[ad_1]
Stellar (XLM) is more than just a solution for cross-border peer-to-peer payments. When Stellar Lumens (XLM) entered the market, cryptocurrency enthusiasts started seeing him as a rival Ripple (XRP) because that was how he was born. Jed McCaleb, the founder of Stellar (XLM) was originally a developer of Ripple (XRP) that, after some fundamental differences with the other developers of Ripple (XRP), found Stellar (XLM). The reason why Stellar (XLM) has become a direct Ripple competitor (XRP) is due to its basic philosophy of focusing on end users rather than intermediaries. Ripple (XRP) wants to empower the middle men while Stellar (XLM) wants to cut the middle men. This is what made Stellar (XLM) more acceptable in the cryptic community in its early days.
However, recently we have seen investors interested in distributed accounting technologies flow towards XRP / USD more than XLM / USD. One of the main reasons for this important change is that Ripple (XRP) is selling a dream but Stellar (XLM) is not. The founder of Stellar (XLM), Jed McCaleb recently admitted in an interview that he was left behind in marketing. He also said that he intends to remedy these shortfalls in 2019. Until recently, Stellar (XLM) has promoted itself as a competitor in the cross-border payments sector, but recently they have also focused on other uses of their blockchain. The Stellar (XLM) team seems convinced that Stellar (XLM) will become the preferred ICO platform for years to come. This is because Stellar (XLM) is faster, cheaper, safer and more scalable.
Chart for XLM / BTC (1W)
The strategic partnership between Stellar (XLM) and IBM is unlike any other major partnership we have seen in this space. Both are seriously committed to working towards common goals to push for greater adoption and innovation on the blockchain. IBM believes it can use stellar blockchain to launch a series of applications that take advantage of the true potential of blockchain technology. One of these joint ventures between Stellar and IBM is IBM Blockchain World Wire. Ripple (XRP) launched Swell in direct competition with Swift, but Stellar (XLM) and IBM seem to become familiar with Swift. Ripple (XRP) has a lot of partnerships compared to Stellar (XLM), but this partnership between Stellar (XLM) and IBM rivals everyone. Instead of signing left and right partnerships, Stellar (XLM) has found a strategic ally and has worked closely with it towards common goals.
On the technical front, we have Stellar Lumens (XLM) ready for a massive rally against both the US dollar (USD) and Bitcoin (BTC). Stellar (XLM) is currently trading around $ 0.127 and is undervalued compared to Ripple (XRP) at its current valuation. Stellar (XLM) is not only a good cover against Ripple (XRP), it is also a good cover against Ethereum (ETH) given its potential to serve as a stable platform. Many promising projects have lined up to launch their ICOs on Stellar (XLM) in the first quarter of 2019. Over time, this trend is expected to increase and it is very likely that Stellar (XLM) may end up replacing Ethereum (ETH) as the preferred ICO platform.
