2017 was the year of irrational exuberance. 2018 became the
2017 was the year of irrational exuberance.
2018 became the year of reality checks with crashes and sputters in the market.
Will 2019 see a return back for cryptocurrencies?
Well, the truth is, nobody knows yet!
As the global market deflate, it not just brings down the price of bitcoin, but also keeps it low because the deflation will cause investors to move out of the perceived risk investment into something that is more stable.
Currently, bitcoin has become a very risky investment.
But when the world’s governments commence to do helicopter drops of freshly printed fiats to recover their failing economies, that’s when bitcoin will be seen as GOLD.
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ICOs’ Real Promise
The crazy bull market of 2017 and early 2018, and the commendation of ICOs (Initial Coin Offerings) had such a perplexing effect that we had a great migration away from the values and principles of a decentralized economy to get-rich-quick scheme throughout the world.
That got people really sucked!
When done right, ICOs are actually very promising. The most exciting thing we learned from the success of Bitcoin is that cryptocurrencies have the unique ability to align all the users and investors through direct participation and incentives.
Cryptocurrencies make stakeholders feel invested in the success of a project which results in creating a powerful network effect.
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The First Breakout Killer App
This is the year in which we may see the first proof point of a project, which breakout killer app where users are aligned inside the token economy.
That’s because they actually feel like they own a part of the project.
And you know what?
That may come from a place we don’t expect, like Gaming. Yes, we are most likely to see the interesting breakout dApp in games, take Tamagotchi for example.
Blockchain in gaming industry has already given a knock.
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The Emergency of Stable Currencies
In 2019, we will see more stablecoins bridging the gap to mass adoption.
We will see a class of creative new financial products leveraging stablecoins for counteracting the perceived volatility issues which cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are dealing with.
Though it’s not necessarily the original vision of cryptocurrency, yet it’s a great gateway for getting people comfortable with virtual assets.
This will also result in a very positive effect on the enhanced adoption of Bitcoin as well as other networks.
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Middle Ground Hunt
There’s no denying that we are reaching a bit of a hybridization point where projects are seeking success in the middle ground, where they are neither the Libertarian of complete decentralization nor highly centralized systems.
And, that’s fine!
But the emergence of a hybrid can be seen with the things like delegated proof-of-stake and Hashgraph that is more decentralized than a centralized system, however, not as decentralized as a Proof of Work (PoW) network like Bitcoin.
The tradeoffs are evident in these networks, but they have a good chance of success to reach businesses that need to be able to scale, have a dependable framework to work on and that they are decentralized enough for those needs.
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Final Thought
Something needs to drive the demand in the industry, and that’s the truth.
You can have all the supply in the world, if you have demand. But if you don’t, then it’s not going to get you anywhere.
Currently, the exciting stuff is the innovation and competition happening on the public networks. We are most likely to find the use cases we never gave a thought about owing to the permissionless nature of public blockchain systems.
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