For a newly created crypto currency based on the Ethereum blockchain, how can the creator and the public in general track the current total supply of the coin, provided he enables mining new coins on his currency, and how do you track the live market capitalization?
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1 Answer
You can easily make new currencies on Ethereum by following the ERC 20 standard. If you follow this standard, other applications and people can easily interact with your token. This standard makes it very easy for people to read the total supply of the token. They simply call the totalSupply() function. Often the creator of these currencies starts out with the total supply of the currency on his own account and he can then attempt to start an economy by distributing his token or by promising to back them up with an asset that he owns.
Regarding mining: Are you sure you want mining as part of your token? Ethereum and Bitcoin gives the miners the native currency of the blockchain (ether/bitcoin) in order to incentivize them to secure the system by using their computing power. You do not need to secure your system since it is already secured as the rest of the Ethereum network.
See also: Once I have created my new Crypto Currency, how may miners mine for my currency?
answered Mar 31, 2017 at 11:34
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Thank you for the question as this helps me think out of all angles. Do you think I can issue a fixed supply right at the beginning (say 10million token) and distribute it ? What if I want the currency to expand on a world wide rate and be actively traded on different exchanges ? Won't it limit the ability of the currency to develop and expand if this fixed supply of 10 million is set right at the beginning ? Won't it be better emitting 10million token at the beginning and let miners mine for more and grow the supply ? Would love to hear your thoughts on these points. Commented Mar 31, 2017 at 11:53
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Take your mind off mining for a second. So the currency that you create on top of Ethereum is simply just a smart contract that you place on the Ethereum Blockchain. This smart contract is some code that you can write. If you want the ability to create more tokens late, you can add that option in the smart contract. But you will need to also consider the economics of that: Will other people trust (and thus use) your currency if you can create new tokens at a whim? Will you back up your currency with some asset? Why should people start using your currency? Commented Mar 31, 2017 at 12:01
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If you want to, you can add something in the code such that the total supply grows x % per year. These newly created tokens can be given to you, the contract owner, or they can be distributed to other people or to all people holding a balance in your currency. Only your fantasy limits kind of smart contracts (and thus tokens) that you can design. But coding token contracts is not merely a question of computer science. You also need to have some understanding of economic incentives in order to be successful. Commented Mar 31, 2017 at 12:06
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A token contract is a smart contract that represents a currency (or token if you will). The token is represented as a key/value pair in a data structure called a "mapping". The keys are Ethereum addresses, and the value is the balance of that address. Commented Mar 31, 2017 at 12:09
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I got your point here. My vision is more industry wise for this currency. I would like to integrate it at business levels, not right at the beginning since I have to build trust into the currency first. Once the acceptance of the currency grows (of course I will have to go through many negotiations with different parties) I will then start collaborating with strategic partners to reach the ultimate goal of global acceptance. Commented Mar 31, 2017 at 12:10