Stellar Lumen

Stellar Lumens are the cryptocurrency coin associated with the Stellar blockchain and are represented by the cryptocurrency symbol XLM. 100 billion Stellars (original name) launched on the Stellar network in 2014, and in 2015 the Stellar network was upgraded and Stellars become Stellar Lumens to distinguish them from the Stellar network and the nonprofit organization working in Stellar Lumen development called Stellar.org.

Every year there is a 1% inflation rate of Stellar Lumens and no additional Stellar Lumens can be created by anybody on the Stellar network. The 1% yearly inflation is equally distributed to Stellar users, and includes Stellar Lumens gathered by the Stellar network from its base fee for transactions of 0.00001 XLM.

On September 9, 2019 the Stellar Development Foundation and Keybase announced they will be airdropping 2 billion XLM (worth approximately $120 million at the time of announcement) over the following 20 months, and that Keybase users can expect to be receiving about 100 million XLM airdrops each month. The CEO of the Stellar Development Foundation, Denelle Dixon, made the following comment regarding the companies airdrop announcement:

The foundation’s mandate is to deliver lumens [XLM] into the world. This is part of that plan. The up to 2 billion is a really great way. And we will have checks along the way. The number seems much more rational when looked at over a 20-month period. It demonstrates that we think this is a valuable opportunity for users of Keybase to get to know us. They aren’t crypto-first.