Travala (AVA): Booking a Price Increase?

Travelling in the COVID era is not a good idea. And although the pandemic is gradually fading away, many borders still remain closed, and travelers often face many inconveniences. It is all the more surprising that Travala crypto booking (AVA token) continued to thrive even in the midst of this disgrace.

Flights are not in a dream, but in reality

Startup Travala appeared in 2017, having raised a "modest" $2.6 mln via ICO. This platform is a fairly typical booking service. Users can book a hotel, a flight (this opportunity appeared just a few months ago), or, say, a theater ticket. The number of all possible options is over three million. These impressive funds are the result of many partnerships with “traditional” firms like Tripadvisor and Booking.com.

However, the platform accepts dozens of popular cryptocurrencies, and their number is constantly growing. So, on March 15, the system has the ability to pay with Monero tokens (XMR). Of course, traditional payment methods like credit cards or PayPal are also supported. Excessive volatility of cryptocurrencies is the biggest sticking point to integrating with everyday life that is bypassed by converting funds into stablecoins.

However, the developers state that crypto technologies not only provide additional ways to pay for a ticket, but help solve many problems – from fake reviews and discounts for buyers to low margins of service providers. For example, users are encouraged to write reviews thanks to the corresponding award in the AVA, which removes the well-known problem of "negative motivation".

Travala owners are also very proud of their "best price" program. Its conditions do not differ from similar programs – with the difference only that the client will also receive the difference between the "best" price and Travala's offer in the AVA token.

Flying token

AVA performs on the Binance blockchain in the BEP-2 format and on the Binance Smart Chain in the BEP-20 format. Developers buy a part of the tokens, equal to 20% of the profit, every quarter – a scheme reminiscent of Binance. The ultimate goal is to burn 21,571,086 coins, and bring their total to a tidy sum of 40 mln.

There is a staking in the form of a "Smart Program" – the user can block up to 5 000 tokens on his account, which will allow him to receive not only discounts and bonuses, but also up to 50 AVA to his wallet at the beginning of each month.

AVA hasn't escaped the DeFi fad – since August last year, the token has been used in the Bidaochain ecosystem as a collateral asset. This means that Bidaochain users will be able to lock AVA tokens in the system in order to receive a local stablecoin BAI in return.

Perhaps the main reason for Travala's stability is its close cooperation with Binance, which became strategic after the merger of booking with Travelbybit, an affiliate of Binance. True, it has not yet reached the point of buying a startup by the crypto exchange, rumors about this have been circulating for a long time. But Travala has already integrated the recently launched Binance Pay payment service. In turn, the exchange listed AVA in August 2020.

High flying bird

Fluctuations in the AVA rate have been very positive lately. At the end of May 2018, this token started at a price of $0.277 and soon dropped even lower, to levels like $0.058 in October of the same year. But growth began in May 2020 and continues to this day. Of course, it is largely due to market conditions – but not entirely. If on May 10, 2020 the price of AVA was only 11 cents, then on August 10 it was already $1.70. At the time of this writing, the price is about $3 – an increase of about 50% since the beginning of last month.

Should you invest in AVA? On the one hand, it is doubtful that this cryptocurrency will ever "take off to the Moon", as it happened with DeFi projects at one time. There are simply no prerequisites for this. On the other hand, AVA's chances of collapsing to the bottom are also relatively small: its price is supported not by trends or promising technologies that may not “shoot”, but by a really working service, the stable growth of which, in theory, will entail an increase in the AVA price.

At least for now, it works like this – in February, Travala developers said their annual revenues were up 137%. But COVID restrictions will be off one day, which should lead to the revival of tourism. So, investing in the largest crypto booking service seems to be a matter, much less risky than investing in projects usually reviewed – unless a "miracle" like another serious market crash will happen.