Why is Stellar (XLM) up 138% in a week and 37% in a day?

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Altseason is upon us now that Bitcoin has been steadily rising ever since the election of Democratic candidate Joe Biden, the institutional FOMO phase, the fear of many that further Covid-19 stimulus will lead to inflation, the announcements of PayPal and Square, the… Well, you get it, there are lots of reasons to explain why crypto is having a fantastic time right now.

One of those that stand out in the altcoin department is Stellar Lumens. The coin, which was launched from a fork from the Ripple Labs protocol by developer Jed McCaleb, has been steadily climbing towards the top of the charts of CoinMarketCap and currently ranks 11th among all cryptos.

Stellar Lumen (XLM) skyrockets by 68% - two big upgrades announced #stellar #xlmhttps://t.co/7kQeIIzPQL

— Crypto News Flash (@CryptoNewsFlas3) November 24, 2020

By the way, you may have heard the name Jed McCaleb before. That is because he is the founder of the Mt. Gox exchange, the infamous platform that at one time traded 75% of the world’s Bitcoin and which forever holds a special place in the cryptosphere.

Upgrade and African expansion

For the first time since 2018, Stellar is once again trading over the 20 cents mark. This is because the project’s developers announced that a new version of the Stellar public network protocol was approved and implemented by validators. Thanks to the upgrade, two new features were introduced which increases usability.

The Stellar blog stated:

After the upgrade, developers can create simpler, better user experiences that abstract away the complexity of blockchain, and do it without losing any of the advantages of a fast, cheap, and permissionless public ledger.

Learn how @ClickPesa is making cross-border B2B payments easier in East Africa with #Stellar.https://t.co/Mu3qW2TlR4

— Stellar (@StellarOrg) November 24, 2020

Furthermore, Stellar has recently launched a partnership with ClickPesa, an African business-to-business payment platform. If you know the opportunities that lay in Africa for crypto and you have been reading Cryptotips as of late, you will know that Bitcoin and other crypto currencies are widely accepted as a means of payment over there.