Chronicle

The marketplace for NFTs backed by major brands.

Published in

4SVofficial

12 min readMay 17, 2021

NFTs, or Non-Fungible Tokens, which are currently trending in the cryptocurrency space, are unique digital items. Imagine that each ERC20 token could possess different properties from one another- that’s basically what NFTs are. A digital collectable that can attribute specific properties to each of the tokens that compose a token set.

A couple of examples of current NFT applications are Crypto Kitties, Crypto Punks, NBA Topshot or Sorare. With a few exceptions, like Sports, there’s a problem with NFTs: They are not backed by recognized and beloved brands.

In this article, we will examine the current NFT space, and why Chronicle may be poised to capture a large share of the market. We will look at what problems it solves, as well as discuss the roadmap, team, tokenomics and XNL, Chronicle’s utility token.

Why are NFTs booming?

(https://opensea.io/rankings?sortAscending=false&sortBy=total_volume)

A non-fungible token (NFT) is a type of cryptographic token on a blockchain representing a single asset. These can be entirely digital assets or tokenized versions of real-world assets. Since NFTs are not interchangeable, they can function as proof of authenticity and ownership within the digital realm.

NFTs possess qualities that make them a brand new asset class that may well come to dominate the digital world. NFTs critical properties are:

Uniqueness: these assets have many analogies with works of art, of which there may be copies (it is even easier to make copies of digital works), but here the owner can certify that he is the sole and actual owner of the original work. It’s a curious shift in the perceived value we place on physical and digital works of art.
Non-interoperable: one NFT may possess different attributes than one of its collection counterparties. Hence, they’re not interoperable.
Indivisible: Unlike cryptocurrencies, NFTs cannot be divided into smaller pieces, and they have a total value as a whole entity or token without more. You can’t have 1/1000 of a crypto kitty.
Indestructible: the data of an NFT is stored in the blockchain through a smart contract (Smart Contract), which makes it impossible to destroy, delete or replicate.
Absolute ownership: unlike music or movies, your property is yours if you buy one of these goods. You do not buy a license to see the movie or listen to the song, but that intangible good is entirely yours.
Verifiable: the blockchain makes it possible to verify something that is much more complex to demonstrate or certify with topics such as art collecting or stamps; for example, the blockchain maintains a history of who has bought or sold an NFT and who is its current (absolute) owner, including the original creator from whom that digital asset was purchased in the first place.

At the moment of this writing, most NFTs created are associated with digital games and art.

The top-5 collections according to OpenSea are CryptoPunks, a digital art collection, with a total volume above 161,000 ETH; followed by Decentraland, a virtual world, with 133,000 ETH; then Rarible, an NFT marketplace with over 82,000 ETH in total volume; CryptoKitties comes after with over 66,000 ETH in total volume; and, finally, Sorare, a football digital trading card game with over 40,000 ETH in trading volume.

In total, the total volume of the five projects above almost reaches 500,000 ETH. At the current price, that’s over $1,4 billion in total volume.

If we now look at the past thirty days, the outlook is staggering.

NBA Topshot, a project from Dapper Labs, the home of CryptoKitties, is ranked first with over $540 million in trading volume.

CryptoPunks, Rarible and Sorare come next, with $300 million, $95 million and $65 million, respectively.

Ranked last comes Hashmasks, a digital art project with a total of $50 million in trading volume over the past month.

The problem?

Nevertheless, we notice that most of these NFTs are not backed by any brand, with a few exceptions like the NBA Top Shot, which are involved in the sports vertical specifically.

Additionally, Chronicle rightfully identifies other critical issues that impede mass adoption of NFTs:

The digital collectables (NFTs) market primarily consists of users who are already familiar with cryptocurrency and the operational use of the blockchains they’re hosted on. Therefore:

It’s hard to acquire cryptocurrencies in exchanges for the ordinary person.
It requires an understanding of different blockchains and technologies.
Knowledge on how to set up a crypto wallet.
Knowledge on how to export tokens from the exchange to a crypto wallet.
Heavy network prices on the blockchain (e.g. Ethereum network).

Hence, there is a clear market opportunity, and we think that Chronicle possesses the necessary qualities to deliver the best solution.

Let’s dive into what Chronicle is and what solution it offers.

Chronicle: Branded NFTs for the Masses.

Many people approach the NFT market problems like they are technical issues. They debate what the right level of decentralization is or how to deal with high transaction costs. What Chronicle gets right is recognizing that there are usability and incentive problems: issues created by perverse incentives that block participants from accessing the market (high fees) to hope an attacker does not appropriate the network with malicious intent (decentralization).

While we admit these problems exist due to how these protocols (Ethereum, bitcoin, etc.) are set up, we think there’s a much simpler solution to the issues above: avoid decentralization.

Does this mean we don’t think decentralization is essential?

We think that until fully decentralized protocols can deal with masses and brand-backed NFTs, it makes little sense to build a product on expensive and not user-friendly networks. Hence, Chronicle proposes:

Accessible email address sign up.
USD onboarding via payment integration partners (e.g. Stripe).
Premium access authenticated digital collectables backed by the world’s greatest brands.
Options to buy, sell, swap/trade, bid, and gift collectables.
Show off your collectables to social media.
Gamification — build up your Chronicle profile.
Earn rewards via Chronicle’s native XNL token can be used for trade discounts and priority access to limited edition collectables.
Friendly user experience. Each user assigned a wallet for the storing of their collectables. Chronicle handles all the blockchain on the backend.

Why Chronicle?

Chronicle is not only just a marketplace. It offers different services, and it has incorporated attractive token features to build an ecosystem that may potentially attract hundreds of brands, and consequently, millions of users. Let’s dive a bit deeper:

Chronicle Ecosystem

The Chronicle ecosystem is split into two different categories: individual roles and services provided within the Chronicle universe:

Individual Roles

Chronicle Authenticated Collectibles (Traders)

Licensed collectables are developed by Chronicle Studio, which can be sold on the Official Chronicle Store and purchased by collectable traders. Based on brand categories, these collectables can vary in their forms (still images, 3D models, music, videos, etc.), all with an emphasis on creating an immersive experience for the collectable holder.

Chronicle Studio (Creators)

An internal team of 2D and 3D environmental and character artists working at the Chronicle HQ design and develop authenticated collectibles licensed directly from the world’s leading brands sold in the Chronicle Store. Each collectable that the Studio creates, whether extremely rare or common, comes with a Chronicle hologram/watermark for instant recognition and brand verification.

Licensing Partners

License holders of brand IP in partnership with Chronicle will earn a percentage of revenue, typically on the sale of packs and the marketplace transactions. Each license that Chronicle holds is unique, usually dependent on the brand, its owner, history, and fanbase size.

Chronicle Affiliate Partners

Those who scout for official brands introduce and successfully facilitate the landing of major licensing deals for the Chronicle. Typically this can be all licensing agencies for big brands around the world. Scouts will share the revenue from the brand they bring onboard. The percentage is subject to change based on brand valuation and each contract.

Chronicle Revenue Sharing (Crowdfunders)

Individuals looking to earn a share in Chronicle’s revenue can claim a stake by participating in a crowdfunding arrangement for the license onboarding of a brand’s collectables to the Chronicle Universe. Once the brand is successfully onboarded, funders effectively become a minority shareholder of that brand’s collectable assets within the Chronicle Universe and can constantly collect dividends from the revenue generated from that brand within the Chronicle Store. The percentage is subject to change based on brand valuation and funding pool size.

Services within Chronicle

Chronicle Store

The issuance and distribution centre for authenticated digital collectables. All licensed collectables are sold in limited edition sets. There are only a limited number of sets per period (e.g. week, fortnight, month) being sold, and the issuance will be divided into:

Proof of Stake round (XNL)
First come, first served (USD)
Premium auction (subject to each licensing deal).

Chronicle Swap & Brand Token Offering (BTO)

Further enlivening the fan ecosystem, Chronicle allows certified artists and brands to create their loyalty tokens which can be used to redeem unique offerings and privileges of participating in different events, both online and offline, such as exchanging tickets, claiming exclusive products, participating in special events, and auctioning scarce collectables.

Chronicle Swap is a web platform that allows the listing and trading of brand tokens. All brand tokens that have completed their BTO will be automatically listed on Chronicle Swap, and their token can be traded instantly and freely, just like any other cryptocurrency on other Exchanges. Chronicle Swap will be based on a decentralized swapping mechanism, similar to Uniswap and Pancakeswap.

The BTO is the initial offering process of an artist or a brand issuing its token on Chronicle. Brand tokens can be purchased using XNL.

Chronicle Marketplace

Central to its platform, Chronicle’s collectable marketplace allows users to buy, sell, swap, trade, bid, and gift licensed digital collectables from leading brands.

Listing of a collectable for sale, swap, or trade is free, as is gifting a collectable.
Once a buyer takes an order, 2.5% of the deal price will be charged from the seller.

Chronicle Affiliate Partners & Crowdfunders

An affiliate reward system for revenue sharing of big brand licenses launched on Chronicle Store paid directly to:

Affiliate partners, who bring licensing deals now to Chronicle, and
Crowdfunders, who co-invest in licensing pools by staking XNL tokens.

Affiliate Partners

The process of a license finder introducing and securing a brand’s license to Chronicle. Partners can be an individual, company, or any licensing agency around the world. Specific licensing terms will be determined by joint efforts of the Chronicle’s legal team and the affiliate partner. Once Chronicle successfully acquires the license and launches it on Chronicle Store; the affiliate partner will secure a small share of the ongoing sales revenue from the brand they successfully helped to onboard.

Crowdfunders

The process of initiating a crowdfunding campaign for a secured license deal between the License Holder and Chronicle. Based on the deal, Chronicle will assign a valuation for that license and determine the maximum pool size. Users can invest in the pool using XNL tokens

and effectively become Chronicle Funders who will enjoy ongoing dividends of the brand’s sale on Chronicle Store based on their shares of the crowdfunding pool.

Chronicle DAO

A future decentralized platform built by Chronicle where users can create their artist profiles and sell their digital collectables.

Chronicle Certification

An election system that allows users to be certified in different roles.

Certified Brand: a Certified Brand can license their Brand to Chronicle, launch a collectables series on Chronicle DAO Store and access auctions.
Certified Artist: a Certified Artist can join Chronicle DAO Studio.

Chronicle Governance

A voting system for community governance. Specific voting rules will be released in the future.

Chronicle Finance: the financial arm of Chronicle that offers a variety of DeFi products and services, including XNL staking, swap, farm, loan, vault, etc.
Chronicle Trust: an innovative bridging solution for NFT physical items and deNFT digital collectables by placing physical collectables from the real world into custody (e.g. vault), thereby issuing an NFT token.
Chronicle X: A standardized technical solution to support and unify the NFT ecosystem through the development of a protocol for NFTs (i.e. <filename>.nft).

Tokenomics

XNL is Chronicle’s native cryptocurrency. A BEP20 token issued on Binance Smart Chain, XNL denotes users’ rights on Chronicle and is designed to empower the ecosystem and governance over the community. It serves as an ETF-like benchmark index for suggesting the overall value of all NFTs on Chronicle. XNL also is the base trading token, making up with brand tokens into trading pairs which can be traded on Chronicle Swap.

Total Supply: 100,000,000 XNL

Let’s do a breakdown of the token economics and distribution:

Token Utility

Common Utilities

XNL is used for Proof of Stake for the claiming of digital collectable packs.

Community Governance

Eventually, Chronicle will have a community-driven DAO. XNL holders can create and vote for different proposals on Chronicle Vote to guide Chronicle’s development and management from usage of Foundation Reserve to migrate and support other blockchains.

Treasury

Chronicle will use a certain percentage of its net profit to buy back XNL tokens and deposit them into the Treasury for incentivization. The majority of these bought-back XNL tokens will be rewarded back to the XNL holders and Chronicle Medal owners.

Rewards & Bonus

Chronicle will launch different DeFi programs where users can take advantage of their XNL tokens to yield extra interest.

Fees & Discounts

Depending on the amount of XNL being held, users will enjoy discounts on collectable purchases and trades.

Roadmap

Team

Chronicle is composed of a team and advisors who are experts in various fields:

Tim Glover, has worked as a viral marketing and franchise consultant for Universal and Amblin’s Jurassic World franchise creating immersive digital content since 2014. Tim works tirelessly for the fans and is driving the creative arrangements with Chronicle.

Amir Farhand, has been involved as an innovative thought leader and has taken several startups from concept to capital raising. In his advisory capacity, Amir is helping develop the innovative business model behind Chronicle.

Jim Jin, has been an investor in blockchain projects since 2016. Jim has been involved with the tokenomics behind successful projects, such as Thorchain. Jim is overseeing the XNL component behind Chronicle.

Executive and Advisory:

Doug Neil, a senior entertainment executive with over ten years experience in digital marketing for Universal Pictures. Doug oversaw the release of 200+ theatrical titles and established Universal’s presence in an ever-adapting digital world.

Fong Jek Gan founded Jubilee Capital Management and launched one of the earliest Blockchain VC funds in Singapore. He was also an early investor of Smart Valor, the first European digital asset exchange to launch an NFT marketplace.

Lucas Lang founded a number of successful technology and business startups in Australia. He has been an investor on the blockchain since 2018 and is an avid collector of rare items.

Risks

While Chronicle is building a high-end marketplace that will integrate user-centred features that will bring extra value to marketplace adopters, we think there are potential risks to discuss:

Firstly there is a risk that the demand for NFTs will cool down, which would have an effect on every NFT related project in the ecosystem.

Additionally, there is a risk that the more influential brands may be slow to adopt Chronicle due to the complexity of implementing NFTs. Although the team is likely to be able to communicate their ideas in layman terms and focus on the benefits for the organizations, there is of course the concern that Chronicle itself may be difficult for organizations to fully understand and thus integrate into their business model.

Conclusion

Chronicle is building a marketplace for digital collectables from the world’s greatest brands.

While the challenge is enormous, the rewards are even more alluring. Due to the current issues in marketplaces like lack of brand awareness and high fees, and a low token incentive for users, Chronicle has all the weaponry to tackle both problems by using the Binance smart chain, and due to the immense combined knowledge of team members.

Chronicle is expected to be a major contender in the NFT marketplace space, and we hope it can bring together all the major brands worldwide!

Note: 4SV invested in Chronicle. Nothing written in this article should be considered Financial Advice of any kind.