After a general upwards trend from Bitcoin following its February 6 low of US$6,000, today marks the first major downtrend from the cryptocurrency. After nearing $12,000, the coin has dropped significantly, and is currently trading close to $10,700. As is usually the case, the significant drop has caused widespread losses among a majority of altcoins.

Of the 1,516 cryptocurrencies listed on Coinmarketcap.com, only 28 have seen USD gains of 1% or more. While a majority of these coins consist of undocumented market caps, as well as coins with negligible volume and market cap, a top performing member of this group is DigixDAO (DGD), which has seen a USD growth of almost 20%, from close to US$275 to just over $325, as well as BTC and ETH gains of over 30%, and appreciated to a market cap of over US$620 million.

What is DGD?

DigixDao represents one of two cooperating cryptocurrencies, along with Digix Gold (DGX) that currently makes up the umbrella ecosystem, Digix Global. The role of Digix Global is to tokenize physical gold on the Ethereum blockchain, so that gold can be transacted in a manner that is both trustless and massively efficient. Digix utilizes a Proof-of-Asset (PoA) protocol to assign a number of values used to identify the physical gold represented by each DGX token. These values include the time stamp of the creation, the stock keeping unit (SKU) of the gold bar, and the purchase receipt, among other variables. The physical gold is provided by ValueMax Singapore, audited by Bureau Veritas Inspectorate, and stored by Malca-Amit. From there, holders of DGX can claim their gold in person or through the mail.

DGD provides several privileges to its holders. Most importantly, DGD tokens are subject to quarterly dividends accrued from the transaction and minting fees associated with gold registry and usage. In the future, it is likely that more services provided by Digix Global will also account towards the quarterly dividends. Additionally, DGD holders maintain the power to determine direction and funding of future Digix projects.

Last week, Digix Global published their developer report,

which included a successful audit and confirmation that Digix Gold will launch this quarter. Much of this appreciation can be attributed to growing faith in the system as a successful audit has now been documented. Additionally, as the public launch of the DGX functionality is coming increasingly near, it’s likely that holders and potential supporters are now looking to increase their DGD holdings in preparation for the quarterly dividends.

While the missions DigixDAO vary greatly from many other top market cap cryptocurrencies, which primarily consist of upgraded blockchain protocols and even next-generational cryptocurrencies,  the service it provides certainly has merit, and so far, it appears that the project is carrying out its mission in a proper manner.