Pavel Durov rebrands Toncoin as Gram; Telegram ramps TON role

Pavel Durov posted that TON’s native token will be renamed Gram (GRAM). The network will keep the TON name. Durov said there will be no token swap and no technical changes to wallets, user balances, staking positions or decentralized finance contracts.

The rebrand will run for about three weeks and is the fourth of seven items in Durov’s “Make TON Great Again” roadmap. Earlier entries on the roadmap included an upgrade called Catchain 2.0, which introduced sub-second finality, and changes that reduced transaction fees roughly sixfold to near-zero. Telegram has become the largest validator on the chain, with millions of tokens staked.

Gram was the token name in Telegram’s 2018 whitepaper and was used during the project’s initial fundraising, which raised about $1.7 billion before U.S. regulators intervened in 2020. Telegram halted active development at that time, refunded investors and released the code. A community-led effort and the TON Foundation later relaunched the chain under the Toncoin name.

Telegram said the rename will be cosmetic for holders: the underlying ledger and smart contracts will remain unchanged, and wallets, staking contracts and DeFi positions should show no difference after the rebrand. The company plans upgrades to developer tools, a redesigned ton.org, improvements to TON Pay and new liquidity bridges to Bitcoin in the coming weeks.

Market activity earlier this year followed Durov’s May announcements about taking a more active role on the chain. Toncoin prices rose from about $1.30 to peaks near $2.80 amid higher trading volume and increased staking inflows.

“We’re returning to our roots — and starting a new chapter,” Durov wrote on X. The rollout will update public-facing branding and references to the token while leaving the technical structure of the network intact.