Usopp

Genesis Validator. Come join us on this journey.

[Usopp @UsoppClub]

An economy that can’t repair is an economy that can’t love @lexfridman

Real progress isn’t only expanding to Mars, it’s strengthening the connective tissue here: systems that can listen, route help and make responsibility legible

If we can’t coordinate at the neighbourhood level, how do we manage a planet? @elonmusk @vitalikbuterin #SystemsThinking #Coordination

[Will Ruddick @wor]

This is how we reach a Type I (planetary) civilization on the Kardashev scale without destroying ourselves in the process.

Not by “more tech.” By better coordination: making our offers and needs legible, routable, and accountable … like a living system that can sense, share, and repair.

Cosmo-Local Intelligence is the next obvious evolution of intelligence (fungal, human, and machine) working together so fewer beings fall through the cracks and more communities can safely thrive.

Share your comments on the article: https://t.co/7oxcGuXElO

[Bankless @Bankless]

LIVE NOW - The Most Underrated Chain: Celo’s Surprising Traction Around the World

@Celo is quietly powering real-world payments at global scale.

In this episode, @TrustlessState and @RyanSAdams sit down with @marek_, CEO of @cLabs, to unpack how Celo became a fast, low-cost payments layer used for remittances, savings, onchain FX, and identity across emerging markets.

--------------
TIMESTAMPS

0:00 Celo’s Origin Story and Design Philosophy
5:18 The Long Bet on P2P Payments
17:19 700,000 Daily Users: The Data Behind the Narrative
22:11 MiniPay: Global Venmo Built on Celo
30:28 Solving the Last-Mile Banking Problem
37:36 Celo x Opera partnership
40:37 Stablecoins, FX, and the Rise of Onchain Forex
46:53 Perpetuals for FX: UpDown .xyz
49:37 Open Finance vs. Governments and the Battle for the Payments Stack
59:13 Why Celo Chose Ethereum L2 Over an L1 Path
1:06:02 Self .xyz and Proof of Personhood
1:14:06 Putting It All Together: Celo’s Endgame

[Usopp @UsoppClub]

@VitalikButerin when you see L2 growth driven by micro-transfers/stablecoins, what metric best separates real adoption from spam/Sybil? Active addrs, retention, median tx value, something else?

[Usopp @UsoppClub]

Facts. Mission-first, execution-driven and finally getting recognized for it: Ethereum L2 path, 11M+ @minipay users, and building trust/identity rails with @selfxyz. Let’s keep scaling.

#Builders #celo

[chaskin.eth @jchaskin22]

be like @Celo

> built real-world, positive-sum use cases since day 0
> made the pragmatic move to become an Ethereum L2 (and continues to decentralize)
> @MiniPay onboarded 11m real users
> pushing zk identity forward w/ @selfxyz

[Usopp @UsoppClub]

12% up in 30 days and 38% YoY on active addresses... 840k active addresses💥

This is the kind of growth that matters: micro-transfers and stablecoins = real usage, not just narratives. Celo keeps extending its lead 🚀
#Crypto #RealWorldUtility #celo

[growthepie 🥧📏 @growthepie_eth]

Extending its lead, @Celo has reached a new high of 840k active addresses.

The primary source of this activity is microtransfers and stablecoins, which have led to a 12% increase in addresses in the last 30 days.

[Usopp @UsoppClub]

Love seeing the boring playbook win: distribution, consumer UX, stablecoins, repeat users. Celo quietly turned traction into real numbers and it’s compounding. 🚀
If this is the year of proof, what happens in 2026 when it scales?💥

[Chilla @chilla_ct]

We’ve seen it time and again: chains that raised massive sums in past cycles, fueled by the hype of being the next Ethereum killer, only to fade as years went by. The list is long, the promises too. Just a few managed to get adoption.

Most have experienced a long, steady decline, while others have been able to react and adapt to a constantly evolving ecosystem that leaves no room for those left behind.

This is why i got curious about a chain that was quite popular at the beginning of 2020, and which, in recent years, following various ups and downs and changes, has been evolving and finding its own place in crypto. While many OG chains have lost their way by not focusing on a specific product, like a spray and pray tactic, @Celo has a different strategy.

Indeed, this may be news to most (me too until very recently, actually), but Celo has seen its revenue increase by 10x since the beginning of 2024. No sudden flashes but linear growth, as shown in the image.

What was initially an independent EVM-compatible L1, in 2024 followed the community's proposal to become an Ethereum L2, leveraging the OP stack and Eigen Layer, to achieve greater security and interoperability and reduce costs. And as you can see from the previous graph, this choice, combined with the focus on specific verticals and distribution, is paying off with user growth.

It seems that, unlike other options, the goal was to become more accessible to emerging markets, where everyday users dominate. So yeah, it’s not surprising the latest stablecoin-focused chains let users pay gas with USDT or USDC (though never with both). But Celo actually did it first, offering both stablecoins instead of just sticking to one.

Perhaps the motivations behind all this stem from a market already saturated with protocols that often move in the same direction, touching on the usual verticals, so strong in the crypto world but still needing to find a real product-market fit in the traditional one, where the total addressable market is way bigger.
While innovation in DeFi, AI, and other areas is crucial for a chain's growth, it seems that putting the fundamentals first in terms of UX has given this solution resilience. Indeed, although the ecosystem's total TVL is around $50M, everyday users keep on growing.

Indeed, after starting to look at the data, i ended up being genuinely surprised by what i discovered. For example, in the last six months, Celo has steadily been in the top three L2s for weekly active users, and averaging 1M WAU in the last two weeks, consolidating its second placement.

While perhaps the most interesting fact is this: Celo has been steadily in first place for the number of daily active addresses compared to the entire Ethereum ecosystem, including mainnet, since November 3rd, after overtaking Base, and steadily positioning itself above 700,000 daily users, as shown by this picture taken from @growthepie_eth.

This can only be evidence of a broader target, potentially with less value exchanged per capita, but with a broad distribution.
And in any case, having Vitamin personally shilling your product must be something, especially considering that Celo is now much more integrated into Ethereum than before, given its new role as L2. This is one of the reasons that made me collaborate with them to objectively show this data.

In any case, the boost that perhaps kick-started this growth was the 2023 integration with @opera. From this partnership, @minipay was born, a non-custodial wallet on Celo that lets users send and receive stablecoins at very low costs, which has onboarded 11M+ users and facilitated 300M+ stablecoin transactions since launch. Along with this, integration with local or traditional payment methods such as cards, transfers, or on/off-ramp services has made this transition smoother for everyday users. And recently, at Binance Blockchain Week, the extension of this partnership was announced.

MiniPay was probably one of the moves that led Celo to greater financial inclusion by interfacing with more emerging markets, increasing its numbers, where Opera is seeing wallet growth hitting 175% YoY with particularly strong expansion in markets like South Africa, Ghana, Kenya, and the US.

Conclusion
There are several ways to reach PMF and find your own loyal user base. This can be through innovative apps, gambling, institutional liquidity, gaming, or through stronger distribution. It seems that Celo is aiming for the widest possible distribution, targeting users where there is a real need for crypto to improve the quality of life.

Ultimately, it's not necessary to invent the new shiny thing to attract users, unless there's a way to distribute the product to a wider audience. Yes, the chain's TVL can't be compared to that of other L2s currently in circulation, but at the same time, the market share is different, and in its own way, Celo, as Vitalik says, has survived all these years in a highly competitive market where people too often think that all infrastructures must have the same end goal.

But this isn't inherently true, given the vast amount of verticals from which chains can choose.
Meanwhile, some are focusing on consumer apps, some on DeFi, some on gaming, and some on payments.

Posterity will choose winners, and losers.

[Usopp @UsoppClub]

Huge milestone. Jello Hardfork shipped, and now l2beat reflects it. Celo reclassified and sitting #1 in Validiums & Optimiums. Real engineering + real transparency. Congrats to @cLabs who grinded on this !

[marek.celo.eth 🦇🌳 @marek_]

Thanks to the Jello Hardfork, @l2beat has reclassified @Celo putting it at the top of the Validiums & Optimiums tab 🎉

[Usopp @UsoppClub]

This is what "going mainstream" actually looks like: people sending money, paying, saving without thinking abt fees, settlement or chain. Celo’s focus on verifiable usage is paying off. Proud to have been here since genesis, 6 years in and more bullish than ever. Excited for 2026

[Rene ◘ @RegenRene]

Every year, I share a letter capturing what has happened in the Celo ecosystem and industry at large. While crypto continued to cycle through narratives and resurfaced debates, new chains and apps launching and the usual "logo x logo" announcements- Celo was hyperfocused on proof.

We became @Ethereum's biggest distribution channel - the #1 L2 in daily active users - ahead of Coinbase' Base and Sam Altman's World, and the #1 transport layer for USDT measured in weekly active users, ahead of Tron, thanks in large part to our long-term partnership with Opera and the quickly growing traction around their @MiniPay wallet.

This is usage that repeats, product that becomes habit. We cracked the code to product-market fit, what the industry has been starved for, and have started to deliver it across the Global South. For all the shiny projects that captured mindshare only to fizzle out, Celo's staying power is a testament to those who prioritize mission over marketing, verifiable usage over hype.

Through this mission-driven work, we saw crypto move from feature to assumption. More and more instances occurred where someone sends money across a border and doesn’t think about settlement, someone pays or gets paid and doesn’t think about fees, someone uses a mini app and doesn’t think about chain selection, or someone saves in a stable asset and doesn’t think about volatility. Beyond adoption, this is normalization.

If 2025 was the year proof became undeniable, 2026 will be the year we see that scale.

We will continue to work with partners like Opera, tapping into their massive distribution of 300M+ active global users as we help build a trillion-dollar onchain economy on Celo by 2030. We’ll continue to make the real world the center of our design, making stablecoin payments feel native everywhere, expanding the mini-app economy, and strengthening the rails for trust and safety at scale.

Thank you to our community members and teams for holding the line on mission while pushing the frontier on execution.

Read my letter to the community for a more in-depth recap of all the Celo delivered this year, and what 2026 has in store.

https://t.co/5BQVW2MaPg

[Usopp @UsoppClub]

Not just a stat: 1B+ tx is momentum. Vision 2030 is direction. Next stop: building a trillion-dollar onchain economy. Let’s go. #Celo #economy #Vision2030

[marek.celo.eth 🦇🌳 @marek_]

It's a new day 🌄

[Velodrome @VelodromeFi]

Velodrome Slipstream LP Rewards 🚴‍♂️

• $CELO - $USDT: ~1,198%
• $USDT - $WETH: ~243%
• $USDC - $USDT: ~48%

Explore all @celo LP opportunities on Velodrome's Liquidity page

[Rene ◘ @RegenRene]

ICYMI: @Celo Becomes First Payments-Focused Blockchain to Deploy Nightfall Privacy Layer for Enterprise Payments

https://t.co/YNqIH7OgUR

[Usopp @UsoppClub]

Real users. Real impact.
Great to see @marek_ and @MentoLabs highlight stablecoin adoption at #EthPrague and on a panel with @VitalikButerin no less!
@CeloOrg is pushing boundaries where it matters most. 📊🌍

[marek.celo.eth 🦇🌳 @marek_]

Same @Celo story but on a bigger stage 🙌

This time, I was on with @VitalikButerin at @EthPrague sharing about @MentoLabs stablecoin user insights

[marek.celo.eth 🦇🌳 @marek_]

The sybil problem is now solved, thanks to @selfxyz 🙌

[Celo @Celo]

🏡 @Ethereum, we're home!

Following a successful "hard hard fork" led by core contributors at @cLabs & L1 validators, Celo is officially an Ethereum Layer 2 🪨 🪨 🍴

What does that mean for the diverse, global decentralized ecosystem? Keep reading to find out ↓

[MiniPayNews @MiniPayNews]

We’re thrilled to hear @VitalikButerin highlights @minipay as a true bridge for bringing Web2 users into Web3!

At MiniPay, our mission is simple: make crypto accessible and useful for everyone.

Congratulations again to the @Celo team, @RegenRene and @marek_ on becoming an L2, here’s to unlocking new possibilities together! 🙌

[Token Terminal 📊 @tokenterminal]

Celo is for stablecoins; w/ activity primarily driven by @MentoLabs, @tether, @gooddollarorg, and @circle.

[MiniPay @minipay]

Big news from Nairobi 🇰🇪:
MiniPay just won the Web3 Award at @AfricaTechSMT 💚

[marek.celo.eth 🦇🌳 @marek_]

Some exciting @Celo community highlights from last week:

 ♻️ @CeloPublicGoods announces results of the Celo Citizen Retro round, rewarding 183 individuals for their contributions to the Celo community 🙌
 ⛶ @Ledger Live and the Celo Ledger App have been updated ahead of the L2 migration. New app supports Ethereum derivation paths 💪
↕️ @Transak launches free on- and off- ramping on @Opera @Minipay across 50+ countries
🍠 @ubeswap launches UbeStarter, an automated launchpad for the Celo network
🐼 @okutrade launches Celo support using @squidrouter & @lifiprotocol
🤖 @swing_xyz announces Celo launch
🐉 @OrochiNetwork brings Orand and Orocle to Celo
📜 @Celo Regional Council H1 2025 proposal posted on Celo Forum
👷 @CeloDevs hosts Builder Showcase of the Year, scheduled for Jan 31
⚖️ @StabilaFnd and Celo become a Title Sponsor for Stable Summit
🟠 @prezenti_grants supports @DigNow to build AI agents for institutions

What did I miss?

[Usopp @UsoppClub]

@0xFrenchy From @zachxbt

[Coinbase Assets 🛡️ @CoinbaseAssets]

Coinbase previously announced that customers must withdraw CGLD by January 13 to prevent funds becoming inaccessible.

This withdrawal deadline is no longer required.