Looking forward - The Mother of all 2020 Crypto Outlooks
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“Life is nothing but a competition to be the criminal rather than the victim” - Bertrand Russell
Given that it is a new year and a new decade to boot, it is probably a good time to look at some 2020 ‘outlook-for-crypto’ posts. Since there are a ton of crypto outlook pieces being published anyways, instead of creating something from scratch, we decided to curate and summarize some of the better ones we found.
Bloomberg Outlook:
Bloomberg posits that bitcoin will further solidify its status as store-of-value and digital gold. With gold prices widely expected to rise in 2020, bitcoin could track gold’s price next year, albeit with a much higher volatility
The recent spike in the prices of both bitcoin and gold after the rise in geopolitical tensions between Iran and the US supports the hypothesis. Among cryptocurrencies, BTC is expected to outperform a majority of altcoins as it did in 2019
As the bitcoin futures market matures, we can see more institutional participation and a subsequent reduction in BTC’s price volatility.
Other predictions include stablecoin Tether ($4.5Bn market cap) usurping XRP ($8.2Bn market cap) to become the third largest digital currency. Check out the full report here
Brian Armstrong (@Brian Armstrong) (outlook for 2020s):
In his outlook post for the next decade, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong stated that blockchain adoption could reach 1B users by the end of the decade, from 50M now, driven by the emerging markets, where financial systems are still evolving, and also from a crop of new crypto first startups producing products people want
As the market matures, Armstrong expects consolidation to happen in terms of developer mind share, user base and market cap. There will be as many tokens as there are companies/open source projects/DAOs/charities in the world (so millions) but only a handful of chains will power the underlying infrastructure for these. The winning chains will likely follow a power law distribution on outcomes, just like any other industry
With respect to CBDCs, following China’s digital yuan project, Brian predicts that the US Fed will eventually follow suit and come up with a digital Fed stablecoin. In the next phase of evolution for CBDCs, we can expect basket digital currencies, launched by a consortium or an internal organization like IMF or world bank
Nic Carter (@Nic Carter):
Nic Carter expects a majority of the token projects to go belly up with increasing regulatory scrutiny, as evident from Binance and Poloniex kicking off US customers, Bitfinex’s ongoing tussle and CFTC’s probe into Bitmex. Listing requirements for crypto exchanges will tighten up significantly
Sidechains such as Liquid will see strong growth in 2020 as demand for feature-rich blockchains will wane
In 2020, several high-profile game studios will launch games which have some blockchain element — perhaps a natively integrated marketplace, or genuine ownership of in-game items. These experiences will be seamless. Users may not even be aware that their assets are registered on-chain
Paul Veradittakit (@Paul Veradittakit):
DeFi had a banner year in 2019, and the strong growth could continue into 2020 as well. DAI is increasingly becoming the decentralized stablecoin standard and the shift to multi-collateral DAI could on board even more number of users
Although unlikely that the US will launch a digital dollar this year, the adoption growth of Chinese digital yuan could be the yardstick of benefits and performance for state-backed digital currencies
Privacy regulation could be a major theme in 2020 as technologies that employ zero-knowledge proofs (Zcash, for example) that might present powerful, unregulatable tools for criminal financial use. Data privacy concerns will continue to be front and centre as blockchain goes mainstream and centralized large-scale projects such as Libra could come under further scrutiny
Ryan Selkis (@twobitidiot):
Lightning network to have an irrational exuberance moment in 2020, and blow up 50x YoY USD in channel capacity to $100mn. Crypto exchanges could start integrating Lightning Network into their platforms
After warding off competition from EOS, Stellar and Cardano, ETH could face strong competition from next-generation interoperability blockchains such as Polkadot and Cosmos
Stablecoins will continue to increase in relevance, and will be see significant traded volumes, even rivaling bitcoins
Security tokens will still be meh! It will continue to attract sub-par projects that do not find liquidity in the traditional markets
DeFi, Lending markes and ‘Open Finance’ will have a break out year, building upon the success of 2019
The @Ryan Selkis version is really detailed, and can only be described as a labour of love from a true OG. Read it in full here. well worth it.
We still await the annual outlooks from @Arjun Balaji and @Joey Krug, both of whom had excellent outlook documents last year. Do let us know if we have missed out someone here.
Meanwhile in Crypto Wonderland...
“ESMA To Push For Crypto Regulations In EU ”
The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) has announced on Thursday its intentions to focus on the data security of the financial industry, especially for crypto assets. In its Strategic Orientation for 2020-22, the regulatory agency also revealed its plan to bring a legal framework for digital currencies. As mentioned by the regulator, it planned the activities for the coming years based on the challenges faced by the EU, its citizens and capital markets. It will also focus on developing a large retail investor base to support the CMU, promoting sustainable finance and long-term oriented markets, dealing with the opportunities and risks posed by digitalization, the EU’s role in international finance and ensuring a proportionate approach to regulation.
“Crypto Firms To Cover Costs For Regulation”
Cryptocurrency entities licensed under the New York’s Financial Services Law (FSL) should pay the costs of regulatory oversight, Governor Andrew Cuomo believes. The Democratic Governor purportedly wants the state authorities to amend the FSL in order to require virtual currency-related entities within the FSL jurisdiction to foot the bill for examination and oversight conducted by New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS). The NYDFS is one of primary regulatory agencies for crypto-related businesses in New York state as the regulator issues a major business license for cryptocurrencies, the BitLicense. As the home of the financial capital of the United States, the NYDFS is often at the front line of new regulation.
“Bux Acquires Blockport”
Bux, the Amsterdam-based fintech that wants to make investing more accessible, has acquired the European “social” cryptocurrency investment platform Blockport. Terms of the deal remain undisclosed, although Bux says the move paves the way for the company to launch its own branded cryptocurrency investment app. Dubbed “BUX Crypto,” it will be available in the nine countries in which Bux operates, and is planned to go live in Q1 this year. In addition, we are told the founders and core team members of Blockport will join Bux and “take ownership” of the Bux cryptocurrency offering.
“R3 Closes The Largest Open-account Trade Finance Trial On Corda”
R3 has closed what it’s calling the largest open-account trade finance trial ever conducted on its Corda platform. This trial included more than 70 organizations from more than 25 countries. Upwards of 340 participants from those organizations were involved and came out from sectors like financial services, information technology, telecommunications, logistics, the maritime industry, real estate, hospitality and the automotive industry. The trial tested working capital applications developed by TradeIX and focused on the receivables finance product on Marco Polo’s platform, TradeIX announced Thursday. Accounts receivables financing, also called factoring, is where a business sells account receivables to a third party at a discount in return for immediate cash payment.
Crypto Twitter Pick
The whole Ethereum not ETH thing will seem ridiculous 5 years from now after price goes parabolic:
“So you were seeing the entire decentralized finance industry being built on Ethereum and you didn’t think it was a good idea to buy some ETH at the time ok LOL”
12:36 PM - 8 Jan 2020
What We Are Reading / Listening To
The Borderless State of DeFi by Binance Research
Kyle Samani on How 2020 Will Be the Year of Small Success Stories
Overnight Performance of Top 10 Currencies
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