Waves
WAVES
Evaluation Score
Overall rating on a scale of 0-10
Dimension Breakdown
AI Analysis
Comprehensive evaluation of the token
WAVES (Waves) is a legacy Layer-1 blockchain platform launched in 2016 that maintains active development (e.g., v1.6.2 'Champagne' and RIDE V9), though development exhibits extreme bus-factor concentration and low commit velocity. Significant data gaps exist in Tokenomics (-1.0) and Team & Governance (-1.0) due to search cross-contamination and missing project-specific disclosures, requiring their weights to be redistributed across remaining sections. The project suffers from extremely weak community engagement, severe market drawdown (~99.6% below all-time highs), lack of listed third-party audits or CertiK verification, and historical security concerns dating back to a 2018 DNS hijacking incident. No qualifying red-flag cap was applied as historical events were either outside the 24-month window or explicitly flagged as unverified in the supplied sources. Based on the weighted average of evaluated sections, the overall fundamentals remain weak.
Development Activity
Code updates and developer engagement
Community Support
Social media presence and community engagement
Tokenomics
Supply, distribution, and utility
Market & Use Case
Value proposition and competitive landscape
Team & Governance
Team background and project governance
Security & Audits
Security history and audit status
About Waves (WAVES)
Waves (WAVES) is a Layer-1 blockchain platform launched in June 2016 to support decentralized applications (dApps), token issuance, and smart contracts via its proprietary RIDE programming language. The network operates a native decentralized exchange architecture and Leased Proof-of-Stake (LPoS) consensus, in addition to maintaining an ERC-20 representation on Ethereum. Development on the protocol has continued with updates such as version v1.6.2 ("Champagne"), which introduced deterministic finality and P-256 signature verification alongside RIDE V9 updates.
The project faces notable structural and market challenges. Active development exhibits an extreme bus-factor concentration around a single visible developer, characterized by low commit velocity and an absence of formal public governance processes. On-chain engagement and community activity are minimal, with negligible transfer volume on its ERC-20 wrapper. In terms of market performance, the WAVES token has experienced a severe long-term drawdown, trading roughly 99.6% below its all-time high of $61.30.
From a security standpoint, Waves has no third-party audits or team verification listed on primary monitoring platforms such as CertiK. The project also has a history of security vulnerabilities, including a July 2018 DNS hijacking and phishing incident during its decentralized exchange launch that compromised website registrar servers and drew scrutiny regarding its wallet seed-phrase input practices. Additionally, the broader platform ecosystem was affected by reports surrounding the 2022 depeg of its associated algorithmic stablecoin, Neutrino (USDN), and trading availability constraints across major centralized exchanges.