What Stellar is
Stellar (XLM) is a Layer-1 blockchain network, currently ranked 17th by market capitalization among the assets we track. Stellar is its own settlement layer. Smart contracts run on top of it, fees are paid in XLM, and the security model rests on validators bonding the token rather than burning energy to mine it.
Stellar (XLM) is a decentralized blockchain platform designed to facilitate cross-border transactions and provide financial services to the unbanked. It uses its native cryptocurrency, Lumens (XLM), to enable fast and low-cost transfers.
How consensus and the token economy connect
Staking ties the token's value to network security: more XLM bonded means a costlier attack, and stakers are paid for taking that role. Unstaking queues and slashing parameters shape how liquid that capital really is.
Under the hood, XLM secures its ledger with Stellar Consensus Protocol, built on the Stellar Consensus Protocol algorithm.
Background & fundamentals
Stellar first went live in 2013, giving it roughly 13 years of on-chain price history to draw on. Stellar operates under a centralized structure, which concentrates protocol decisions in an identifiable issuer or foundation. A documented core team of 26 contributors is listed publicly, a depth of disclosed staffing many long-tail tokens lack.
Its codebase is open-source, meaning the implementation can be audited rather than taken on trust. The project publishes a whitepaper documenting its original design, which is worth reading before sizing any position in XLM. CoinPaprika classifies the project's development status as "Working product".
In sector terms it is most often filed under Wallet, Finance & Banking, and Cryptocurrency.
Where Stellar sits in the market
At $0.1928, Stellar carries a market capitalization of $6.25B. Around $164.25M changes hands across exchanges in a typical 24-hour window. That is a turnover of about 2.63% of the float — a healthy level of activity for an asset this size.
Stellar carries no fixed maximum supply; issuance follows a programmatic schedule rather than a hard cap. XLM remains -79% beneath its all-time high of $0.9381, the kind of gap that historically takes a full cycle or a fresh catalyst to close. Measured from its all-time low of $0.0704, XLM is up +174%.
What the price history shows
The tape currently reads 24-hour -2.87%, 7-day -12.17%, 30-day +51.61%, 1-year -11.99%. Within its 365-day range, XLM sits around the middle (the 28th percentile of recent daily closes).
Volatility profile
Recent action puts Stellar in the Moderate-volatility band — it shows the kind of price movement common in mid-cap crypto assets — meaningful but not unusual. Over the last 30 days the move totals +51.61%, a useful input for stop placement and position sizing.
How to evaluate Stellar
A grounded read on XLM comes down to three questions:
- Real usage — active addresses, fees paid, and total value locked — does on-chain demand justify the valuation?
- Staking economics — the share of XLM staked, the yield, and unlock/queue dynamics that govern liquid supply.
- Ecosystem depth — how many applications and how much liquidity have chosen Stellar over competing Layer-1s.
This page pulls live market data, on-chain stats where available, exchange-by-exchange volume, and our forecast model into one view so you can work through those questions in a single place. None of it is investment advice — it is a structured starting point for your own research.
