencies had them both crashing when UST lost its peg to the US dollar.

The market crash

On 7 May, 2022, more than $2 billion worth of UST was unstaked from the Anchor protocol, a decentralized money market built on the Terra blockchain. Hundreds of millions worth of the unstaked stablecoin was later quickly liquidated. This resulted in UST dropping in price from $1 to $0.91.

Once the huge amount of UST had been offloaded, the stablecoin started to depeg. Investors started to panic, and many of them sold off their UST, resulting in the minting of more LUNA coins, increasing its public circulation.

After the crash

The UST crash had a devastating effect on the crypto market. The price of Bitcoin fell to $26,000, down 60% from its November 2021 peak. Ether, the second largest cryptocurrency, lost 30% of its value. Coinbase, one of the largest crypto exchanges, reported a loss of $430 million in its first quarter.

Do Kwon, the Chief Executive of Terraform Labs, tried to salvage the situation by proposing a burn of UST via a tweet on 11 May, 2022. The community passed the proposal, but the burning was not a success. It attempted to burn more UST than existed.

On 13 May, Do Kwon proposed another plan to create a new blockchain and leave behind the failed stablecoin. The community accepted the plan, resulting in a new blockchain and cryptocurrency called Terra 2.0 and Luna 2.0.

LUNA 2.0

It is a new version of the old LUNA coin. It lives on the new Terra 2.0 blockchain and was created to compensate those who suffered heavy financial losses after the TerraUSD crash. It also provided a way for the Terra network to try and recover from the devastating market crash.

The token was released to the public on 28 May, 2022. It started trading at an impressive price of $18.98 and briefly spiked to $19.45 within the first hour of trading. However, by the end of May, it dropped to trading at $8.88. For the rest of the year, it traded between $2 and $1.

It began 2023 worth $1.26, and is currently trading at $2.09. According to Coinmarketcap, it is the 93rd largest cryptocurrency by market cap, valued at $305,627,338.

The coins have a max supply cap of a billion coins. There are currently 202,010,814 of them in public circulation. They have already been listed on several crypto exchanges for purchase, including Binance, KuCoin, and Crypto.com.

LUNA 2.0 differs from its predecessor in that it does not rely on any stablecoin, algorithmic or not, for stability.

Luna Classic (LUNC)

LUNC is the old Terra blockchain's native token. The blockchain is now called Terra Classic. The token maintains all the properties of the original Terra Luna coin.

After the hard fork, LUNC began trading at $0.0001206 per coin. By the end of May, it was worth $0.0001147. By mid-June, it dropped to trading at $0.00006177. Once in a while, it made some slight price appreciation but not enough to warrant attention. It ended 2022 worth $0.0001452.

It began 2023 worth $0.0001451. It is currently worth $0.0001852. According to Coinmarketcap, it is the 53rd largest cryptocurrency by market cap, valued at $1,107,506,959.

While many people may have lost faith in the cryptocurrency, it is still listed on several crypto exchanges for those who wish to invest in it. Some places to buy the cryptocurrency include Binance, Bybit, Deepcoin, OKX, and Bitrue. The coin has a max supply cap of more than six trillion.

LUNA 2.0 and LUNC compared

So far, LUNC and LUNA 2.0 are doing pretty well price-wise. The coins are on a positive trajectory, and some investors are a little optimistic about them.

However, Luna coin news latest reveals that LUNC is doing much better than its new version. LUNC price performance has been doing well because of the recent burn.

The LUNC burn is a move that was passed by the coin’s community to try and save its ecosystem and restore its price.

The new Terra Classic blockchain where LUNC lives has a unique coin burn feature designed to reduce the circulating supply of LUNC tokens while increasing their value.

The LUNC burn mechanism automatically burns tokens whenever a transaction takes place on the Terra Classic network. Tokens burned are relative to the number of tokens in circulation, ensuring that the total supply of LUNC tokens is constantly decreasing, which helps with increasing their value over time.

Binance, one of the largest crypto exchanges, is also implementing the LUNC burn mechanism on trades facilitated by it. The exchange has committed to carrying out LUNC burns monthly. So far, the exchange has burned close to 14 billion LUNC tokens.

The Terra Classic community has burned more than 26 billion LUNC tokens. In the last two weeks, as of writing, the community has burned close to 20 million LUNC tokens. Unlike Binance, which executes the burns monthly, the Terra Classic community carries out the burns weekly.

The continued burn of LUNC tokens has not only increased the number of investors buying them but interest in them too. This is why their price has been surging. More than 40 billion LUNC tokens have been burned so far.

LUNC tokens also outshine the new version with a strong community. The token might have rebranded, but it still is supported by a strong community. Its large network of stakeholders continues to go to great lengths to keep it afloat and hopefully get it back to its former glory.

LUNA 2.0's future

Since its launch, few people have been hopeful about the new Terra token. Several financial analysts have been quite vocal about its quick death and deterring investors from considering adding it to their crypto portfolio.

Founder and CEO of Quantum Economics Mati Greenspan, for example, when asked about the coin's future, stated that it was never meant to live long.

According to Greenspan, the coin was created for a few investors who had heavily invested in its collapsed version as a way to recover some of their losses at the expense of new money coming from the hype. He added that he didn’t see any reason for the coin’s price to ever go up.

Khaleelulla Baig, founder and CEO of Koinbasket, backed up Greenspan's statement by saying the coin had no future because its founder Do Kwon had lost credibility. The project had lost credibility because Do Kwon didn’t build firewalls around the algorithms even when they had an opportunity to do so.

The two are not the only ones who predicted a dismal future for LUNA 2.0 back in 2022. The cryptocurrency has been through a lot. It is obvious why many people would be wary of it and even predict its quick demise.

However, considering Luna coin news latest, it isn’t performing as badly as many thought it would be. Compared to other cryptocurrencies that have been around longer, it is doing considerably well. While its future is hard to predict, it is worth keeping an eye on.