What does the future hold for the Chainlink price?

It's one of the most widely known altcoins in the crypto market today, and, as many people know, it was one of the best price performers in the previous bull run. But just what is Chainlink, and is there potential for returns this time round?

The brainchild of Russian developer Sergey Nazarov, Chainlink describes itself as an 'industry standard Web3 services platform connecting the people, businesses, and data of today with the Web3 world of tomorrow'. In simple terms, this means Chainlink acts as a connector between real-world data, on-chain protocol, and other abstract blockchains.

The development of the Web3 space is a sight to behold. It is surely the infrastructure of the future. The technology, however, will be of no use if each blockchain exists in a walled garden. The technology underpinning Chainlink allows blockchains to talk to each other and manage data streams from the real world.

There's more about Chainlink and how it works in our report.

Real-world use

Chainlink's close association with DeFi is well documented. It has led many to speculate that this was the cause for the token's strong performance through the last bull run.

Core to protocol design is Chainlink's ability to allow users to become node operators and earn revenue by providing critical data infrastructure. These node operators help power a broad range of decentralised price feed oracles, which are critical in securing billions in value for the leading DeFi applications such as Aave, Compound, and Synthetix.

Facilitating DeFi data price feeds is just the beginning. The current Chainlink ecosystem has more than 1 billion data access points, securing in excess of $75 billion in value with over 1,000 integrations across 700 oracle networks. As you can see, Chainlink means serious crypto business.

Reaching far beyond the crypto world, the success of projects such as Chainlink is integral to the widespread adoption of blockchain-based solutions in the real world. Business relationships with mainstream brands such as AccuWeather, FedEx, and Associated Press show just how serious modern business is taking the advent of distributed technology networks.

Ex-Google Chairman Eric Schmidt has joined the project as a Technical Advisor and believes the project is perfectly poised to help speed worldwide crypto adoption stating, "Chainlink is a secret ingredient to unlocking the potential of smart contract platforms and revolutionizing business and society.”

Chainlink price action

Managing the vast amount of data needed to populate blockchains and smart contracts are becoming an industry within itself. It is easy to see why Chainlink proved so popular through 2020 and 2021. With next to no competition, Chainlink price grew by 2,500% in little more than 18 months, from January 2020 to May 2021.

The native token of the Chainlink network is $LINK, which has a maximum supply of 1,000,000,000. However, the circulating supply is only 491,599,970, with a current price of $7.34, giving it a market cap of $3.7 billion.

Starting the year at $5.57, the Chainlink price grew steadily in the following weeks. This slow and steady increase has caught the eyes of many crypto investors looking for a predictable return on their investment.

Opinions vary, but it is commonly believed that the Chainlink price will be one of the strongest performers in the next bull run. Technical analyses are indicating bullish signs going forward, with predictions of $100 per coin by the end of the decade not uncommon.

It doesn't pay to get ahead of ourselves. So, let's look at some predictions for the rest of 2023. Popular crypto resource site CryptonewsZ.com suggests that the Chainlink price will hit $20 by the end of the year. Whatever happens, it is safe to say that $LINK is a good crypto buy if you want to position yourself for the next bull run.

Of course, there are other ways to profit from cryptocurrency besides trading and investing. One of these is staking. Staking allows holders to participate in a Proof of Stake network by loaning their tokens to the network to run a validator node.

For this, stakers are rewarded with a share of the network fees.

Staking is a low-risk way to earn passive income on your investment. With some networks offering rewards of more than 10%, it is easy to see why it is so popular.

For a deep dive into what staking is and how it works, read our article.

Conclusion

As you can see, $LINK is one of the more popular cryptocurrencies available on the market today, with high levels of anticipation about what Chainlink price can achieve in the next bull run. As can be imagined with any top 50 cryptocurrency, getting hold of the $LINK token is relatively easy. Binance and Coinbase prove to be the most popular source. While the long-term future may look bright for Chainlink, there is still some concern regarding the immediate outlook. Users of the popular crypto analytics website coinmarketcap.com see a price reduction by the end of April 2023.

What the future holds for Chainlink price, we just don't know.

However, until comprehensive regulation and policy are implemented, the industry will continue to be victim to fraud and scams. So, the same advice must be heeded for this project as much as any other – always do your own research and conduct due diligence before investing in any form of cryptocurrency.