Top 5 Crypto Trends in 2021

It’s secure to say that 2021 was a very explosive yr for your complete cryptocurrency market. It was additionally one the place notably sturdy narratives have been centered round completely different segments – a yr filled with plot adjustments and varied metagames.

With this stated, as we method the final hours of the yr, we’ve taken the freedom to cherrypick 5 of probably the most influential traits throughout the previous 12 months. The under are available in no specific rating as all of them excelled in particular areas.

So, with out additional ado, let’s dive in.

Memecoins

Although some would possibly argue that memecoins got here to prominence in 2020 throughout the so-called DeFi summer time, they objectively took the middle stage in 2021 – on a couple of events.

Unlike different traits, although, memecoins have been seemingly propelled by a government – so to talk. Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, in addition to TIME Magazine’s Person of the Year, singlehandedly drove super consciousness in the direction of what’s unanimously often called the king of memecoins – Dogecoin.

Dogecoin (DOGE) may need began out as a joke years in the past however is now one of many world’s main cryptocurrency tasks with lots of of 1000’s of HODLers and one of many strongest communities. What is extra, with the obvious backing of Musk, DOGE will, sooner or later, be accepted by Tesla for a few of its merchandise.

The cryptocurrency is up virtually 4,000% on the time of this writing, regardless that it’s buying and selling at 76% under its all-time excessive reached in May.

But what Dogecoin did was way over simply a rise in worth. It impressed a whole motion of memecoins, quite a lot of which got here with alarmingly comparable functionalities that flooded the market within the months to return.

One of probably the most vivid examples is Shiba Inu’s SHIB token. The self-proclaimed “Dogecoin killer” is likely one of the best-performing cryptocurrencies of the yr, with a number of tales of individuals investing as little as $100 a yr in the past and turning into multi-millionaires. Even although it’s 60% under its all-time excessive, proper now, SHIB is up 44,636,200% up throughout the previous 12 months alone.

What is extra, memecoins turned a family identify in addition to a viable market-placement technique. The rise of Doge and Shiba confirmed that there’s a transparent product-market match for cash named after common canine breeds and lots of groups began exploring varied avenues and creating what many contemplate to be legit enterprise platforms.

If one factor is obvious now, it’s that everybody takes memes unironically, satirically.

Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs)

Non-fungible tokens have been on the forefront of the cryptocurrency trade for fairly a while now. It’s additionally one of many traits that’s liable for a complete lot of newcomers within the area.

One cause for it is likely to be that the common Joe doesn’t affiliate NFTs with complicated financial fashions and makes an attempt to disrupt financial insurance policies. For most individuals, NFTs are simply verifiably scarce representations of digital artwork which are, effectively, enjoyable.

Where else are you able to see a digital drawing that may actually be right-click saved as a JPEG promote for $8 million?

Of course, it’s not that straightforward – NFTs carry the digital signature of the artist and might’t presumably be reproduced, making every one primarily completely distinctive except it’s been created in multitude upon era.

Perhaps probably the most impactful story on the matter of NFTs is the astronomical sale of Beeple’s The First 5,000 Days. This is a conjunction of 5,000 items of digital artwork that Mike Winkelmann (a.okay.a Beeple) had produced over 5,000 days. The piece offered for a whopping $69 million at a Christie’s public sale and made him one of many three most respected residing artists.

From Crypto Punks, Rocks, Bored Apes Yacht Club, Rumble Kongs, and Hashmass to literal numbers written on white backgrounds, NFTs are far and wide. What is much more attention-grabbing is that this development doesn’t appear to decelerate in any respect. While it’s true that retail curiosity in NFTs has declined, it’s additionally vital to notice that these tokens are a cornerstone of our subsequent point out – the metaverse and the play-to-earn mannequin.

Play-to-Earn (P2E)

Blockchain and on-line gaming are two fields, touted to go hand-in-hand for fairly a while. Throughout the previous few years, we noticed a couple of video games that have been underpinned by distributed ledger know-how, however up till this level, nothing actually took off.

Well, this all modified in 2021, and particularly in late Q3 and This fall. It was no aside from Axie Infinity that led the march all year long. One of its native tokens – AXS – elevated from roughly round $0.5 and reached an all-time excessive of $160 in November. At the time of this writing, the token is up virtually 17,000% previously 12 months alone, regardless of buying and selling effectively under its ATH. Moreover, a plot of land in Axie Infinity’s universe offered for $2.3 million not so way back.

The total P2E style, although, took off after Facebook revealed that it might rebrand to Meta and grow to be an lively participant in constructing the metaverse. Once that occurred, it was on. The play-to-earn area took off and remains to be raging on the time of this writing.

Projects resembling The Sandbox and Decentraland cracked effectively into the highest 50, and the latter even surpassed Axie Infinity as the most important gaming mission.

Now, plainly the idea of the metaverse is throughout us, and the hype is actual. Hundreds of groups are racing to supply a blue-chip blockchain sport that might win the participant base and grow to be a longtime chief. Maybe 2022 will see that taking place, who is aware of?

Binance Smart Chain Mania

If final yr we noticed the DeFi summer time on Ethereum, then this yr we noticed the identical insanity unravel on the Binance Smart Chain (BSC).

The demand for decentralized apps turned so excessive that it actually clogged the Ethereum community. User-intensive processes elevated the load to an extent the place individuals needed to pay lots of of {dollars} in transaction charges, making it just about unimaginable for smaller buyers to take part within the area of decentralized finance (DeFi).

As the yield farming metagame was rising in reputation, although, options began to pop up in goals of grabbing all these annoyed DeFi degens that have been uninterested in paying massive bucks on Ethereum.

This is how the Binance Smart Chain got here to prominence. In the second week of February, the distinctive addresses on BSC tripled. In March, the depend of transactions on PancakeSwap (the most important DEX on BSC) was larger than that on your complete Ethereum community for a span of a 24-hour interval.

In April, the overall worth locked in PancakeSwap reached $5.5 billion, briefly surpassing the TVL in Uniswap.

All the tasks that we noticed being constructed on Ethereum have been all of a sudden replicated by different groups on BSC, however, as historical past would go on to indicate, it was to no avail. The broad majority of them are presently means underwater because the hype round BSC slowly light away. Even although the distinctive deal with depend continues to develop, it’s nowhere close to the temp it had again in that interval.

It’s additionally value mentioning that this complete development is a part of the the reason why Binance Coin (BNB) is up over 1200% previously 12 months as effectively.

Laser Eyes: Bitcoin to $100K

Laser eyes are a Bitcoin-centered development that additionally noticed quite a lot of hype all year long. Basically, somebody got here up with the thought to place laser eyes on their Twitter profile image and hold it that means till BTC’s worth reaches $100,000.

An enormous variety of individuals, together with MicroStrategy’s CEO Michael Saylor, US Senator Cynthia Lummis, and even our personal potato, succumbed to the thought and thus participated in what gave the impression to be one of many largest actions of the yr.

To this date, Michael Saylor has his Twitter profile image carrying laser eyes, inflicting many to consider that he’s executing the very best conviction commerce on Wall Street.

In any case, the development was considerably short-lived as a result of quickly after it began, the value of bitcoin crashed by roughly 50%, inflicting some to invest that this specific hype was considerably of a prime sign.