As we mentioned, the circulating supply of LEO tokens is designed to diminish over time. Originally, the total supply was set at 1 billion. LEO was sold for $1 apiece on a 1:1 basis with the Tether stablecoin, meaning that a total of $1 billion was raised over a 10-day period. There were 660 million ERC-20 tokens at launch, as well as 340 million EOS-based tokens — and Bitfinex allows conversions between the two chains to be made with ease. At the time, the company described the dual protocol launch as “unique” — and vowed that it would empower the Bitfinex community.

A token burn mechanism means iFinex is committed to buying back UNUS SED LEO from the market on a monthly basis. The amount that’s purchased and burned is equal to at least 27% of the revenues generated by iFinex — and tokens are also purchased at the market rate. In a news release at the time, the company said: “The burn mechanism will continue until 100% of tokens have been redeemed.” Whereas some cryptocurrencies just launch on a single blockchain, LEO tokens were issued on two blockchains. While 64% of the original supply was on Ethereum, the remaining 36% could be found on EOS.