Chainlink’s Link token appears to be outperforming bitcoin by a great deal as the oracle network’s various use cases garners investor attention.
Link went up by 31% in the first quarter, trading near $3.20, representing a 42% month-to-date (MTD) increase. The cryptocurrency was registering a bigger MTD price gain of 62% over the weekend, when it was trading at a one-month high of $3.66.
Bitcoin, the top cryptocurrency, has only managed 5% gains so far this month, having shed 10% of its value in the first quarter.
Research analysts says that Link has a strong fan base that constantly promotes or ‘shills’ the project to potential buyers creating hype as well as a positive reinforcement cycle, further driving up the price.
Chainlink also recently announced its association with the project the Baseline Protocol and partnerships in the decentralized finance (DeFi) space, which has generated hype.
Chainlink is a system of oracles built on top of the Ethereum blockchain. An oracle is a third-party information source that supplies data to blockchains. If someone buys insurance against an earthquake or hurricane, for example, an oracle would tell the smart contract when such a disaster occurs so it can pay the policyholder. The link token, in turn, is used to pay Chainlink node operators for providing these services.
The Baseline Protocol, formed by EY and Consensys in collaboration with Microsoft in March, is an open source initiative that combines advances in blockchain, cryptography and messaging with the goal of delivering secure and private business processes at low cost through the public Ethereum mainnet.
