Flow (FLOW) Key Insights

Flow (FLOW) is a Layer-1 network that was founded in 2018 by Dapper Labs and its co-founders, Roham Gharegozlu, Dieter Shirley, and Mikhael Naayem.

Key Insights

Primer

Flow (FLOW) is a Layer-1 network that was founded in 2018 by Dapper Labs and its co-founders, Roham Gharegozlu, Dieter Shirley, and Mikhael Naayem. Flow launched in May 2020 and was designed for "a new generation of games, apps, and the digital assets that power them." Flow was one of the first networks to implement account abstractions and user experience enhancements that made it easier for developers to onboard consumers. Today, Flow's top applications include those based on world-class brands, such as NBA Top Shot and NFL All Day.

On Flow, developers use "Cadence," Flow's novel programming language. Flow's most recent development came via a network upgrade called "Crescendo." In September 2024, Flow introduced Cadence 1.0 with the Crescendo upgrade, bringing EVM equivalence to Flow via a separate Flow EVM environment. Now, developers can use Solidity to build on Flow EVM with block times of 800 milliseconds. Furthermore, developers can tap into existing tools and liquidity across the EVM, while users experience sub-cent transaction fees.

Flow has played a significant role in onboarding consumers into crypto by pioneering the ERC-721 token standard via CryptoKitties in 2017 and putting NFT collectibles into the mainstream via NBA Top Shot in 2021. Today, Flow continues to innovate and be a foundational part of the industry's effort to bring new users into the space. For a full primer on Flow, refer to our Initiation of Coverage.

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Key Metrics

Financial Analysis

FLOW is the native token of Flow that is used (i) as the primary medium of exchange on Flow and (ii) for staking to facilitate various staking-related functions. FLOW’s price increased 19.5% to $0.70 in Q4 2024, with the highest point in the quarter being $1.22 on Dec. 4, 2024. FLOW’s market cap increased a similar 21% QoQ to $1.08 billion, with the slight discrepancy being due to a 1.2% increase in circulating supply up to 1.55 billion. Despite the QoQ increase in price, FLOW’s circulating market cap rank fell from 77th to 89th.

Project-related catalysts that may have impacted investor behavior and FLOW’s Q4’24 price movements include the Crescendo upgrade, which introduced EVM equivalence and drove an increase in DeFi activity. Additionally, the Flow Community Rewards pre-season offered up to a 15% boost on FLOW tokens that were locked for the pre-season’s one-month duration. Upon the pre-season’s conclusion on Sept. 30, 2024, $17.4 million worth of FLOW tokens, or 30 million FLOW, had been locked.

FLOW is used to settle network transaction fees on Flow. The total transaction fee for any transaction on Flow comprises a variable “execution fee” plus a fixed “inclusion fee,” which is then multiplied by a “surge factor.” Network transaction fees are negligible on Flow, with quarterly fees (USD) reaching only $1,317 in Q4’24. Still, that was an increase of 138.2% QoQ as quarterly fees (FLOW) reached 1,689.

Network Analysis

Flow’s average daily active addresses (DAAs) increased 47.8% QoQ to 27,440, while average daily transactions (txs) increased 11.9% QoQ to 251,100. The ratio of transactions to active addresses (txs/DAAs) decreased 24.3% QoQ to 9.2, suggesting activity is being distributed more evenly across users; conversely, an increasing ratio suggests a rise in “power users.”

These trends could have been driven by two major factors. First, the Crescendo upgrade introduced EVM equivalence and drove an increase in activity. Second, the seasonal nature of Flow’s top applications, NBA Top Shot, and NFL All Day. Both applications experience increases in activity during their regular seasons that overlap in Q4 of every year. These factors likely contributed to the increase in DAAs and transactions on Flow.

FLOW’s initial token supply was 1.25 billion upon Flow’s “Mainnet v1” launch in October 2020. However, the total token supply experiences inflation once per epoch (approximately once a week) due to inflationary staking rewards distributed to Flow’s validator nodes and delegators. Inflation over an annual period is equivalent to 5% of FLOW’s total token supply.

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