Research summary:
This research report is focused on Shopping.io which is considered as one of the upcoming projects with great potential. We will focus on how the project works, how it adds value, and review its pros and cons.
The CMP is $111 as of 14th May 2021.
What is Shopping.io?
Shopping.io is a convenience-based project which allows crypto users to interact with the top major e-commerce platforms in one place and pay with the popular cryptocurrencies. Their objective is to increase the adoption of cryptocurrency.
The project is essentially a dropshipping operation that is focused on the American market. A dropshipping operation is explained below.
To better understand the image above, the online store is shopping.io & Dropshipping suppliers are the top e-commerce platforms.
They have a supply limit of 1 million tokens out of which 95% of the tokens are in circulation. It is ranked #353 in the cryptocurrency market and is on listed Uniswap, Kucoin, and Bilaxy.
What problem is it solving?
Lack of crypto adoption: Currently there aren’t many options to use cryptocurrency to purchase products from any of the major e-commerce platforms. You have to convert them to fiat before making a purchase. Shopping.io solves this issue, by bringing together all the major e-commerce platforms at its platform & by accepting over 100 digital assets.
It achieves this by integrating not 1 but 3 crypto payment processors at their payment gateway. They are Utrust, Crypto.com PAY, and CoinPayments.
A user can also pay with their native token (SPI) as well as other partnership tokens to avail an additional 2% discount on your order.
This project also adds value by providing discounts (more on this coming up).
How does Shopping.io work now?
Unlike many projects which are still in the idea phase, shopping.io is live, operating, and extremely easy to use.
To use the service, you need to sign up with 1 of the following plans.
Each plan comes with discounts (On all orders) and order limits. The native token is integrated with their service in such a way that, the more SPI you hold the more perks you get.
So let’s say you sign up with the free version.
You will get access to all the major marketplace at the same spot (Image below).
Once you choose the products you want to purchase, you can pay via any of the following crypto payment processors.
What are the growth prospects for the project?
The widespread adoption of the internet along with smartphones across the globe has resulted in a huge boost to e-commerce sales that is likely to continue. As of 2018, the annual e-commerce sales were $25.6 trillion and there is no sign of stopping. (Source – United nations conference on trade and development).
Given that this project focuses on processing sales from the e-commerce platforms, it has excellent prospect because Shopping.io has a market capitalization of $113 million and is trying to process a fraction of the $25.6 trillion e-commerce sales with the added incentive of 5% – 10% discount on all orders.
What is the coin used for?
Shopping.io’s native token is SPI and has multiple utilities, but most of its utilities kick in once you own a certain quantity of SPI.
Discounts: If you hold at least 3000 USD worth of SPI, you will be eligible for a 5% discount on transactions. And if you hold at least 1000 SPI, you will be eligible for a 10% discount on all orders. Along with free shipping within the USA.
Order limits: There is a limit to the number of orders that can be placed from Shopping.io. If you hold 3000 USD worth of SPI, then you can order 40 products per month (If you hold no tokens, your order limit is 20 per month) and if you hold 1000 SPI, you order 100 products per month.
Staking: You can stake your SPI for additional returns. However, the staking isn’t in favour of users with a short-term investment horizon. Also prepare to spend 10% entry and 10% exit fees.
Media and community strength:
Shopping.io has a budding community, with 46.3k Twitter followers, 13k telegram members. They however don’t have a strong media presence, with only a few articles written regarding them. On YouTube, there is a mix of positive videos along with videos that question the legitimacy of the project.
Team analysis:
Given the nature of shopping.io’s operations (Dropshipping), It is great to see they have a team made of dropshipping veterans. Mr. Arbel Arif (the owner) owns 8 stores on eBay with 100K live products and is known to be quite well connected in the e-commerce industry.
Conclusion
Pros:
- Shopping.io is an innovative project which is operational and has a sky-high potential due to the ever-booming e-commerce sales. They are currently addressing one of the biggest issues with cryptocurrency, which is the ability to use it as a currency. It also has one of the most simple and pleasant user experiences.
Cons:
1 If Amazon, eBay, or any other cryptocurrency starts accepting cryptocurrency as a mode of payment from a list of operational crypto payment processors, then shopping.io loses some of its edge.
2 Currently, Shopping.io offers a 5% and a 10% discount (If you hold a certain amount of SPI) on all orders. A 10% discount is limited to only 500 users, which is a very small number of users. So if 500 people do sign up for the pro plan (Which gives you the 10% discount perk). The project can no longer advertise it.
3 The reason why they can keep giving a 5% discount on all orders is also not comforting. After interacting with the project’s representative, I was told the following.
“Arbel, owner of this project is a veteran in dropshipping since 2007. He also has a few businesses besides shopping.io including domain names, SEO, dropshipping, crypto, etc. Arbel also owns 8 stores on eBay with 100K live products. He is the owner of an amazon private label called Amazing Shower Curtains as well. So, getting discounts for items is not a big deal for us”
4 The utility of the token does not kick in if you have less than 3000 USD worth of SPI and the media presence isn’t strong.
Please keep in mind that the conclusion points are simply our current observations, and are likely to be easily fixed.
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