what is tezos 
tezos is a blockchain network hosting the associated digital token tez xtz which is also known as tezzie like other cryptocurrency blockchains tezos facilitates user participation in decentralized finance defi decentralized applications and non fungible token nft projects in contrast with other blockchains tezos precludes hard forks or blockchain splits with a blockchain based governance mechanism that adopts and implements protocol upgrades chosen by voting proportional to users economic stake in tezos history of tezostezos was conceived by arthur breitman a france native and former engineer at google x and waymo who went on to work as a quantitative analyst at morgan stanley ms 2 it was developed with the participation of kathleen breitman arthur s wife and a former employee of the hedge fund bridgewater associates and r3 a software company the couple reportedly met at an anarcho capitalist meetup in new york in 2014 while still working at morgan stanley arthur breitman published a white paper under a pseudonym outlining the principles behind tezos 34 in july 2017 the switzerland based tezos foundation headed by swiss entrepreneur johann gevers organized with the breitmans an initial coin offering ico for tezos that proved to be the most successful ico to date by january 2021 it ranked as the seventh largest crypto coin offering 5in 13 days the ico drew 66 000 bitcoins and 361 000 ethers the ico was valued at 232 million at the time with bitcoin trading at 1 964 4 tezos foundation reported assets of 471 million as of dec 31 2022 6amid investor warnings regarding icos by the u s securities and exchange commission sec including notice that some are investment securities subject to registration under u s law the tezos ico was labeled a fundraiser of donations though it eventually allocated tez in proportion to outside contributions 74the distribution of coins was delayed first by a power struggle between the breitmans and johann gevers who ultimately stepped down as tezos foundation president in early 2018 89nearly a year after the ico in june 2018 the tezos foundation said ico donors awaiting their tez allocations would have to first submit to know your customer kyc and anti money laundering aml verification 1011 as of november 2020 tezos had verified 94 of the ico funds 4in march 2020 the tezos foundation the breitmans and the breitmans company dynamic ledger solutions settled for 25 million in a class action lawsuit brought on behalf of ico participants looking to withdraw their investment 12tez started trading just under 3 in july 2018 but fell to a low of 0 36 by december of that year it peaked at 8 55 in october 2021 and was at 2 21 on june 9 2022 tez was up nearly 9 that day after tether usdt said it would deploy its leading stablecoin on the tezos network 13 tez had a market capitalization of 1 99 billion ranking 33rd among cryptocurrencies as of the same date 1understanding tezoslike bitcoin and ethereum tezos is a decentralized ledger that makes use of blockchain technology like ethereum tezos is designed to make use of smart contracts depending on the source tezos is either the ancient greek term for smart contract or much more likely the name discovered by an algorithm arthur breitman wrote to sift through names unclaimed on the internet and pronounceable in english 14staking 8 000 tez known in the tezos network as a roll permits the owner to operate a network node earning a proportional share of tez rewards for validating blockchain transactions holders of smaller tez sums may delegate them to a network node known in tezos parlance as a baker 1516