PIVX History
PIVX (Private Instant Verification Transaction) was originally built as a privacy-centric coin but to date, it is not private but there is work in progress as we write this for the new privacy protocol(zk-SNARKs) it is planned to be implemented sometime in 2020 Q4. PIVX is a proof-of-stake coin which originally forked from DASH.
PIVX was launched back on January 26, 2016, by two DASH community members. The founders admired the DASH technology but wanted to see something to change. They chose to create a fully Proof-of-Stake system opposite to DASH which is a Proof-of-Work system. They implemented what they saw as a fair reward system to auto-balance reward payouts. They saw privacy as a very important factor for the Coin while DASH was more focused on DASH that prioritizes fast, cheap payments with more advanced privacy and anonymity. PIVX aimed to become the go-to payment method for peer-to-peer transactions and in-store exchanges.
Coin Supply and Sustainability
The PIVX network allows for 2.6 million PIVX tokens to be minted per year forever, with 90% of the minted coins going to staking wallets and Masternodes (staking is covered in the next section), and 10% going to fund budget proposals voted on by the Masternodes and stakers.
This lack of a maximum coin supply makes PIVX function similar to a traditional currency, as inflation is introduced to the system to encourage daily usage and avoid hoarding.
The inflation is around 4% per year, but instead of simply devaluing your currency like the Fed does when it prints Dollars, all those minted coins are going directly to holders of PIVX, offsetting the effect of inflation by spreading the profits.
While the coin supply will grow indefinitely, there is a “soft cap” that throttles the rate of inflation imposed by burning transaction fees based on the traffic level of the network. Once the number of transactions reaches a certain threshold, transaction fees are “burned,” meaning that a number of coins equal to the transaction fees are permanently removed from circulation.
Community Governance and Staking
There are two ways to earn rewards for contributing to the PIVX Network: Masternode and Staking.
A network of Masternodes, users holding the coins as collateral, are used to verify and anonymize transactions, store the blockchain, and vote on community proposals, that in return payout rewards in the form of PIV.
All Masternodes require a holding of 10,000 PIV in the PIVX Core Wallet. The budget, development, and any major community decisions are decided using the PIVX Governance model and voting mechanisms, thus decentralizing the governance of the project and putting the decision making power in the hands of those invested in the success of the Project.
Staking coins are used to secure the network and release new blocks. Any amount of PIV can be staked in the wallet, there is no minimum. A block is created every 60 seconds and a reward is released to the block creator that is chosen at random in their chances proportional to the number of coins being staked.
The more coins you’re holding, the higher your chance, but every staking wallet will eventually receive some rewards. The network used a see-saw mechanism to balance the rewards between Masternodes and traditional staking, auto-balancing the reward frequency and size as the number of nodes changes. Your expected returns from staking or running a Masternode can be calculated using the Returns Calculator.
To learn more about running your own Masternode check out the official Masternode website. To learn more about staking coins in the PIVX wallet or other opportunities to earn PIVX, take a look at the reward page.
