Stacks is a Bitcoin layer that adds smart contracts to Bitcoin without changing Bitcoin itself. Its native token, STX, pays for transactions and can be locked to earn Bitcoin rewards through a consensus design called Proof of Transfer. STX is searched heavily because the PoX-5 hard fork went live at Bitcoin block 960,230 on Thursday 30 July 2026.
The search volume is following the price. STX closed Tuesday 18 August 2026 at $0.120005 and closed Monday 24 August 2026 at $0.230377 on CoinGecko, a gain of 91.97% across six sessions, with CoinCodex printing the same window at $0.119927 to $0.236841 for 97.49%. That 5.5 percentage point spread on one identical dated window is nowhere near the largest disagreement in this asset's data.
Stacks at a Glance
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Metric
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Details
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Token name
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Stacks
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Ticker
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STX
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Blockchain
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Stacks, a Bitcoin layer settling to Bitcoin L1
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Contract address
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None. STX is the native gas token of its own chain, not a contract on another network
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Circulating supply
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1,861,158,964 STX read from the Stacks mainnet node at 09:10 UTC Tuesday 25 August 2026
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Maximum supply
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No protocol-enforced cap. CoinGecko lists none. CoinPaprika lists 1,818,000,000, which the live chain figure already exceeds
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Launch date
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Founded as Blockstack in 2013, SEC-qualified Reg A+ offering July 2019, Stacks 2.0 mainnet Thursday 14 January 2021
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Core narrative
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Smart contracts and Bitcoin-denominated yield anchored to Bitcoin settlement, with sBTC carrying BTC onto the chain
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Token type
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Native L1 gas and consensus token, inflationary on a halving-aligned emission schedule
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Primary risks
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No supply cap, price running far beyond chain activity, small initial Bitcoin staking capacity, a ticker shared with a Nasdaq-listed company
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Availability on Phemex
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STX trades as a spot pair. There is no STX perpetual futures contract
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What Is Stacks?
Stacks answers a question Bitcoin deliberately refuses to answer for itself. Bitcoin's scripting language is intentionally limited, which is a security decision rather than an oversight, and it pushes anything needing programmable logic somewhere else. Stacks builds that logic in a separate execution layer while using Bitcoin underneath as the settlement and randomness source.
The mechanism tying the two together is Proof of Transfer, which the Stacks documentation describes in one clean sentence. "Like how Bitcoin PoW miners spend electricity and are rewarded in BTC, Stacks PoX miners spend (already mined) BTC and are rewarded in STX." Miners bid real bitcoin for the right to produce the next Stacks block, and that BTC goes to STX holders who have locked their tokens, a process the network calls stacking. Think of it as renting out your seat at the table. Nothing is minted to pay you, because the yield is recycled miner spending, which is why it arrives denominated in BTC.
Smart contracts on Stacks are written in Clarity, a language the project's own documentation calls "readable and predictable." Clarity is decidable, meaning you can determine what a contract will do before running it, and it trades developer familiarity for auditability on a chain whose entire pitch is Bitcoin-grade caution.
Why Did STX Become Popular?
Two things happened close together, and only one of them is a price event.
The first is governance. SIP-044 and SIP-045 were ratified with 161,443,318 STX and 201,488,528 STX voting in favour against two STX voting no on each, and Stacks published the ratification of SIP-044 and SIP-045 on Tuesday 21 July 2026. Readers who want the machinery behind that kind of vote can start with our explainer on blockchain governance.
The second is that the vote turned into running code, and the claim is verifiable without trusting anyone's press release. PoX-5 activated at Bitcoin block 960,230 on Thursday 30 July 2026, and the Stacks mainnet node's public PoX endpoint returns the active contract identifier SP000000000000000000002Q6VF78.pox-5 with an active flag, running node software version 4.0.1, at Bitcoin block 963,979 as of 09:10 UTC Tuesday 25 August 2026. That is the chain describing its own state, and it is the standard any upgrade claim should meet.
What PoX-5 introduces is Bitcoin Bonds, where eligible participants pair BTC held on Bitcoin L1 with STX on Stacks and earn BTC-denominated yield, with the BTC locked by standard Bitcoin script rather than wrapped or bridged. Stacks announced on Tuesday 11 August 2026 that the first instrument, the Genesis Bond, starts at Bitcoin block 966,350, which is reward cycle 143, and the chain's own arithmetic confirms it, since cycle 142's reward phase begins at Bitcoin block 964,250 and PoX cycles run 2,100 Bitcoin blocks.
Access is deliberately narrow at the start, and Stacks has said broader access "will follow through selected staking pools as capacity expands." A companion piece on this blog covers sBTC itself and how bitcoin moves onto Stacks, which is a separate subject from the token here.
How Does the STX Token Work?
This is where the popular description of STX falls apart, and it is the most useful thing on this page.
STX is widely quoted as having a maximum supply of 1,818,000,000 tokens. It does not. That figure comes from the original supply projection in the project's early economics rather than from a cap the protocol enforces, and the live chain has already passed it. The Stacks mainnet node reported a liquid supply of 1,861,158,963,969,439 microSTX at 09:10 UTC Tuesday 25 August 2026, which works out to 1,861,158,964 STX, or 2.37% above the number many data sites still print in the maximum supply field.
The feeds do not agree with each other either. CoinGecko reports circulating supply of 1,861,007,867 and lists no maximum at all, landing within 0.008% of the chain, while CoinPaprika reports 1,814,620,538 and lists 1,818,000,000 as the maximum. That 46,538,426 STX gap, or 2.56%, propagates into every derived figure. Market cap comes out at $500,265,104 against $488,188,733, and market-cap rank comes out at 107 against 118. Same asset, eleven places apart, because of one supply field.
What the protocol does enforce is a declining emission curve. SIP-029 aligned STX issuance to Bitcoin's halving cadence, stepping the block reward down from 1,000 STX at Bitcoin block 945,000 in April 2026, to 250 at block 1,050,000 in April 2028, to 125 at block 1,260,000 in April 2032, and to 62.5 at block 1,470,000 in April 2036. The proposal states no hard ceiling anywhere. STX is a disinflationary token, which is a different asset class from a capped one, and our guide to token inflation and vesting schedules covers why that distinction shows up in price over multi-year holds.
Stacks vs Bitcoin
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Category
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Stacks
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Bitcoin
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Main identity
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Smart contract layer settling to Bitcoin
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Base settlement and monetary network
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Blockchain
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Own chain, leader election anchored in Bitcoin transactions
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Own chain, no dependency on any other network
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Core value driver
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Application activity, sBTC volume, Bitcoin-denominated yield demand
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Monetary premium and settlement security
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Supply model
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Disinflationary, no enforced cap, halving-aligned step-downs
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Hard cap of 21,000,000 with halvings every 210,000 blocks
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Market maturity
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Roughly $500M market cap, rank 107 to 118 depending on the feed
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Largest crypto asset by market cap and liquidity
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Risk profile
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Small-cap execution risk on a bootstrap product
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Regulatory and macro risk on an established asset
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The comparison people actually run is not Stacks against Bitcoin, since Stacks is a bet on Bitcoin succeeding rather than against it. It is Stacks against the other Bitcoin layers, and we have already covered how Stacks compares with Citrea and Bitcoin Hyper. If your mental model for layers comes from Ethereum, read that alongside our overview of Ethereum Layer 2 solutions, because the security assumptions differ.
What Can Move the STX Price?
Genesis Bond Enrollment at Bitcoin Block 966,350
The nearest dated catalyst is dated in block height rather than calendar time, which is the correct way to state it. At Bitcoin block 963,979 the network sat 2,371 blocks away, roughly sixteen days at ten-minute intervals. Block estimates drift, so treat the height as the commitment and any date as an approximation.
How Much Bitcoin Actually Shows Up
Bitcoin Bonds only matter if bitcoin arrives. Capacity is capped during the bootstrap phase and access starts with institutional participants, so watch BTC committed against available capacity in the first few reward cycles rather than the announcement itself.
Bitcoin Itself
STX is a high-beta expression of Bitcoin adoption, and when BTC sells off, layer tokens sell off harder. The yield story does nothing to protect you from that. Readers new to the base asset can start with our primer on what Bitcoin is.
Chain Activity, and the Gap It Shows
DefiLlama recorded Stacks chain TVL at $72,308,078 on Tuesday 18 August 2026 and $85,751,212 on Monday 24 August 2026, a rise of 18.59%. Over the identical window the token gained 91.97%. Activity grew, and price grew roughly five times faster, which is the honest summary of what has happened here.
Risks of Buying or Trading Stacks
There Is No Maximum Supply to Anchor To
Every valuation model assuming a 1,818,000,000 ceiling is working from a number the chain already passed. Model a supply curve rather than a cap, and expect data sites to keep printing the old figure for a while yet.
The Price Has Outrun the Chain
A 91.97% move against 18.59% TVL growth over six sessions is not a fundamentals-led repricing. It may become one. As of Monday 24 August 2026 it is narrative-led, and STX still sits about 93% below its all-time high of $3.86, set on Monday 1 April 2024, which is what a contested category that already had one cycle of disappointment looks like on a chart.
Bitcoin Staking Is a Bootstrap, Not a Product Launch
Capacity is limited and the first bond is institutional. Retail readers buying STX expecting to earn BTC yield the moment Bitcoin block 966,350 arrives will find the door narrower than the headlines suggest.
The Data Feeds Disagree More Than Traders Assume
Two of the largest aggregators sit 17.2% apart on 24-hour volume, reporting $80,517,186 against $68,722,605 at the same timestamp, 2.56% apart on supply, and eleven ranks apart on market cap. Any single-feed screenshot quoted about STX is one of several defensible numbers rather than the number.
The Ticker Belongs to Something Else Too
STX is the Nasdaq ticker for Seagate Technology Holdings plc, CIK 1137789 in the SEC's own company register. Search results, broker screens and news alerts mix the two constantly, so confirm you are looking at the Stacks token before acting on what a ticker search returns.
How to Research Stacks Safely
Go to the chain before you go to an aggregator. The Stacks mainnet node exposes its PoX state publicly and reports the active contract version, the reward cycle, the burn block height and the liquid supply. That single call settles the supply question two major data sites answer differently.
Compare two feeds on every derived number and print the spread yourself. If they disagree by more than a rounding error, the disagreement is the finding, and on STX the volume spread runs above 17%, which is large enough to change how a position gets sized. Anchor the move itself to dated closes rather than rolling windows, because a rolling 7-day figure read at 09:05 UTC Tuesday 25 August 2026 printed 125.95% on CoinGecko and 126.48% on CoinPaprika.
And read the proposal rather than a summary of it. Emission schedules, activation heights and supply rules live in the SIPs themselves, which are public documents. A price-analysis site claiming an upgrade is live is not evidence, while a node returning pox-5 as its active contract is.
Is Stacks a Good Investment?
The bull case is coherent, which is more than can be said for most tokens that double in a week. Stacks has a working chain, a ratified upgrade that is live and verifiable on-chain, a yield mechanism paying in bitcoin instead of in its own inflation, and a dated forward catalyst at Bitcoin block 966,350.
The bear case is arithmetic. A roughly $500 million market cap against $85.75 million of chain TVL on Monday 24 August 2026 values the token near six times the assets deployed on the network it secures, the supply has no ceiling, and the price already moved 91.97% before the first Bitcoin Bond enrolled anyone. Nobody can tell you where it goes from here, and anyone offering a target is guessing. STX is a small-cap infrastructure position carrying execution risk rather than a Bitcoin proxy, and size it accordingly.
Final Thoughts
The number settling the Stacks question is not the price chart. It is how much bitcoin gets committed to Bitcoin Bonds in the first reward cycles after Bitcoin block 966,350, because that is the figure turning a ratified proposal into a business. If committed BTC scales and chain TVL follows it upward from the $85,751,212 recorded on Monday 24 August 2026, the valuation stops looking stretched. If capacity fills slowly and TVL flatlines while the token holds above $0.23, the gap between a 91.97% price move and an 18.59% activity move closes the way those gaps usually do. Watch the block height, not the headlines.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does STX have a maximum supply?
No, and this is the single most repeated error about the token. The live chain supply of 1,861,158,964 STX has already moved above the 1,818,000,000 figure some data sites list as a maximum, and issuance declines on a halving-aligned schedule under SIP-029 instead of stopping at a ceiling.
Is stacking STX the same as staking on Ethereum or Solana?
No, and the difference matters. Proof of Stake validators are paid in newly issued tokens of the same chain, while Stacks stackers are paid in bitcoin that miners already spent to bid for blocks. There is also no slashing of your STX for validator downtime in the way Ethereum applies it.
Can I trade STX on Phemex?
Phemex lists STX as a spot pair, so buying and holding the token directly is straightforward. There is no STX perpetual futures contract, so traders wanting leveraged exposure to the Bitcoin layer theme have to express it through Bitcoin futures rather than through STX directly.
Why do CoinGecko and CoinPaprika rank Stacks differently?
They use different circulating supply figures and market cap is price multiplied by supply, so a 2.56% supply difference produces a $12 million market cap difference and eleven places of separation in the rankings.
This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial or investment advice. Cryptocurrency trading involves substantial risk. Always conduct your own research before making trading decisions.
