Worldcoin, the token of the crypto project co-founded by OpenAI Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman, jumped by more than 60% on Monday, its first day of trading.
Worldcoin climbed as high as $3.58 from its initial listing price of $1.70 before falling back to $2.2 at the time of writing. Trading volume for the asset has also soared following listings by popular exchanges such as Binance, OKX, and Huobi.
Sam Altman’s Worldcoin Launches
The Worldcoin project, which officially launched today, Monday, July 24, has been in development for over three years. Its parent company, Tools for Humanity, notably raised $115M in a May Series C funding round led by Blockchain Capital at a $1 billion valuation.
The Worldcoin project uses a small device called an “Orb” to scan people’s eyeballs in order to generate a unique digital identity. The World ID or identity grants its holder proof of personhood in the Worldcoin ecosystem.
Users can earn WLD tokens by visiting a Worldcoin Orb location to verify their human identity and provide proof of their humanity. The project hopes to enable global democratic processes, increase economic opportunity, and provide a reliable solution for distinguishing humans from AI online while preserving privacy.
However, Worldcoin’s promise does not resonate with everyone. Critics voiced concerns about around invasion of privacy and targeting people in the global South on several platforms.
Following today’s launch, Worldcoin’s whitepaper revealed an initial supply capped at 10 billion tokens. The project has allocated 75% of its supply to community initiatives, 9.8% to the development team, and 13.5% to Tools for Humanity stakeholders.
Meanwhile, Monday’s launch saw the release of only 143 million Worldcoins, of which 100 million was loaned to market makers and the remaining amount airdropped to WLD users who verified with the project’s Orb technology in the pre-launch phase.
The Worldcoin mobile app has also been updated, although the WLD token is not available to trade in the U.S. due to unclear cryptocurrency regulations.