Algorand - my perspective on future outlook

I have always trusted the balanced approach the r/cc community takes to various projects, and I feel this story needs to be told.

I want to give you my 2 cents about Algorand (yes, the token which has gone -95% from its ATHs) and take you on the journey that I've been the last 3 years.

Facts (positives):

1. Algorand is decentralised (you may refute that argument on a relative basis) but it has 120 relay nodes and 1600 participation nodes. One-click nodes currently rolled out to the ecosystem will increase this further.
2. Its very cheap, extremely scalable and has instant finality (3.3 secs) using pure proof of state consensus mechanism - ideal for payment systems
3. One of the most environmentally sustainable L1 protocols
4. Forkless, monolithic, gasless, smart contract network (using own architecture Algorand Virtual Machine vs. ERC20 / EVM)

Facts (negatives):

1. Adoption - Algorand dev tools was absolutely garbage before Jon Woods came into the picture. Because it uses Teal (turing complete) it has always been hard to get developers to build on Algorand. Good apps are a necessity for users to come on a chain and stay there
2. Tokenomics / price action - Was launched in 2019 via a dutch auction, had massive incentives for node runners (which was adjusted to accelerated vesting across 2021 - 22). This absolute garbage tokenomics model bled Algorand to where it is at today. To paint you a picture, during the COVID crash, Algorand's market cap was USD 90m. Today (July 2023), it is USD 900m (through FTX, Celsius, Do Kwon, SEC, Myalgowallet hack etc. etc.). In spite of this 10x market cap expansion, the token price is at all time lows.
3. Algorand Foundation - Foundation's job is to increase (i) visibility; and (ii) adoption. Things can always be run better. However, AF has taken many decisions which have left the community flummoxed. E.g. face value governance, pivoted towards spending tokens aggressively on marketing in 2022 which did not work out. They have hired very smart people and focused on the right things but leadership is questionable ("Nike" tweet anyone?)

User experience:

Personally, using Algorand has been the best experience I've had in crypto (I've used in defi, governance, real estate tokenisation and music NFTs).

Outlook on negatives:

On adoption, I think one click nodes and Algokit will help greatly in getting the ecosystem together. The unanswered question in my mind is they still need to come up with a node running incentive system which is sustainable (and no, I don't think people will run nodes for free).

On price action, I think this is a pivotal time for the Algorand unit token to rise, as all the bad blood has been taken out of the system. The current circulating supply is 7.8bn (of a max 10bn) and within the remainder 2.2bn, 1.0bn is earmarked for governance rewards, 1.0bn is for ecosystem growth (grants) and 200m discretionary at Algorand Foundation. Going forward, algo will have c. 3% inflation each year to 2030 till all 10 bn is in circulation.

On Algorand Foundation, honestly, I think they will fade away into the background once they are done with their structured selling and grants. I am very optimistic of a day when Algorand is fully community driven (having a core developer team like bitcoin but largely upgraded via Algo inc and the community). Algorand has the network effect to live and breathe and be successful. Some of the big usecases already are testament to it (hesabpay, Bank of Italy sureties, etc).

I think Algorand will be one of the best outperformers over 2024 - 25 (ex. any black swan event)

I will link one of better deep dives on Algorand by u/Maleficent_Plankton here if you'd like to read more on the project: https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoCurrency/comments/wg1tes/algorand_deep_dive/

Update: Included thoughts on Algorand foundation and their shortcomings.

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TLDR: Algorand's market cap has 10xed since COVID till 2023 in a bear market through FTX, Celcius, Terra Luna, SEC vendetta. A large part of that uplift was absorbed in the massive amount of token unlock through accelerated vesting for node runners (not ideal for original investors). What do you think may happen over the next couple of years beyond the next halving when Algorand's inflation per year is 3% vs. 150% per year historically?"