Kraken's Layer-2 network, Ink, has recorded a strong growth in on-chain activity with transaction volume crossing the 550,000 threshold for the first time since its launch. This surge follows the Ink Foundation's announcement about the upcoming native Token issuance.
Data from dune analytics shows that the daily transaction volume on the network has surged dramatically in the past week, first reaching 557,557 transactions on June 18, right after the INK Token announcement.
Since then, over 550,000 transactions are processed daily on average, with a peak of 563,677 transactions on June 20. With this sustained high activity, the 30-day moving average has exceeded 490,000 transactions.
Ink – A Breakthrough Journey After a Quiet Period
Launched in December 2024, Ink is built on the Optimism stack. Initially, the network did not generate much buzz while competing with other popular Ethereum Layer-2 networks like Base from Coinbase or Arbitrum, which dominate most of the transaction market share.
However, the latest figures from dune show an increase in active contracts on the network. On June 20, daily active contracts peaked at 5,693, with 1,249 new contracts deployed.
Nevertheless, some other indicators like daily active addresses are currently around 70,000, down from the previous peak of over 100,000. The Total Value Locked (TVL) on the network is also struggling, with bridge TVL at approximately 94 million USD, while DeFi TVL has dropped below 8 million USD.
INK Token Airdrop – A Network Activation Lever
The surge in activity on the Ink Layer-2 network primarily stems from expectations of the upcoming INK Token airdrop. Although the official release date has not been announced, the information has been enough to attract a large number of new users to the network.
The first applications of the INK Token are still being developed. According to the Ink Foundation, the Token will be introduced through a native liquidation protocol integrated with Aave. The first users of this protocol are likely to receive an INK airdrop.
While specific implementation details are not yet clear, the project emphasizes that this protocol plays a crucial role in building the DeFi ecosystem on Ink – an ambitious goal given the current low level of DeFi activity and project volume on the network.
Ink's preparation to launch a Token is a significant difference compared to Base – a Layer-2 developed by Coinbase using the Optimism infrastructure, which currently has no Token issuance plans. However, Ink also clarifies that the INK Token does not have governance functions, aiming to differentiate itself from traditional tokens.
Ethereum Reaches Weekly Active Address ATH
In this context, the Ethereum network has just reached a new record in the number of active addresses, with over 20 million addresses interacting in the past week. Layer-2 networks are overwhelmingly dominant, with 17.699 million addresses (equivalent to 87.55%) belonging to individual Layer-2 networks.
According to growthepie on the X platform, the data shows that many Layer-2 networks account for 2.05% of addresses, while multi-layer addresses account for 1.2%. Ethereum's mainnet recorded only 1.858 million addresses in the week, representing 9.19% of total interactive addresses.
The dominance of Layer-2 networks is most evident in Base – Coinbase's Layer-2 network, which recently reached a record high of 3.59 million daily active addresses. The transaction volume on Base currently exceeds 8.74 million, significantly higher than the mainnet ETH's 1.23 million transactions.
In the market, ETH increased by 3.66% in the past 24 hours, beginning to recover after dropping below $2,200 for the first time since May. The decline was due to concerns about potential war tensions between the US and Iran, causing Bitcoin to fall below the $100,000 threshold after months of stability.
Currently, ETH is trading around $2,250, alongside a recovery of the entire cryptocurrency market as expectations are that the conflict will not escalate. However, the Fear & Greed Index on CoinMarketCap has dropped to 37, indicating that market sentiment remains influenced by pessimism.
