What's next for Decentraland?
Key Takeaways
What may have seemed like, in the eyes of the world at large, the last mutterings of a once-great beast sounded in June 2023 when the Decentraland metaverse platform announced a “game jam ” centered around a Lucid Dream theme. While the opportunity to create a new interactive experience on the system may not have got the same sort of takeup as it got during the height of metaverse mania in late 2021, the news showed, if nothing else, that Decentraland and its native token, MANA, were still up to something.
This would have been a better showcase for MANA than the news, earlier in the month, that the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) considered it to be an unregistered security when it filed a legal case against the Binance crypto exchange.
But what is Decentraland (MANA)? How does Decentraland work? Let’s see what we can find out, and also take a look at some of the Decentraland price predictions that were being made as of 23 June 2023.
The Metaverse, the idea that we can create an online world where people can interact with each other through avatars, was a big deal in 2021. With the growth of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) at the same time, there were plenty of people who were convinced that the Metaverse was here to stay and that it was The Future.
Unfortunately, the crypto crashes of 2022 put paid to that, with metaverse coins and tokens taking the brunt of some disastrous losses. However, there are still some metaverse cryptos which continue to have a following, with one of the biggest being Decentraland ‘s MANA.
Decentraland was founded in 2015 by two Argentinians, fintech expert Ariel Mielich and blockchain specialist Esteban Ordano. The pair wanted to create an online world which was not under the control of one person or organization, hence the name.
Decentraland is supported by the MANA cryptocurrency. In order to do things in Decentraland, people need to hold MANA.
The Decentraland platform features 90,601 pieces of land. People can use MANA to buy these and can decorate them with NFTs which can be bought, again with MANA, on the Decentraland Marketplace.
MANA holders can also vote on changes to the network, and they have the right to change their avatars. They can also take part in auctions for Decentraland’s other cryptocurrency, LAND, which is used to track the ownership of the land in Decentraland.
It is worth noting that MANA, which can be bought, sold, and traded on exchanges, is based on the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain. This means that it is a token, rather than a coin. You might see references to such things as a Decentraland coin price prediction, but these are wrong.
It’s now time to talk about the Decentraland price history . While past performance should never be taken as an indicator of future results, knowing what MANA has done in the past can help give us some very useful context if we want to either interpret or make a Decentraland price prediction.
MANA first came onto the open market in September 2017, soon dropping to trade at an all-time low of $0.007883 on 13 October 2017, before spending much of the next three years or so between $0.01 and $0.10.
After closing 2020 at $0.07825, things started to build in 2021, with it going above the dollar in the middle of March to peak at $1.58 in late April. By the summer, the market had slowed, and MANA sank to $0.58 in June.
Early September saw it go back above the dollar again before it dropped only to shoot up in late October and November, reaching an all-time high of $5.90 on 25 November. Concerns about the Omicron variant of Covid-19 slowed the market down, though, and it closed the year at $3.27, more than 4,000% higher than where it had been a year earlier.
If 2021 was a year of massive gains, 2022 saw Decentraland suffer losses. The market had already been sluggish when the Terra blockchain collapsed in May, sending MANA down to below $1 for the first time in more than a year and, although it was able to stage something of a fightback over the summer, it last traded above the dollar in the middle of August.
Come November, the bankruptcy of the FTX exchange came as another blow and MANA struggled, closing the year at $0.297, having lost more than 90% over the course of the year, a time when the market as a whole dropped by around 65%.
So far, 2023 has been a little better, although we are a long way from where overenthusiastic crypto “experts” dubbed the Metaverse a harbinger of a fourth industrial revolution.
The token climbed up early on in the year, reaching $0.8178 on 23 February but then it slid down, reaching a low of $0.317 on 10 June as the market was shaken by the news that Crypto.com had suspended its US institutional operations in the wake of the SEC’s lawsuits.
By 23 June, though, it had made a small recovery of sorts and was trading at about $0.378.
At that time, there were about 1.89 billion MANA in circulation out of a total supply of around 2.19 billion. This gave it a market cap of about $715 million, making it the 60th-largest crypto by that measurement.
MANA, which had already fallen way past where it was during the Metaverse boom of late 2021 and early 2022, was hit by the market crash following the announcement of the SEC’s lawsuit against Binance, which explicitly named the token as an unregistered security.
By 5 June 2023, before the SEC filed its papers, it was worth about $0.5313. Over the course of the next five days, it lost more than 40% of its value.
The token made something of a recovery from that, rising about 20% by 23 June. Its current price is, however, nearly 30% lower than pre-crash levels.
With that all over and done with, let’s cast our eyes over some of the Decentraland price predictions that were being made on 23 June 2023.
Keep in mind that price forecasts, especially for something as potentially volatile as cryptocurrency, have a high likelihood of being wrong. Also, it’s worth pointing out that many long-term price predictions are made using an algorithm, which means that they can change at any time.
First, CoinCodex had a pretty optimistic short-term Decentraland price prediction. The site said that it would step up to $0.3907 by 28 June and then shoot up, with it climbing past $1 for the first time in more than a year to trade at about $1.01 by 24 June.
The site’s technical analysis was, despite that, slightly bearish, with 16 indicators sending downbeat signals against 14 making bullish ones.
As far as other Decentraland price predictions for 2023 were concerned, Bitnation said that the token could reach $0.5677 this year, while DigitalCoinPrice was even more upbeat, saying it would trade at $0.77. CaptainAltcoin , on the other hand, said that things would get worse before they got better, predicting MANA to drop to $0.3661 in July before recovering to $0.4794 in December.
When it came to making a Decentraland price prediction for 2025, the general consensus was for MANA to climb above the dollar, with CaptainAltCoin predicting it would reach $1.14, DigitalCoinPrice arguing for $1.27 and Bitnation making a MANA price prediction that says it will be worth $1.32 in two years’ time.
In terms of a more long-term Decentraland price prediction, DigitalCoinPrice was the most optimistic, saying the token would be worth $3.91, while Bitnation saw it trade at $3.22. CoinPriceForecast , on the other hand, was far more reserved. The site, which had it reach $0.37 this year and $0.42 in 2025, claimed MANA would trade at $0.82 in June 2030 and $0.85 by the end of the first year of the next decade.
Is Decentraland a Good Investment?
It is difficult to tell at the moment. Keep in mind that MANA is not only a long way from its record price, but also that metaverse cryptos were even more badly affected by the crashes of 2022. The fact that the SEC considers it to be an unregistered security, which could be interpreted as kicking a man while he’s down, might just make things worse.
On the other hand, there is enough of a fanbase to allow Decentraland to have a game-making experience, and both cryptos and other things which people had long thought had had their time have made a comeback, so it might be that this current state is the lull before the storm of a metaverse renaissance.
Either way, you will have to do your own research before you decide whether or not to invest in Decentraland.
No one knows for sure right now. Although the Decentraland crypto price predictions are largely optimistic at the time of writing, price predictions have a well-deserved reputation for being wrong. Remember, too, that prices can, and do, go down as well as up.
Before you decide whether or not to invest in Decentraland, you will have to do your own research, not only on MANA, but also on other, similar coins and tokens, such as The Sandbox (SAND). Most importantly, though, you must make sure you never invest more money than you can afford to lose.
In terms of pieces of land in the Decentraland game, there are 90,601 pieces of land. Regarding the Decentraland (MANA) token, there were 1.89 billion in circulation out of a total supply of 2.19 billion on 23 June 2023.
It might do but, if it does, it will not be for quite a long time. The most optimistic long-term MANA price prediction comes from PricePrediction.net , which says it will get to $10 in 2032. Keep in mind that $10 is considerably higher than the token’s record price of $5.90, which it reached in November 2021.
The MANA cryptocurrency is used to buy items and land in the Decentraland metaverse. The token’s holders can also vote on changes to the platform, and it can be bought, sold, and traded on exchanges.
Please note that the contents of this article are not financial or investing advice. The information provided in this article is the author’s opinion only and should not be considered as offering trading or investing recommendations. We do not make any warranties about the completeness, reliability and accuracy of this information. The cryptocurrency market suffers from high volatility and occasional arbitrary movements. Any investor, trader, or regular crypto users should research multiple viewpoints and be familiar with all local regulations before committing to an investment.