Telegram founder Pavel Durov said the messaging app will embed a native, non-custodial Gram wallet in every version of Telegram this summer, putting a self-custody crypto wallet in front of the platform's more than one billion users.
In a post on July 21, Durov said he is "implementing a native non-custodial Gram wallet in every Telegram app," describing the plan as "the largest deployment of a non-custodial crypto wallet in history." He said the wallet will support instant, fee-free transfers of Gram, the token that until last month was known as Toncoin.
A non-custodial wallet means users hold their own private keys and control their assets directly, rather than relying on a third party to store funds. Telegram has not published a firm launch date, the full list of supported assets, or other technical specifications.
Gram climbed to an intraday high of $1.66 before paring the move to about $1.52, a 5.5% increase over 24 hours, according to CoinGecko.
On-chain, total value locked in TON-based DeFi protocols stood at about $66 million, and the network recorded roughly 117,600 active addresses and 3.85 million transactions over the prior 24 hours, according to DeFiLlama. Stablecoins on TON had a market capitalization of about $790 million, with Tether's USDT accounting for roughly 85% of that supply.
