HBAR Surges as FedNow Integrates Dropp, a Micro-Payment Network Built on Hedera

The Federal Reserve's instant payment system, FedNow, has recently integrated Dropp, a micro-payment platform operating on the Hedera network.

According to the announcement, Dropp serves as an alternative payment solution, facilitating transactions of small values at affordable fees. Currently, Dropp supports payments in HBAR, USD, and USDC.

This news swiftly propelled HBAR's price up by more than 20% in a single day and nearly 50% since mid-June, pushing its market capitalization to reach $2.1 billion. As of the time of writing, HBAR continues to show strong momentum and is poised for further gains.

Chart showing the 4-hour price movement of HBAR/USDT on Binance as of 10:00 AM, August 15, 2023.

Hedera Hashgraph describes itself as a unique blockchain due to its Hashgraph consensus mechanism, boasting over 10,000 transactions per second and extremely low latency.

According to Messari's report, daily active accounts on Hedera have increased by 288% since the beginning of the year, with user numbers surging from 3,500 to 13,500 in the second quarter alone. The platform also saw a 340% rise in new account creations compared to the same period. The primary driver behind Q2 activity was in-game NFTs, notably centered around Karateka, a Web3 game developed by GameOn leveraging the IP of Karate Combat. In contrast, last year's activities primarily revolved around DeFi protocols, as per Messari's comparative analysis.

Hedera has made significant updates in recent months. FreshSupplyCo (FSCO), a crypto asset platform in agricultural supply chains, integrated Hedera for payments. This API was previously used on the Mastercard Provenance blockchain before its shutdown. In February 2023, tech giant Dell also confirmed its node deployment on Hedera after joining the project's governing council.

Additionally, Shinhan Bank recently completed a pilot of a stablecoin transfer network built on Hedera's open-source code.

On July 20th, the Federal Reserve officially launched FedNow, an instant payment service, marking a significant advancement in the U.S. money transfer process, enabling near-instant transactions nationwide. This launch comes as the U.S. economy still heavily relies on cash and checks, with bank transfers typically taking several days.

Despite the Federal Reserve's denial of FedNow's involvement in digital assets, concerns remain among some that such systems could potentially undermine existing cryptocurrencies, as both aim to facilitate instant, 24/7 money transfers.