Stellar Development Foundation Q2 2023 in Review

Concluding the first half of 2023, and the Stellar Development Foundation made significant strides on its roadmap to further its strategy: utility is the growth exponent. To that end, SDF delivered on the three building blocks: make innovation easy and scalable, win over builders, and focus on utility to build trust.

Our Q2 report outlines what SDF has accomplished, measured against the three building blocks. Highlights include:

• Soroban development continues to be a top priority, and each quarter brings SDF closer to mainnet launch. Q2 saw two key preview releases: Preview release 9 added Soroban fee support, metering & limits, validator-configurable Soroban settings, and first class support to updating contracts. Preview release 10 introduced state expiration. The Stellar network is the first to implement state expiration of this design to solve the issue of state bloat, an industry-wide issue long hindering the scaling of blockchain’s benefits. Watch below for a handy explainer!

• Hubble focused on self-service and data governance in Q2, with some exciting new additions which you can read all about here. A limited Soroban futurenet preview is now available with testnet and mainnet support scheduled with the protocol releases. Join the #data-analytics Discord community to learn more about analytics on Stellar.
• The Stellar Anchor Platform announced support for Deposit & Withdrawal services on Stellar (SEP-24), enabling companies to offer their on and off-ramp services on Stellar and connect to wallets on the network. This makes it easier for projects to build on Stellar while decreasing development time and costs.
• As part of the Soroban Adoption Fund, the Soroban Adoption Fund Programs ramped up activity significantly. Highlights include: 1) over 14,000 RPCiege NFT badges were claimed by over 200 unique accounts, and 2) the Stellar Community Fund received 184 submissions across 3 rounds, awarding over $3.2M in Q2.
• Franklin Templeton announced the Franklin OnChain U.S. Government Money Fund (FOBXX) surpassed $270M in assets as of late March. The Fund’s transfer agent maintains the official record of share ownership via a proprietary blockchain-integrated system currently using the Stellar network, and is the first U.S.-registered fund to use a public blockchain to process transactions and record share ownership.
• MoneyGram Access celebrated its 1-year anniversary on the Stellar network, extending its massive reach to 180+ countries and over 300,000 locations.
• Coinbase now supports USDC on Stellar. With this launch, Coinbase adds another significant ramp for USDC on Stellar, enabling millions of institutional and retail customers to access a truly global digital dollar.
• SDF activated at Consensus as a 5 Block Sponsor, meaning that the entire floor was filled with messaging on why Stellar is the blockchain for real-world utility. CEO Denelle Dixon and Sr. Product Manager Tori Samples took the stage at their respective sessions.
• Actor and UN Goodwill Ambassador Idris Elba will be opening Meridian 2023, SDF’s annual conference that will feature a jam-packed agenda appealing to developers, entrepreneurs, general crypto enthusiasts, and more.
• Stellar Aid Assist won the “Best Innovation in Digital Currency” award at the Digital Currency Conference, and was recognized as a Project to Watch by CoinDesk.
• SDF’s Adam Minehardt was named a subcommittee member on Commodity Futures Trading Association’s Digital Asset Markets Subcommittee (DAMS)
• The Policy team continued to document their progress, from commenting on their views on the EU’s Data Act, MiCa implementation, and the state of regulation in the UK.
• This past quarter, Vibrant saw a 35% MAU growth quarter over quarter, largely due to the launching of Referral and Quests programs in Argentina.
• After successful pilots, multiple organizations are moving forward with using the Stellar Disbursement Platform to send money to vulnerable and marginalized people around the world. Scaling the program means it has been proven effective, efficient, and trustworthy at the highest levels.

‍Read the Q2 report to learn more about these highlights and other strategic achievements from this quarter. You can also watch the Q2-in-review webinar below, where Denelle Dixon (SDF CEO and Executive Director) was joined by Justin Rice (VP of Ecosystem) and Jordan Edelstein (Chief Marketing Officer) to cover growth metrics for the Stellar network and other highlights and accomplishments from the second quarter of 2023.