Fantom is a smart contract platform built for high performance, scalability, and strong security, using a directed acyclic graph (DAG) architecture. It launched in 2018, and the network was created to address some of the shortcomings seen in earlier blockchain systems.

Fantom supporters say it tackles the blockchain Scalability Trilemma, which holds that only two of these three properties can be achieved at once: Decentralization, Security, and Scalability. The team’s view is that Fantom can scale heavily without giving up security or decentralization, aiming for more than 300,000 transactions per second.

What are FTM key features and how does it work?

The Fantom network is designed with a modular approach, giving it a high level of flexibility. At the heart of this modularity is Lachesis, a modular consensus blockchain layer that Fantom uses as its core component. This consensus layer is decoupled and adaptable, allowing it to be integrated with any distributed ledger

Lachesis uses an aBFT (asynchronous Byzantine Fault Tolerance) consensus method. In many respects, ABFT is regarded as among the strongest consensus standards. It can scale across many nodes placed around the world in a permissionless, open setting, helping sustain a high degree of decentralization.

Lachesis remains efficient because it is asynchronous and leaderless, while also delivering finality and supporting Byzantine Fault Tolerance. Put simply, this allows operations to happen at different times, prevents any single participant from having greater authority than others, and confirms transactions in roughly 1-2 seconds. The Byzantine Fault-Tolerant model can handle up to a third of faulty nodes, including those behaving maliciously. Validators must stake a minimum of 1,000,000 FTM. 

On top of that, Lachesis is built to connect easily with applications written in any programming language. As a result, developers can move existing Ethereum-based dApps to the Fantom Opera mainnet quickly, gaining from better performance and reduced costs.

The Fantom Opera Mainnet is a secure, high-speed setting where developers can build decentralized applications. It is fully permissionless and open-source, and it runs on Fantom’s aBFT consensus protocol. It is compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) and supports smart contracts through Solidity. Because of this, many Ethereum-based dApps operate on Fantom, including Curve’s liquidity pool and yearn.finance, which provides lending and trading services.

Networks and applications deployed on Fantom stay independent from one another. This helps ensure performance remains strong and that network congestion does not become a problem.

What can Fantom be used for? 

Given the mainnet’s design, Fantom has a wide range of possible use cases. The team imagines the platform being applied across multiple sectors, such as public utilities, smart home solutions, healthcare, education, traffic management, resource management, and environmental sustainability initiatives.

In the DeFi space, Fantom currently supports the following:

Finally, the Fantom Foundation has agreements with several countries and their governments regarding the use of Fantom. These include Pakistan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, and India.

Where can you buy FTM?

You can buy it on a number of major cryptocurrency centralized and decentralized exchanges, as shown here.