What Exactly is Loopring (LRC)?

Earlier today, I checked my profile earnings to make a crypto withdrawal here on Publish0X, and noticed that a new tipping token known as "Loopring (LRC)" was added. Though I've only heard mentions of this token, I decided to do some investigative work to learn a little more about this token.

In short, Loopring is an ERC-20 token built upon the Ethereum blockchain, and is primarily used to pay miners in Loopring's decentralized exchange protocol. Though Loopring itself is not an exchange, it allows other people to build decentralized exchanges that runs on the protocol, aiming to create an ecosystem for traders to exchange crypto in a decentralized fashion. In other words, Loopring facilitates decentralized crypto exchange through ring-sharing and order matching through an automated execution system. 

Loopring is a blockchain agnostic, meaning that this particular protocol may be deployed on any blockchain possessing smart contract capabilities. All decentralized exchanges built on Loopring works on the same principles, and work together to provide liquidity. To ensure that decentralized exchange owners are not abusing or mistreating users, all owners must stake LRC tokens. Those who treat users poorly will lose a proportion of staked tokens. With the launch of Loopring 3.0, LRC is also utilized as gas to fuel smart contract execution so that a 10% cut from each trading fee is taken and this amount is burned by a smart contract to decrease supply. 

Meanwhile, "Ring-Miners" are tasked with matching orders for traders on decentralized exchanges. After a Ring-Miner successfully completes a trade, they are rewarded with some LRC.

Alright, that's interesting... But what's it worth and how many tokens are out there?

As of April 14th, 2020, at 11:42am local Toronto time, a single Loopring LRC is worth about 0.027335 US dollars, and there are about 1,024,323,329 LRC in circulation, down from the total circulating 1,374,813,985 LRC (Please note that this number will constantly change as the Loopring 3.0 protocol uses and destroys LRC to fuel smart contract execution). 

Hmm... Maybe I'll give Loopring a try? But first, how secure is this protocol?

Unlike many centralized exchanges, Loopring users do not give up their private keys so that their tokens will not be easily stolen. Because it is a completely decentralized protocol with every decentralized exchange built on this protocol, Loopring is not subjected to external attacks such as hackers. Loopring 3.0 also introduced "Zero-Knowledge Proofs" (zkSNARKs) to add additional privacy to users and also increase scalability of the project.

What's their website so I can check our Loopring for myself?

Oh, that's easy. Just go to Loopring.org . Here, you can check out what Loopring is all about in more depth, meet their team, and even learn a little about Staking! I didn't really go into staking in this article for the sake of keeping the article short and informative to the general community. 

Cool. If I want to buy some LRC, where can I go?

1. Loopring.io         Here, you can buy LRC with ETH, USDt, and DAI

2. Binance               Like many other coins and tokens, users can buy LRC with BTC and ETH

3. Bittrex                 Bittrex allows users to buy LRC using BTC

Disclaimer: I am in no way affiliated with Loopring. I wrote this article to provide a little insight into the coin, especially to those who have never heard of the project until now.

Please note that I'm not a financial advisor.

Remember, investments in cryptocurrencies are like any other investment: Invest only what you can afford to lose. No investment is a guarantee.