Stellar price spikes 15 percent following Lightnet funding round

Stellar (XLM)—one of the market’s top 20 cryptocurrencies—has shot up by more than 15 percent in the last day and is now trading for approximately $0.0617 per coin.

That’s a 35 percent jump from the price of Stellar stood at the start of last week—which itself was a 10 percent hike from the previous day. Like most other cryptocurrencies at the moment, Stellar appears to be enjoying a bit of a bullish run.

Just two months ago, that was a different story. Stellar was one of several coins struggling through bear country, having lost more than five percent and trading at its lowest point since October.

But new developments on the Stellar network could be responsible for the coin’s recent good fortune. Stellar blockchain platform Lightnet—based in Thailand—recently garnered more than $31 million in funding, which it will use to enhance its payment system in Southern Asia.

Lightnet has also stated that it will add several remittance services to its platform, including MoneyGram, which—oddly enough—is partnered with Stellar competitor Ripple. Lightnet said it's looking to handle as much as $50 billion in annual global transactions by the year 2023.

Meanwhile, the rest of the crypto market is similarly on an upward trend. Bitcoin is currently trading for just below $9,000 per coin, while Ethereum is up 4 percent and priced at just over $170 per token.