The Toncoin (TON) blockchain has undergone a significant technological upgrade with the activation of Catchain 2.0, leading to an immediate 5% price surge to approximately $1.30. The upgrade, announced by Telegram co-founder Pavel Durov, slashes block times from about 10 seconds to just 400 milliseconds, enabling near-instant transaction settlement and faster decentralized application performance.
The validator vote for the upgrade concluded on April 8-9, 2026, with major exchanges like Binance and Bithumb performing wallet maintenance to support the change. While the main chain block reward remains at 1.7 TON, the faster block production rate is projected to increase the network's annual inflation from 0.6% to 3.6% as validators earn more rewards per cycle.
Durov framed this as the first of seven steps in his "Make TON Great Again" (MTONGA) plan, with the next step aiming to reduce transaction fees by approximately sixfold.
This technical momentum coincides with notable on-chain activity. According to data from Santiment, the 100 largest Toncoin whale addresses have accumulated 189,730 TON over the past three months. This accumulation occurred despite TON losing nearly two-thirds of its market capitalization since its local peak in August 2025, suggesting long-term confidence from large holders during the downturn.
The ecosystem is also expanding its reach. Rakuten Wallet announced it will add TON for spot trading starting April 15, 2026, providing regulated access to Japanese retail investors. Further institutional support includes a partnership between the TON Foundation and SCRYPT for Swiss-regulated USDT access, and enterprise wallet infrastructure from Fireblocks and Dynamic for Telegram-based financial products.
Technically, the price move was accompanied by a more than 35% increase in trading volume to $130.1 million. Key indicators turned positive, with the MACD line crossing above its signal line and the price moving above all three Alligator indicator lines. The next significant resistance level is seen around $1.3168.
