Pavel Durov says Telegram will replace the TON Foundation and become the network’s largest validator as part of a ‘Make TON Great Again’ roadmap.
Toncoin (TON) rallied roughly 33% to an intraday high of $1.90 after Telegram founder Pavel Durov said the messaging app will replace the TON Foundation as the driving force behind The Open Network and become its largest validator.
The token last changed hands at $1.80, up about 26% on the day, with 24-hour trading volume above $906 million, according to CoinGecko. The rally lifted TON’s market cap to roughly $4.8 billion, though the token remains around 78% below its all-time high of $8.25, set in September 2024.
In a post on Telegram, Durov said TON fees have fallen sixfold to nearly zero and that the next step is for Telegram to take over from the TON Foundation as the network’s driving force, with the focus shifting toward “tech superiority.” A redesigned ton.org, new developer tools, and performance upgrades are expected within two to three weeks. Durov framed the move as step three of a seven-step “Make TON Great Again” (MTONGA) roadmap, and the ton.org domain now displays a holding page referencing the same initiative.
Pushing back on centralization concerns, Durov argued in a follow-up post on X that Telegram becoming TON’s largest validator actually strengthens decentralization by encouraging other major players to join the validator pool, with Telegram serving as a counterbalance.
From Foundation to Corporate Stewardship
The shift marks a sharp reversal for a project whose governance has long been deliberately separated from Telegram. The Switzerland-based TON Foundation has acted as the network’s primary coordinator since 2021, after Telegram abandoned the original Telegram Open Network in 2020 following an SEC enforcement action that forced it to return $1.2 billion to investors and pay an $18.5 million fine.
The relationship deepened in stages. In early 2024, Telegram launched an ad-sharing program that pays channel owners 50% of ad revenue in TON. The network went on to become 2024’s fastest-growing major Layer 1, with TVL peaking near $800 million that summer.
That trajectory broke in August 2024 when French authorities arrested Durov at Le Bourget airport on charges including complicity in drug trafficking and failure to moderate illegal content on Telegram. The token cratered, and TON’s TVL fell roughly 30% in the days that followed.
Despite the price action, TON’s on-chain activity remains a fraction of its 2024 peak. DefiLlama data shows the network’s DeFi TVL at just over $69 million, far below its 2024 high of nearly $800 million.
The latest push builds on the Catchain 2.0 upgrade activated April 9, which cut block production times from about 2.5 seconds to 400 milliseconds, and the May 1 fee reduction to a base cost of roughly $0.0005 per transaction.
Ecosystem Tokens Rip
The rally extended across Telegram-linked tokens.
Notcoin (NOT) gained nearly 26%, Dogs (DOGS) more than doubled, and memecoin UTYA jumped over 140% on the day, according to CoinGecko.
This article was written with the assistance of AI workflows. All our stories are curated, edited and fact-checked by a human.
