Called out by Vitalik, on-chain data is growing rapidly, and the established public chain Celo is starting a new narrative with L2 and stablecoins

Author: Nancy, PANews

A tweet from Vitalik has triggered a double-digit rise for Celo. As a well-established public chain, Celo, which originally focused on the concept of ReFi (Regenerative Finance), is accelerating its strategic transformation towards L2 and stablecoins, achieving impressive results that add more highlights to its profile.

New Narrative Transformation Towards L2 and Stablecoins

On September 25, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin tweeted about Celo, leading to a peak increase of approximately 22.3% in its token CELO. Vitalik stated on X, "Improving global access to basic payments/finance has always been a key way Ethereum brings benefits to the world, and I'm glad to see Celo gaining attention. My impression is that Celo is clearly focused on developing countries. This is a good thing for them, as many important challenges and opportunities lie there."

In fact, Vitalik's high praise for Celo is closely tied to its narrative shift. On one hand, Celo is "pledging allegiance" to Ethereum by transitioning to L2. Since proposing the migration from an EVM-compatible Layer 1 blockchain last July, Celo recently announced its transformation into an Ethereum Layer 2 solution, aiming to provide a seamless user experience that is fast, low-cost, and easy to use. Regarding this shift, Celo emphasized its alignment with Ethereum's culture, stating, "Becoming L2 not only connects Celo more closely with Ethereum's vast network but also empowers the community to innovate with greater confidence and impact."

As part of this transformation, Celo is currently running two second-layer testnets: the already launched Dango, built on the OP Stack, and Alfajores, which will upgrade to L2 on September 26 this year, with the official launch of the L2 mainnet scheduled for November.

In addition to this significant transformation, Celo has also begun to focus on stablecoin payments and the entire RWA sector. For instance, in February of this year, the Celo Foundation announced that Circle's USD stablecoin USDC had been deployed on the Celo mainnet, followed by an announcement in the next month regarding a partnership with Tether to complete the deployment of USDT. To increase user adoption, Celo also allows users to pay gas fees using USDC or USDT. This decision has received support from dozens of protocols, covering areas such as on-chain savings, lending, remittances, peer-to-peer, and cross-border payments.

Furthermore, Celo is further positioning itself in the RWA space by launching Credit Collective in partnership with others, providing 2 million cEUR to support RWA projects, integrating with the RWA protocol Centrifuge, and collaborating to launch the RWA Base Camp accelerator program.

According to official disclosures from Celo, the platform has established partnerships with over 1,000 partners in 150 countries, including the Opera MiniPay ultra-light stablecoin wallet in countries like Kenya and Ghana, which has recently surpassed 2 million users in Africa. This also boosts Celo's confidence in rapidly expanding its influence in the L2 and RWA markets.

Multiple Metrics Surge This Year, Possibly Stimulated by Stablecoins

Several rapidly growing metrics showcase the effectiveness of Celo's transformative initiatives.

According to Dune data, as of September 25, the number of transactions on the Celo network has exceeded 470 million, showing a generally increasing trend month by month, with daily transactions more than tripling since the beginning of this year to 1.2 million; the number of user addresses has grown to 8.467 million, marking an 84.1% increase this year, with new users reaching a peak of 63.1% in April.

At the same time, Artemis data shows that the number of active addresses on Celo has recently surpassed that of Tron, BNB Chain, and Polygon PoS. Further data indicates that this increase in address numbers is driven by the growth in Celo's stablecoin transaction volume.

As of September 25, Artemis data indicates that Celo's monthly stablecoin transfer volume is nearly 1.13 billion transactions, with a growth rate exceeding 28.3% over the past three months, and the stablecoin supply has reached 290 million, significantly increasing by about 6.4 times compared to the beginning of this year. Among them, Tether's official transparency page shows that the total authorized amount of Tether on the Celo chain has exceeded $470 million, surpassing Near and Cosmos, with $269 million authorized but not yet issued on the Celo chain.

Additionally, the growth of data from Celo's ecosystem wallet applications further confirms the rapid growth of the entire ecosystem. For example, the Web3 payment wallet MiniPay reached 1 million wallets within five months of its launch in 2023, and by July of this year, it had grown to 3 million, expanding into countries with high cryptocurrency adoption rates such as Kenya, Ghana, and South Africa.