What is Gnosis (GNO)? It is the staking and governance token of a community-owned, EVM-compatible network, Gnosis Chain, and of a wider set of Ethereum-aligned products. The chain runs Ethereum's consensus client software with Gnosis-specific parameters, uses GNO for staking, and uses xDAI as its gas token.
At the snapshot time, GNO traded at $106.52, up 0.28% over 24 hours, with a market cap of $281.16M (rank #204) and 24h volume of $967,823. The all-time high is $644.20, and the current price is 83.47% below it.
Core technology and blockchain architecture
Gnosis Chain uses a composite design. The Execution Layer is the legacy xDai network, and the Consensus Layer is the Gnosis Beacon Chain, which launched its Epoch 0 on 8 December 2021. The chain has a chain ID of 100, 5-second blocks, and 80-second epochs.
The network moved from proof-of-authority to proof-of-stake in the Merge, completed in December 2022. It supports Nethermind, Erigon, Reth and Geth as execution clients, and Nimbus, Lighthouse, Teku and Lodestar as consensus clients.
Protocol upgrades
The Pectra upgrade activated on Gnosis mainnet on 30 April 2025. The Fusaka upgrade activated on 14 April 2026, with a participation drop of about 6% from nodes that had not updated and no chain downtime, according to the Q2 2026 quarterly report. The next target is Glamsterdam.
Primary use cases and real-world applications
Gnosis Chain is used for low-cost payments and DeFi activity, with fees typically under one cent. Its stablecoins include ZCHF, BRLA, BRZ and ZARP. The gas token, xDAI, is USD-pegged and USDS-backed.
The ecosystem's main products are:
- Safe: Smart-account and multisig infrastructure, spun out in 2022 under GIP-29 and governed by SafeDAO. The gnosis.io site reports more than 63 million smart accounts on Safe.
- CoW Protocol: A batch-auction DEX designed to protect trades from MEV, spun out to CoW DAO under GIP-13.
- Circles: A trust-graph currency launched in May 2025 that uses CoW Protocol for trade execution.
- Gnosis Pay: A self-custodial Visa card built on Safe accounts. It recorded 561,252 payments in Q2 2026, down 0.4% from the previous quarter.
- Gnosis App: A consumer app combining Safe, Gnosis Pay, Circles and CoW Protocol.
Gnosis Chain processed 25,818,351 transactions in Q2 2026, up 36.5% from Q1.
Who is behind Gnosis and where is it based?
Founders and key people
Gnosis was founded in 2015 by Martin Köppelmann and Stefan George to build prediction markets on Ethereum. Köppelmann is identified as Co-Founder and CEO, and George as Co-Founder and CTO. Friederike Ernst is listed as COO by Crunchbase and as a co-founder by Private Equity International, so her title differs across sources. None of the reviewed sources confirm Allan Niemerg as a founder or role-holder.
The team is publicly identified rather than anonymous. Gnosis was part of ConsenSys before a spin-out in April 2017, according to a 2021 fundamental review.
Project history
- April 2017: The GNO token sale ran as a modified Dutch auction on 24 April 2017 and raised $12.5M.
- 2020: GnosisDAO launched.
- November 2021: The xDai and GnosisDAO communities voted to combine their ecosystems into Gnosis Chain, a process that drew community disputes.
- December 2022: The Merge moved the chain to proof-of-stake.
Legal entity and location
The principal operating company is Gnosis Ltd, registered in Gibraltar under company number 115571, with its registered office at World Trade Center, 6 Bayside Road, GX11 1AA. Gnosis Ltd describes itself as a software development company that contributes to the ecosystem, and states that it is not GnosisDAO and does not manage it. GnosisDAO documentation says Gnosis Ltd became a company limited by guarantee in December 2024. A registry profile describes it differently, so the corporate form is not fully settled in the sources.
Most sources place the company in Gibraltar. Private Equity International is the only source found that describes a Berlin base. The sources do not consistently confirm where the team works day to day.
Tokenomics
GNO has a target total supply of 3,000,000 tokens. GIP-35, voted on 3 February 2022, reduced the target from 10,000,000, a 70% reduction. The snapshot shows 2,639,589 GNO in circulation.
- Vesting: About 80% of the original supply was placed in an 8-year linear vesting contract starting in November 2020, which runs to roughly 2028.
- Burns: GIP-116, approved in January 2025, burned 3.15M GNO from the vesting contract.
- Fee burns: GnosisDAO documentation says base fees burn GNO under EIP-1559, and also says transaction fees are paid in xDAI. The sources do not reconcile these two statements.
- Distribution: Historical allocations went to investors, the team, ConsenSys and the Gnosis Vault. The founder reportedly said 10% of tokens would incentivize the team, though this is unverified.
- Issuance: The sources reviewed describe no ongoing issuance schedule. The documented supply changes are the GIP-35 reduction and the GIP-116 burn.
- Treasury: A GIP-150 forum proposal from April 2026, which has not been adopted, cites 1,335,542 GNO held by the DAO.
Consensus mechanism and network security model
Gnosis Chain is a proof-of-stake network. Validators stake GNO, earn rewards for their duties, and can be slashed for malicious or disruptive behavior. The chain uses LMD-GHOST for head selection and Casper FFG for finalization, which requires two-thirds of stake.
The minimum stake is 1 GNO per validator, and bulk deposits of up to 128 validators are supported. Staking yield was reported at about 8.5% in 2026, and 334,900 GNO were staked at the end of Q2 2026. Gnosis documentation recommends that operators choose a minority client, because a majority-client failure would put the network at risk.
Reported validator counts vary widely by source and by whether total or active validators are measured, so no single figure is reliable.
Key partnerships and ecosystem integrations
- Dappnode: Described by Gnosis documentation as a partner and service provider for the Beacon Chain.
- Shutter Network: Provides a shutterized mempool for Gnosis Chain.
- Ethereum Economic Zone: Gnosis is co-leading the EEZ framework. An October 2026 test, led by Gnosis and Zisk with Ethereum Foundation funding, executed a 0.001 ETH atomic transaction from Ethereum mainnet to a layer-2 network.
- Zodiac: Gnosis Pay uses the Zodiac delay module. A critical bug in the module caused a multi-day service halt in early June 2026, and the Q2 report says over 99% of users were restored within a week.
Competitive advantages and unique value proposition
- Low barrier to validation: Gnosis states that only 1 GNO is needed to run a validator, compared with 32 ETH for home staking on Ethereum.
- Stable, low-cost gas: Fees are paid in xDAI, and the network claims sub-cent fees.
- Ethereum tooling compatibility: The chain runs Ethereum client software, so existing EVM tools and wallets work with it.
- Product lineage: Safe, CoW Protocol and Gnosis Pay were all incubated within the Gnosis ecosystem.
Gnosis markets 100% uptime, but this claim has not been independently verified.
Current development activity and roadmap highlights
GnosisDAO approved GIP-153 on 19 August 2026, with 123,158 votes for, 115 against and 151 abstaining. Under the proposal:
- Gnosis Chain would become the first EEZ instance, a ZK-proven rollup that settles to Ethereum.
- The chain would produce blocks every two seconds and prove state every Ethereum block.
- The Gnosis Chain validator set would be sunset, with Ethereum validators providing settlement security.
- Genesis is targeted for December 2026 or January 2027. The approval is a direction-level mandate, not final funding or design sign-off.
- Full EEZ specifications are expected during 2027.
Other active proposals include GIP-152, which proposes spinning out the Gnosis App, and GIP-155, which proposes a governance overhaul. GIP-154 asks GnosisDAO to fund Gnosis Ltd with $15M in stablecoins over 12 months from 1 September 2026. Validator hardware reduction is discussed in the GIP-153 thread, but no confirmed specification appears in the sources.