1.5 Billion in Crypto Tokens Set for August Release: XRP, Avalanche, and Wormhole Lead

In Brief:

Nearly $1.5 billion in tokens from major crypto projects, including XRP, Avalanche, and Wormhole, are set to be unlocked in August.

Ripple will release 1 billion XRP tokens worth $609 million on August 1, while other significant unlocks include Sui, dYdX, and ZetaChain.

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$1.5 Billion in Crypto Tokens Set for August Release: XRP, Avalanche, and Wormhole Lead

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Nearly $1.5 billion in tokens from major crypto projects are set to be unlocked in August, with 1 billion XRP tokens — worth $609 million at current prices — making up a massive part of the month’s total on August 1.

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Ripple, the firm behind the XRP Ledger and the native token XRP, has unlocked up to 1 billion tokens on the first day of every month since 2017. It uses several main escrow wallets, including Ripple (24) and Ripple (25), to evenly split the unlocks each month.

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Ripple's Strategy: Re-lock or Release?

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However, Ripple may look to re-lock much of the newly-released XRP. In June, Ripple relocked 800 million XRP from its June 1 unlock, but it still made moves to sell around 300 million XRP — worth $182 million at the time — according to data from TradingView.

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While up to 1 billion XRP tokens are unlocked at the start of each month, the actual amount of XRP released into circulation is "likely much less than this" due to a re-escrow process, wrote XRP ledger in a 2017 blog post.

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Other Major Token Unlocks in August

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Other major unlocks in August include those from layer-1 network Avalanche and cross-chain bridging platform Wormhole, releasing a combined $449 million worth of tokens, per Token Unlocks data.

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Wormhole (W) will unlock 33.3% of its circulating supply — 600 million W tokens with a current market value of $180.5 million — on August 3. This follows its long-awaited airdrop launch on April 4.

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On August 20, Avalanche will unlock 2.4% of the circulating supply of AVAX tokens, amounting to 9.4 million AVAX with a current market value of $268 million.

Additional Token Unlocks on August 1

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Other than XRP, three other projects, including layer-1 network Sui, decentralized exchange dYdX, and “universal” blockchain ZetaChain, will also unlock significant portions of their supply on the first day of August.

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Sui will unlock 2.56% of its circulating supply, releasing 64 million tokens with a current value of $50 million on August 1.

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dYdX will unlock 8.33 million tokens worth nearly $11 million the same day — amounting to 3.65% of its circulating supply. Notably, the tokens will unlock for three groups: investors, founders and staff, and future employees.

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Meanwhile, the new layer-1 network ZetaChain (ZETA) will unlock nearly 18.9% of its circulating supply on August 1. At current prices, 53.9 million tokens amount to a market value of around $34.5 million. It follows its launch in February this year.

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Other August Unlocks

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Crypto gaming network ImmutableX will unlock 2.11% of the circulating supply of IMX on August 9, amounting to 32.5 million tokens which command a current market value of $49 million.

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Aptos, Sui’s rival layer-1 network, will unlock $80 million worth of its native token APT on August 12, while Web3 gaming platform The Sandbox will unlock $69 million worth of SAND on August 14.

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Two Ethereum layer-2 networks, Starknet and Arbitrum, are set to unleash tokens as well.

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On August 15, Starknet will unlock 64 million tokens, amounting to 4.4% of the token’s circulating supply. The token has a current market value of $35 million.

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On August 16, Arbitrum (ARB) will unlock 92.6 million tokens amounting to 2.8% of its circulating supply. The market value of the yet-to-be-unlocked tokens stands at $67 million.