Monero

Monero receives a C+ risk grade (40/100) from Hindenrank, where lower scores indicate lower risk. Moderate risk — FCMP++ Trail of Bits audit completed (May 2026, no critical findings disclosed) and THORChain XMR mainnet live provide positive development signals. Regulatory risk escalated as EU MiCA custodial ban phases in through 2027, UAE enacted a platform-level ban, and Monero was directly cited in the May 2026 THORChain hack laundering trail. The RandomX hashrate concentration vulnerability persists structurally despite Qubic's exit. Monero is the leading privacy-focused cryptocurrency, using mandatory ring signatures, stealth addresses, and RingCT to make all transactions private by default. With a market cap of approximately $7.6 billion, XMR ranks among the top 20 cryptocurrencies. Its C+ grade reflects the 2025 51% attacks — which the Qubic mining pool executed but has since exited as of April 2026 — alongside 73 exchange delistings due to regulatory pressure on privacy coins. These risks are balanced by 10+ years of operation, a fair-launch distribution, active development momentum (Ring Signature v3 deployed March 2026, FCMP++ beta stressnet live with audit in progress), and a tail emission model providing permanent mining incentives.

The key risks identified for Monero are: (1) In August-September 2025, Qubic's mining pool captured over 51% of Monero's RandomX hashrate through dual-mining incentives, executing chain reorganizations of 6 and 18 blocks. Kraken halted XMR deposits during the incidents. Qubic exited Monero mining on April 1, 2026, transitioning to Dogecoin, which removes the immediate threat actor. However, the CPU-friendly RandomX algorithm remains theoretically capturable by any future dual-mining scheme offering sufficient secondary economic incentives. (2) Monero faced 73 exchange delistings in 2025, including Binance globally and Kraken in parts of Europe. EU MiCA Article 79 explicitly bans custodying anonymity-enhancing coins across all 27 EU member states, with full implementation by 2027; UAE/Dubai enacted a platform-level ban in early 2026. THORChain XMR mainnet launched in May 2026 providing non-custodial swap access, but THORChain itself suffered a $10.8M exploit days after the integration and Monero was cited in the attacker's pre-attack laundering trail. Liquidity increasingly depends on P2P and DEX venues, which offer lower volume and wider spreads than centralized exchanges. (3) All Monero transactions are mandatory private — there is no transparent mode. This means the total circulating supply cannot be independently verified from the blockchain. Supply integrity depends entirely on the mathematical soundness of ring signatures and RingCT. A cryptographic flaw could allow undetectable inflation. (4) The tail emission of 0.6 XMR per block provides a permanent security budget, but at current prices the total annual miner revenue may be insufficient to prevent hashrate concentration, as the 2025 attacks demonstrated.

Monero scores 40/100 across eight risk dimensions: Mechanism Novelty: 3/15, Interaction Severity: 6/20, Oracle Surface: 0/10, Documentation Gaps: 3/10, Track Record: 8/15, Scale Exposure: 9/10, Regulatory Risk: 8/10, Vitality Risk: 3/10. The highest risk area is Scale Exposure at 9/10.

Among 58 rated L1 protocols on Hindenrank, Monero ranks #44 by safety (lowest risk score = safest). Its 40/100 risk score and C+ grade place it among the riskier L1 protocols.

Monero scores 8/15 on the Track Record risk dimension, indicating some history of security incidents or exploits. Higher scores reflect more severe or frequent incidents. Review the full risk report for details.