Zelcore

Coin & Chain Guides

Deep dives into the 50+ chains Zelcore supports.

Each guide covers what the coin does, how its chain works, how to hold it in Zelcore, and what quirks to watch out for — fees, address formats, memo fields, staking rules.

Building on the XRP Ledger: DEX, AMM, Tokenization — and Holding XRP in Zelcore

Building on the XRP Ledger: DEX, AMM, Tokenization — and Holding XRP in Zelcore

XRPL's native CLOB DEX, AMM (XLS-30), NFTs, and MPTs explained — plus how to hold XRP in Zelcore with reserves and destination tags covered.

10 min read
RLUSD, Ripple Prime, and the Institutional Settlement Play

RLUSD, Ripple Prime, and the Institutional Settlement Play

How RLUSD, Ripple Prime, and the Mastercard pilot build Ripple's regulated institutional stack — and what XRP's bridge role actually means.

8 min read
XRP and the SEC: What 'After the Settlement' Actually Means

XRP and the SEC: What 'After the Settlement' Actually Means

How SEC v. Ripple ended: $125M stands, the $50M deal was denied, and what the 2026 commodity classification does — and doesn't — guarantee for XRP holders.

10 min read
How the XRP Ledger Works: Consensus, Coins, and Reserves

How the XRP Ledger Works: Consensus, Coins, and Reserves

A technical guide to the XRP Ledger: federated consensus, 100B pre-mined XRP in escrow, burned transaction fees, and the 1 XRP account reserve.

9 min read
Tron's Settlement Role and the Regulatory Overhang

Tron's Settlement Role and the Regulatory Overhang

Tron moved $7.9T in USDT in 2025, rivaling Visa—but its scale rests on two control points: Tether's freeze switch and a founder whose SEC case just closed.

11 min read
Using Tron Safely: Approvals, Fake USDT, and Permission Hijacks

Using Tron Safely: Approvals, Fake USDT, and Permission Hijacks

A practical self-custody guide to TRC-20 approvals, fake-USDT airdrops, address poisoning, the Energy trap, and Tron's account-permission takeover vector.

10 min read
Why USDT Lives on Tron: The Emerging-Market Dollar Rail

Why USDT Lives on Tron: The Emerging-Market Dollar Rail

How TRC-20 USDT became the default dollar for remittances and inflation hedging—and why fee economics and network effects keep it dominant.

9 min read
What Tron Actually Is: TRX, DPoS, and the Energy Model

What Tron Actually Is: TRX, DPoS, and the Energy Model

Understand Tron's DPoS consensus, TRX burn mechanics, and the Energy/Bandwidth resource model that makes USDT transfers near-free at scale.

8 min read
TON's Risks: Platform Dependency and Validator Centralisation

TON's Risks: Platform Dependency and Validator Centralisation

TON's code is open-source and its validator set is growing — but its economy orbits one private company. How to price that risk before you self-custody.

10 min read
Mini-Apps, Notcoin, and Telegram as a Distribution Channel

Mini-Apps, Notcoin, and Telegram as a Distribution Channel

How Telegram mini apps work on TON, why tap-to-earn tokens collapsed 98%+ after airdrop, and how to stay safe connecting wallets inside your chat app.

8 min read
The Telegram Wallet and USDT-on-TON: Self-Custody Inside a Chat App

The Telegram Wallet and USDT-on-TON: Self-Custody Inside a Chat App

Telegram's Wallet hides two services with opposite trust models. Learn which one you're really in, how native USDT on TON works, and how to self-custody it.

9 min read
What TON Is: Toncoin, Jettons, and Workchains

What TON Is: Toncoin, Jettons, and Workchains

TON started as Telegram's Gram project, survived SEC shutdown, and revived as The Open Network. Understand Toncoin, workchains, infinite sharding, and Jettons.

9 min read
The Long Tail: SSF, Verkle Trees, EOF, and Ethereum's Endgame

The Long Tail: SSF, Verkle Trees, EOF, and Ethereum's Endgame

Pectra and Fusaka were the warm-up. Single-slot finality, Verkle trees, and EOF are the long-tail upgrades that define Ethereum in 2030.

8 min read
Glamsterdam: ePBS, Block-Level Access Lists, and the MEV Endgame

Glamsterdam: ePBS, Block-Level Access Lists, and the MEV Endgame

Glamsterdam enshrines proposer-builder separation and adds Block-Level Access Lists in H1 2026. Here is what changes for MEV, validators, and gas.

8 min read
PeerDAS Explained: Data-Availability Sampling and the L2 Fee Story

PeerDAS Explained: Data-Availability Sampling and the L2 Fee Story

How PeerDAS turned Ethereum's data layer into a sampled network and pushed L2 fees below a cent in Q1 2026. Part 2 of Ethereum After Pectra.

8 min read
Ethereum After Pectra and Fusaka: The State of the Network in 2026

Ethereum After Pectra and Fusaka: The State of the Network in 2026

Pectra (May 2025) and Fusaka (Dec 2025) reshaped Ethereum into a DA layer for rollups. Where ETH the asset and ETH the network actually stand in 2026.

7 min read
Choosing and Using a Bitcoin L2 in 2026: A Self-Custody Operational Guide

Choosing and Using a Bitcoin L2 in 2026: A Self-Custody Operational Guide

A practical 2026 decision guide for picking and using a Bitcoin L2 with self-custody discipline, peg-risk checks, and clear exit planning anchored to native BTC.

7 min read
Babylon and Rootstock: BTC Restaking and the Original Sidechain

Babylon and Rootstock: BTC Restaking and the Original Sidechain

Babylon keeps your BTC self-custodial and slashable. Rootstock locks it in a federation and gives you EVM. Two opposite philosophies for putting Bitcoin to work.

7 min read
Stacks Nakamoto and sBTC: BTC Programmability via Threshold Signers

Stacks Nakamoto and sBTC: BTC Programmability via Threshold Signers

Part 3 of our Bitcoin L2 series: how Stacks Nakamoto and sBTC deliver BTC programmability today via a 15-signer threshold federation, not zero-trust cryptography.

8 min read
BitVM2, Citrea, and Alpen: The Validity-Proof Generation of Bitcoin L2s

BitVM2, Citrea, and Alpen: The Validity-Proof Generation of Bitcoin L2s

How BitVM2 unlocked optimistic verification on Bitcoin without a soft fork, and what Citrea, Alpen, and Bitlayer actually ship in 2026.

8 min read
The Case for Bitcoin L2s: From Sidechains to BitVM

The Case for Bitcoin L2s: From Sidechains to BitVM

Why Bitcoin's L1 stays small on purpose, and how the L2 trust spectrum from WBTC to BitVM rollups finally made trust-minimised BTCFi real in 2024-2026.

7 min read
Privacy Coins Explained: Zcash, Monero, and the Self-Custody Path in 2026

Privacy Coins Explained: Zcash, Monero, and the Self-Custody Path in 2026

Zcash and Monero in 2026: two privacy designs, the 2024 delisting wave, and how to hold ZEC and XMR in Zelcore — with honest capability limits.

9 min read
Bitcoin Cash Explained: The 2017 Fork That Kept Building

Bitcoin Cash Explained: The 2017 Fork That Kept Building

Bitcoin Cash in 2026: 32 MB blocks, ASERT difficulty, CashTokens since 2023, the scheduled May 2026 Layla upgrade, and how to hold BCH in Zelcore.

8 min read
Dogecoin Explained: From Meme to Merge-Mined Coin in 2026

Dogecoin Explained: From Meme to Merge-Mined Coin in 2026

Dogecoin in 2026: Scrypt PoW, AuxPoW merge-mining with Litecoin, 10,000 DOGE tail emission, ~3.4% inflation, Grayscale ETF, and DOGE in Zelcore self-custody.

7 min read
Litecoin Explained: Scrypt, MWEB, and the Original Altcoin in 2026

Litecoin Explained: Scrypt, MWEB, and the Original Altcoin in 2026

Litecoin in 2026: Scrypt proof-of-work, 2.5-minute blocks, 84M supply cap, optional MWEB privacy, and what LTC actually looks like in Zelcore self-custody.

8 min read
Holding SOL in Zelcore: Outage Lessons and Practical Self-Custody

Holding SOL in Zelcore: Outage Lessons and Practical Self-Custody

Capstone of the Solana Deep Dive: what the outage history teaches a holder, how Zelcore handles SOL and SPL tokens, ATA rent, priority fees, and staking.

7 min read
Solana's Validator Set, Nakamoto Coefficient, and the Firedancer Rollout

Solana's Validator Set, Nakamoto Coefficient, and the Firedancer Rollout

Solana has ~1,414 validators, a Nakamoto coefficient of 19, and ~95% of stake on Agave-lineage code. Here is what Firedancer changes — and what it doesn't.

9 min read
Solana Fees Explained: Base Fees, Priority Fees, and the Jito MEV Auction

Solana Fees Explained: Base Fees, Priority Fees, and the Jito MEV Auction

How Solana fees really work: a flat 5,000-lamport base fee, a priority-fee auction in micro-lamports per CU, and the Jito MEV bundle market.

8 min read
Proof of History and Tower BFT: How Solana Hits 400ms Slots

Proof of History and Tower BFT: How Solana Hits 400ms Slots

Proof of History and Tower BFT explained: how Solana uses a SHA-256 VDF and doubling vote lockouts to hit 400ms slots and ~13s rooted finality.

8 min read
Solana's Origins and Architecture: One Monolithic Chain, Eight Innovations

Solana's Origins and Architecture: One Monolithic Chain, Eight Innovations

Why Solana bet on one high-throughput Layer 1 instead of rollups, and how eight coordinated innovations built the monolithic blockchain camp.

8 min read
Holding Ethereum in Zelcore: Gas Hygiene, L2 Access, and What Pectra and Fusaka Change

Holding Ethereum in Zelcore: Gas Hygiene, L2 Access, and What Pectra and Fusaka Change

Capstone of the Ethereum Deep Dive: one 0x address for everything, reading EIP-1559 fees, auditing approvals, L2 choice, and Pectra plus Fusaka in practice.

8 min read
Ethereum Rollups Explained: Optimistic vs ZK, Data Availability, and the Post-Dencun L2 Economy

Ethereum Rollups Explained: Optimistic vs ZK, Data Availability, and the Post-Dencun L2 Economy

How Ethereum rollups actually work: optimistic vs ZK, the 7-day challenge window, EIP-4844 blobs, L2Beat Stages, the sequencer problem, and how to pick an L2.

10 min read
Ethereum Staking Explained: Validators, Beacon Chain, and Liquid Staking Tokens

Ethereum Staking Explained: Validators, Beacon Chain, and Liquid Staking Tokens

How Ethereum validators earn, get slashed, and exit the queue — plus solo vs SaaS vs stETH/rETH, and where EigenLayer restaking stacks extra slashable risk.

10 min read
Ethereum Gas Mechanics: EIP-1559, Priority Fees, and Blob Fees After Dencun

Ethereum Gas Mechanics: EIP-1559, Priority Fees, and Blob Fees After Dencun

How Ethereum gas fees actually work in 2026: the EIP-1559 base-fee auction, priority-fee tips, and the independent blob market born at Dencun and scaled by Pectra.

9 min read
Accounts, Contracts, and the EVM: How Ethereum Actually Executes

Accounts, Contracts, and the EVM: How Ethereum Actually Executes

Ethereum replaces Bitcoin's UTXO purse with a giant table of accounts and a gas-metered stack machine. Here is how the state, the opcodes, and an ERC-20 transfer actually work.

10 min read
Ethereum's Supply Story: From ICO to The Merge to Post-Dencun Issuance

Ethereum's Supply Story: From ICO to The Merge to Post-Dencun Issuance

How ETH's supply went from a 2014 presale to a proof-of-stake asset whose net issuance oscillates near zero — and what that actually means for holders.

9 min read
Holding Bitcoin in Zelcore: UTXO Hygiene, Lightning Access, and Self-Custody in Practice

Holding Bitcoin in Zelcore: UTXO Hygiene, Lightning Access, and Self-Custody in Practice

A practical, advanced guide to storing Bitcoin in Zelcore: BIP-84 addresses, UTXO hygiene, fee tiers, Lightning split, and a risk checklist that ties the whole series together.

9 min read
The Bitcoin Halving Schedule: Why BTC Supply Is Capped at 21 Million

The Bitcoin Halving Schedule: Why BTC Supply Is Capped at 21 Million

Bitcoin's halving cuts the block subsidy every 210,000 blocks, enforcing a hard 21 million cap. Here is the schedule, the math, and why it matters.

6 min read
UTXOs Explained: How Bitcoin Tracks Balances Without Accounts

UTXOs Explained: How Bitcoin Tracks Balances Without Accounts

Bitcoin has no account balances. It tracks unspent outputs (UTXOs) like coins in a purse. Here is how the model works, why it exists, and what it means for you.

7 min read
Bitcoin Fees and the Block-Space Market: SegWit, Mempool, and Fee Estimation

Bitcoin Fees and the Block-Space Market: SegWit, Mempool, and Fee Estimation

How Bitcoin transaction fees work: weight units, the SegWit witness discount, address types, mempool dynamics, RBF, CPFP, and why fees spike.

7 min read
The Lightning Network: Payment Channels, Routing, and Bitcoin's Scaling Layer

The Lightning Network: Payment Channels, Routing, and Bitcoin's Scaling Layer

How Lightning turns Bitcoin into a payment network: 2-of-2 channels, HTLC routing, liquidity, Taproot channels, splicing, LSPs, and honest trade-offs.

9 min read
51% Attack Economics: Why Bitcoin's Security Budget Matters

51% Attack Economics: Why Bitcoin's Security Budget Matters

Why Bitcoin's ~900 EH/s hashrate makes 51% attacks economically irrational, what smaller chains like BTG, ETC, and BSV teach us, and how to pick a safe confirmation depth.

10 min read
    Coin & Chain Guides | Zelcore Academy