Deep Speculation – Ultranote (XUN) a replacement for Monero

Jamie Dimon said it best, governments are going to crush Bitcoin. He said a few other interesting things about governments liking to know where money is going, who has it and how it is spent. They enjoy controlling currency and the people who use it. Much like the CEO of Evil Corp on USA’s Mr Robot. An excellent show if you haven’t seen it.

If that is true then governments have their eyes on Monero (XMR) because it violates what Mr. Dimon is referring to as control and tracking. Monero is up 14% today and I like to think it is because I spilled the beans on the coming MultiSig wallet to the world before the official release which still has not been made. With the price run-up Monero now has a market cap that would make it a target of governments looking to crack down on untraceable currency.

Enter Ultranote (XUN) which is a carbon copy of the blockchain technology behind Monero including all of the privacy feature of confidential transactions, ring transactions, anonymous wallets, etc. It also adds a few interesting features like secure messaging and an interest paying function to store coins much like a certificate of deposit although without the FDIC insurance.

The White Paper

“The Ultranote Blockchain forms the ecosystem of the digital asset, which has been structured to deliver a set of financial and communication solutions that offer enhanced security, greater utility (messenger app), increased scalability, wider acceptance, improved efficiency, unquestionable confidentiality and asset transfer. “

There are 100s of new altcoins all trying to distinguish themselves from others through thier core mission or some sort of new blockchain technology that much of it gets lost in the noise. Ultranode is not pretending with a new technology but makes emphasis on the application of a successful blockchain already on a successful coin in Monero (XMR). Ultranote is not redefining blockchain but rather, “. . . it is our messaging facility match with our Untraceability and anonymity which set Ultranote apart from the competition”. 

The dev team focused the white paper more like a mission statement or sales pitch rather than focused on technology behind the new coin. It makes mention of the cryptonote technology and even discloses that it is a carbon copy of the blockchain used to create Monero (XMR), “Ultranote is based on the Cryptonote Blockchain technology on which is also based Monero as well as Bytecoin our main competitors.” Then refer readers to https://cryptonote.org/inside/ to read about it rather than re-telling the tech story. 

Competition

Both Bytecoin (BCN) and Monero (XMR) use the same technology without the added messaging and banking services offered by Ultranote. BCN has a current market cap of $240 million while XMR is approaching $2.4 billion after a nice run this week to $155 per coin. The missing piece is coming to Monero in the form of Multisig wallets but is not mentioned in Ultranote’s white paper.

Monero and Bytecoin were part of the first wave of non-Bitcoin clones. Litecoin is an example of a Bitcoin clone that has carved out a niche by differentiating itself from Bitcoin through faster transactions and a willingness to implement newer technology to better the ecosystem. Charlie Lee who founded Bitcoin has made no shame of trying to be part of the Bitcoin ecosystem and hoping for an interchangeable system of coins.

Lightning cross-chain atomic swaps (or ⚡️⛓️💱 in emoji) is the next step in my vision on how crypto-currency scale can scale to 7B people. I’m really excited to see the @lightning team make progress on it! 🚀

And we are just in time for the over 9000 meme. 🤣 pic.twitter.com/6rRPcotSXm

— Charlie Lee [LTC] (@SatoshiLite) November 16, 2017

Mining

For now the only way to get Ultranote (XUN) is via mining or purchasing directly from a miner. The node went live November 10th and has been growing. Currently there are 80-100 miners connected at an given time. Like we said in the title, this is a deeply speculative play. There is no pre-mine here but there is an interesting separation of 18 billion coins to help with liquidity and market stability. The coins are market for interest payments and related programs to launch such as a bounty program.

Conclusion

How does Jamie Dimon have a part in this. The market cap on Monero is growing fast and is becoming large enough to target for regulation or outright banning. If it were to become banned the market demand would move to another coin like Bytecoin or Ultranote. Until that happens Ultranote has time to establish itself, set up the messaging and banking services and demonstrate the usefulness to users to build some demand.

Perhaps this is the market for Ultranote. It could be the bank and messaging service for Monero holders and traders. As the blockchains are a copy there should be a ‘lightning network’ based technology that will allow swaps between the block chains. Monero holders could move coins over to earn interest or use the messaging service to discuss trades. For now the Ultranote dev team is doing the right things in trying to differentiate from Monero and Bytecoin to carve out a niche while they get established.

In an interesting twist JP Morgan Chase was found to be money laundering only 1 month after deriding Bitcoin and the buyers. He made sure to mention that Bitcoin was being used for nefarious reasons and yet a the same time was found to be conducting the same activity. Maybe if they conducted the business on Ultranote (XUN) they would not have been caught.

For more reading check out the bitcointalk thread, reddit, Ultranote website, the white paper and the official mining pool. We have reached out to the Dev team with some questions and will explore more about UltraNote (XUN) in the coming months as they grow.