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Protocol Design - Distribution and Units

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Part of work in progress Living Whitepaper

This page is part of the Living Whitepaper revisions currently underway to replace the original static whitepaper. These efforts include the Protocol Design and Node Implementation sections of the docs, which will cover and expand on details and topics covered in the original whitepaper.

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Divisibility

There are three important aspects of divisibility of the supply which are satisfied by the final distributed amount:

  • The supply needs to be able to be divided up amongst a large number of users with users possibly wanting several accounts.
  • Each account needs to be able to represent an adequate dynamic range of value.
  • The supply should be able to deal with deflation over time as accounts are abandoned.

Distribution

The distribution of Nano (formerly RaiBlocks) was performed through solving manual captchas starting in late 2015 and ending in October 2017. Distribution stopped after ~39% of the Genesis amount was distributed and the rest of the supply was burnt.1

Distribution Accounts

  • Genesis: nano_3t6k35gi95xu6tergt6p69ck76ogmitsa8mnijtpxm9fkcm736xtoncuohr3
  • Landing: nano_13ezf4od79h1tgj9aiu4djzcmmguendtjfuhwfukhuucboua8cpoihmh8byo
  • Faucet: nano_35jjmmmh81kydepzeuf9oec8hzkay7msr6yxagzxpcht7thwa5bus5tomgz9
  • Burn: nano_1111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111hifc8npp

During distribution the Genesis seed was kept in cold storage and funds were moved to the Landing account once per week to minimize the number of live, undistributed blocks. These were subsequently moved into the Faucet account for distribution until the faucet was closed and remaining funds sent to the Burn account.

Total Supply

With 2^{128} - 1 raw (i.e. FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF HEX raw) in the original Genesis account, upon closing of the faucet and burning of the remaining funds, the total supply which is 100% in circulation ended at ~133,248,297 nano (or more precisely 133248297920938463463374607431768211455 raw). Since then, additional funds have been sent to the known burn address slightly lowering the amount in circulation as a result. This amount can be found using the available_supply RPC.

Unit Dividers

A 128 bit integer is used to represent account balances. The reference wallet uses nano as a divider.

Name Integer Power Previous
nano (NANO/Nano) 1000000000000000000000000000000 10^{30} Mnano
raw 1 10^{0} raw

NOTE: 1 raw is the smallest possible division and is used in QR codes as amount, while nano is the current standard division used for human readable elements in most wallets, on exchanges, etc.

A set of SI prefixes2 from the base nano has been previously used to make the numbers more accessible and avoid confusion in certain scenarios, but this approach is not common (e.g., micronano or μnano for 10^{24}).

  1. https://medium.com/nanocurrency/the-nano-faucet-c99e18ae1202 ↩

  2. The SI prefixes are metric prefixes that were standardized for use in the International System of Units (SI) by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM). https://www.bipm.org/en/measurement-units/si-prefixes ↩