Qtum is a decentralized and open-source smart contracts platform and value transfer protocol. Qtum uses proof-of-stake consensus, meaning node operators are rewarded for validating transactions. It is a DGP governed blockchain where community participants can vote to change certain network parameters. Qtum is built on a bitcoin core fork, but the foundation has created its own hybrid blockchain with the help of several key tools. The coin uses bitcoin’s chain because of its simple and stable nature, allowing the foundation to build upon it more easily. As the QTUM project is a hybrid of Bitcoin and Ethereum, its team comprises of members from both Bitcoin and Ethereum community. They also have team members who formerly worked with Tencent, Alibaba, Nasdaq etc. Apart from that, they are backed by some notable VCs and prominent people from the Blockchain community such as Patrick Dai (Project Co-Founder), Neil Mahi (Chief Blockchain Architect/Co-Founder) and Jordan Earls (Lead Developer/Co-Founder). Qtum provides a Turing-complete blockchain stack and is able to execute smart contracts and decentralised applications like the Ethereum blockchain. Qtum builds on Bitcoin's UTXO transaction model and uses the Proof-of-Stake algorithm. It is backed by some highly prominent members of the blockchain community such as Anthony Di Iorio, Xu Star, Bo Shen, David Lee, Jehan Chu and Roger Ver. Qtum sold over 10 million dollars’ worth of its tokens after only 90 minutes, eventually raising a total value of $15.7 million before stopping the campaign early after only 5 days. They raised a total amount of 11,156.766 bitcoins (BTC) and 77,081.031 ether (ETH) in exchange for the 51 million Qtum tokens being distributed to the public. In Qtum’s whitepaper, 51% of the coins were distributed to the public via the crowdfunding campaign. Of the remaining 49%, 29% of the coins would be allocated as community incentives, and the remaining 20% would be distributed to the early backers and development team.
Zcoin (XZC) is a cryptocurrency focused on privacy and decentralization. It is the first coin to implement the Zerocoin protocol that enables financial privacy through the power of zero knowledge proofs with a focus on making privacy easy to use. It is also set to be the first to release MTP an ASIC resistant, anti-botnet proof of work algorithm that remains lightweight to verify to ensure fair distribution of coins and decentralized security. Zcoin is an open source decentralized cryptocurrency that focuses on achieving privacy and anonymity for its users while transacting. To achieve this privacy and anonymity, Zcoin uses zero-knowledge proofs via Zerocoin protocol which is one of the most cited cryptography papers at this point in time. In other words, when you transact using Bitcoin or Ethereum or something similar, your transaction history is always linked to your coins by default which makes you vulnerable. That, because all it takes is one link to your personal information or IP to find out the origin of the coins.However, if you transact using Zcoin’s Zerocoin feature, none of your transaction histories is linked to the actual coins and only the receiver and sender know that you have actually exchanged funds. Zerocoin is a cryptocurrency proposed by Johns Hopkins University professor Matthew D. Green and graduate students Ian Miers and Christina Garman as an extension to the Bitcoin protocol that would add true cryptographic anonymity to Bitcoin transactions. Zerocoin was first implemented into a fully functional cryptocurrency released to the public by Poramin Insom, as Zcoin who is also the lead developer, in September 2016. At the initial stage, Zcoin uses the Lyra2z algorithm for proof of work, then they will transition to a Merkle Tree proof of work algorithm, known as MTP. MTP is a unique memory hard algorithm that aims to solve several problems. Memory hard algorithms help prevent the development of ASICs which lead to centralized mining farms. Memory hard algorithms also prevent the use of botnets infecting computers for mining purposes. If a botnet was using up multiple gigs of memory, you’d be likely to notice something is wrong. “The basic concept is that it should establish the same price/cost for a single computation unit on all platforms meaning that there is no single device that should gain a significant advantage over another for the same price hence promoting egalitarian computing.