jakiro
The entire crypto industry in 2023 was ups and downs. The Silicon Valley banking storm at the beginning of the year continued to fluctuate the market that had just suffered heavy FTX positions, and then began to usher in various regulatory storms, and everyone in the industry giants were in danger.
However, “danger” and “opportunity” are always born together.As Bitcoin halving approaches, expectations of Bitcoin spot ETF passing, coupled with the rise of BRC20 narratives triggered an inscription craze in various public chains, and various narratives have brought about a high market enthusiasm at the end of the year. Bitcoin once exceeded US$45,000, the annual increase is more than 150%, and the market has entered the early stage of a bull market.
So, among these strange and treacherous people, are there any storm?What is the direction of the entire market in 2024? Do you still have to depend on them?
Retreat in the torrent—CZ
On November 23, 2023, CZ announced that it would step down as BN CEO and said that it would not hold the executive position, but would still retain a majority stake in Binance, and said that it would step down behind the scenes as an investor.The news shocked the entire industry.
Why did CZ resign suddenly?The reason is that on November 22, 2023, BN and its CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ) pleaded guilty to the U.S. federal charges.BN was charged with three counts, including anti-money laundering, operating an unlicensed remittance business and violating U.S. sanctions. In order to further develop a settlement between BN and the SEC, the cost is to bear a huge fine of US$4.368 billion to allow it to continue operations. At the same time, CZResign.
In fact, this lawsuit has been ripped for five years. As early as 2018, the US Department of Justice began to investigate BN’s suspected unlicensed remittances, money laundering and violations of US sanctions, but it was finally settled this year.
However, looking back at BN’s growth from Little Transparency, which was started in 2017, to the current industry leader, CZ has made an indelible contribution in the past six years. It can be said that it has built a diversified business system for the industry from scratch.Including spot, futures, options, mining pools, cloud services, public chains and other fields, it also develops the originally single CEX into a comprehensive Web3 group, and spreads its products, services and brand influence around the world.
In the past six years, under the leadership of CZ, BN has achieved a leading position in trading platforms, public chains, wallets, investment and other fields.But as BN becomes an industry giant, CZ may have realized that as an industry leader, the biggest challenge at this time may no longer be competition, but to assume the responsibility of leading the crypto industry toward compliance.
Therefore, after CZ stepped down, some people said that it was “burning the self for light and illuminating the path of compliance and innovation for later generations”, and even putting a stone steps on the “promoting ETF”.
A kick-off – SEC Chairman
Since serving as SEC Chairman, especially in 2023, Gary Gensler has launched a strict crackdown on crypto regulations, which has also brought him a lot of attention in the crypto space.Most notably, he led the SEC’s lawsuit against Ripple and imposed millions of dollars in fines on crypto trading platforms such as Kraken.This has sparked a wave of fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) across the crypto industry and has also caused concerns from other top platforms.
Speaking of his crackdown on encryption, what made him famous was the SEC lawsuit against Ripple, a digital payment agreement he led in December 2020.In the name of protecting consumers, the case cracked down on pledge services on crypto platforms and tried to turn all tokens into securities.
The recent lawsuit against CZ and BN is another regulatory mileage for the SEC to win under Gensler.In addition to these two encryption litigation cases, according to incomplete statistics, the SEC designed encryption cases include:
1) Bittrex and its former CEO are accused of operating unregistered exchanges, brokers and clearing agencies.
2) The two people suspected of Ormeus Coin fraud were fined, more than $23 million.
3) Tron founder Justin Sun and his company are accused of illegally selling unregistered securities, fraud and market manipulation.
4) Terraform Labs and Do Kwon are accused of planning billions of dollars in crypto-asset securities fraud.
5) Trade Coin Club is accused of allegedly conducting a $295 million crypto Ponzi scheme.
6) The SEC filed a lawsuit against Dragonchain, accusing the issuance of unregistered crypto asset securities.
7) The SEC accused 11 people suspected of creating and promoting Forsage, involving a $300 million fraud Ponzi scheme.
8) The Second Circuit Order Terraform Labs and Do Kwon to comply with the SEC subpoena.
9) The SEC urgently stopped the distribution of Tokens of Telegram cryptocurrency project TON, saying it was suspected of offering unregistered securities.
10) The SEC filed charges against Block.one and reached a settlement by paying a $24 million civil fine involving the issuance of the unregistered digital Token EOS.
In short, it can be said that with the growth of the crypto world, the regulatory hammer of the SEC under Gensler has followed suit.
Bear market pillar—Vitalik Buterin
Since its establishment in 2014, Ethereum has also entered its tenth year mark. Under the leadership of Vitalik, Ethereum has made a breakthrough contribution to the development of encryption, from a platform that can only support digital assets to the ability toIt supports various decentralized applications and is known as the “world computer”.If Satoshi Nakamoto is the creator of blockchain, thenVitalik ButerinIt is another key crypto leader in blockchain.
Vitalik has determined the earliest Ethereum roadmap: PoW to PoS (Phase 0) → Data Sharding (Phase 1) → Execution Sharding (Phase 2).Then, it was constantly corrected and debugged during the development process, expanding to the Rollup-centered Ethereum roadmap: The Merge, The Surge, The Scourge, The Verge, The Purge and The Splurge.
Even though Ethereum’s overall development in 2023 is relatively dull, the most important one is the Shanghai upgrade completed in April, and the resulting rise of the staking track after the upgrade is completed.
In the unsatisfactory market in 2022, only Ethereum layer2 experienced an explosive growth stage at the end of the year, becoming the main highlight that continued into the first half of 2023, especially the leading development of the leader Arbitrum.According to L2beat, Layer2’s total value lock (TVL) currently reaches US$20.1 billion (as shown in the figure below), retaining room for development for Builder in this stage of bear market.
Vitalik is more optimistic about Rollup, so he combines it with privacy protection and zero-knowledge proofs (ZK) technology.Although the Layer2 ecosystem is still mainstream with OP-Rollup, with the advancement of zero-knowledge proof technology, ZK Rollup is likely to become the final Layer2 solution.
In addition, we have to mention the next step of Ethereum upgrade – Cancun upgrade. There has been news thatIf there are no unexpected situations, the test will be officially started on January 17, 2024. If successful, this will significantly increase the transaction volume per second of the Ethereum network.It will also open a new stage of development of Ethereum data storage and retrieval capabilities, further laying the foundation for the development of Ethereum Layer2.
Founder of the Inscription craze–The Founder of Ordinals
The recent carnival in the inscription market has exceeded many people’s expectations, and the founder of this event needs to be traced to Casey Rodarmor, the founder of Ordinals.
Rodarmor has been engaged in technical work since 2010, working in Google and Chaincode labs, and has also done related work for the implementation of the main code of the Bitcoin core protocol.Last year, he also served as co-host of Bitcoin BitDevs in San Francisco, which started in New York City and is a community that hosts monthly gatherings to discuss some of the more technological aspects of Bitcoin, a key part of Bitcoin’s grassroots culture..
Earlier this year, the Ordinal protocol developed by Rodarmor allowed Ordinal NFT and inscriptions to be implemented on Bitcoin, which is another attempt at NFT on Bitcoin since Bitcoin appeared in 2012 and derivatives of Counterparty in 2014.
The Ordinal protocol outlines a method of sequential numbering of Satoshi (the smallest unit of Bitcoin, sat, representing one hundred millionth of Bitcoin).Once the Sat serial number is obtained, the user can burn data on these Sats to make digital artifacts, which is the initial description of Rodarmor relative to NFT.As of December 27, 2023, the cumulative cost of Ordinals inscription casting reached 5028 BTC.
Source: dune.com
Rodarmor said Ordinals was inspired by Satoshi Nakamoto, the founder of Bitcoin’s pseudonym.Satoshi Nakamoto mentioned something called “atoms” in his original Bitcoin code base.
Rodarmor is currently working full-time in Ordinals. In September this year, Rodarmor proposed a new Bitcoin FT protocol design concept called “Rune”, also known as the “rune” protocol, but it has not yet been launched.
But no matter what the subsequent development of the rune is,Ordinals proposed by Rodarmor inspired the development of BRC20 Token. In addition to starting the inscription craze, it also triggered the further development of the Bitcoin ecosystem.
The financial giant waiting to be opened – CEO of BlackRock
BlackRock applied for a spot Bitcoin ETF on June 15, 2023, and the news caused a sensation in the crypto industry.The SEC has rejected dozens of similar funds in the past decade.But why did BlackRock’s application make the industry so sensational?
On the one hand, the SEC has previously rejected the application of spot Bitcoin ETFs on the grounds that it is worried about fraud and market manipulation and wants to protect investors, including the previous FTX collapse, which has led to further tightening of regulation of cryptocurrency companies this year.
As the world’s largest asset management company, BlackRock manages assets about 10 times the market value of the entire cryptocurrency industry. If the ETF application is successfully passed, its large amount of funds will generate a large amount of funds for the cryptocurrency industry.A significant impact and driving the rise in crypto asset prices, if applied, may trigger the next bull market.
On the other hand, BlackRock’s actions encouraged eight financial companies including Fidelity, Invesco, VanEck, Cathie Wood’s Ark Investment Management, and WisdomTree to follow suit. These companies have submitted corresponding applications, which has greatly promoted the development of Bitcoin ETFs.
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink has a long story to do with Bitcoin.Back in 2017, Fink said he was a “faithful believer” in cryptocurrencies, but was worried about market speculation at the time.On July 16, 2018, he said BlackRock customers were not interested in cryptocurrencies and slowed BlackRock’s tendency to invest in the field.In 2019, as the market improved, BlackRock hired Robbie Mitchnick, former Ripple marketing director, to continue exploring the feasibility of cryptocurrencies.In 2020, a shift in attitude towards cryptocurrencies began, believing that cryptocurrencies would be necessary and could replace gold.In 2021, Fink said it was studying Bitcoin again, but no definitive conclusions have been drawn.In 2023, BlackRock submitted an application for a Bitcoin ETF, and Fink said cryptocurrencies are expected to surpass global currencies.
Lifetime incarceration – SBF
In November 2023, on the first anniversary of the FTX crash, its founder SBF was founded on seven counts, including fraud, money laundering, etc., which prosecutors said was “one of the largest financial fraud cases in American history.”
What happened?
Originally known as Sam Bankman-Fried, SBF is the co-founder and former CEO of bankrupt CEX FTX and crypto company Alameda Research. FTX rose in the 2020 bull market.It has become the third largest CEX in the world, attracting more than one million users and many well-known investment institutions, with a peak valuation of US$32 billion.
In November 2022, CoinDesk disclosed a financial document that exposed the potential debt problems of FTX and Alameda Research. This information caused panic among users and led to a run of funds. In less than a few days, FTX Group announced bankruptcy and SBF resigned.In 2021, the 28-year-old SBF has already ranked in Forbes’ top 30 under-30 elite list, but in just two years, he now has a real-time net worth of $0.
After FTX went bankrupt, more than $370 million of assets were stolen, triggering an investigation by US prosecutors.In response to the chaos, FTX asked former regulatory officials for help, but the company’s collapse sparked doubts about regulation.In court filings, FTX revealed that more than $2 billion was transferred to SBF.FTX accused former executives of SBF and other ex-employment of $1 billion in company funds, and the trial involved 20 witnesses, including former CEO, SBF’s ex-girlfriend and other executives.
The trial of this case started in early October 2023 and lasted for one month. The verdict was scheduled for March 28, 2024. If SBF is sentenced to the maximum sentence for all charges, he will face 115 years in prison.
However, according to relevant news on December 30, 2023, the U.S. government has revoked six charges against SBF, including allegations of violating campaign finance regulations and conspiring to commit bribery, which means that SBF will not need to face a second trial.
Meme leader—Musk
The most famous story of Musk’s relationship with crypto is his story with Dogecoin, but Musk’s relationship with crypto has a long history. As early as 2021, Musk’s companies Tesla and SpaceX bought a large number of bits.currency.
Since it acquired Twitter in October 2022, on April 5 this year, Musk replaced the Twitter logo with a dog head. This move caused the price of Dogecoin to rise by more than 20% in an instant. Please refer to the articleMusk changed his Twitter logo to Dogecoin expression, what is his intention?
Then on July 30, Twitter changed its classic little bluebird logo to “X”, but this move was hailed as a cryptocurrency with a significant impact.Because in 1999, Musk co-founded the online financial services and email payment company X.com, which is now PayPal, becoming one of the earliest and most successful online payment processing companies in the world.
And now Musk reshapes Twitter into a broader new service called X, which is likely intended to turn the iconic social media app into a payment platform.Some speculate that he will integrate other crypto assets such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, and stablecoins such as USDC, especially the favorite Dogecoin of billionaires.
Therefore, Musk is also likely to continue to bring major changes to the crypto industry.
Moving forward with pressure——Coinbase CEO
With CZ leaving BN and SBF going to jail, Brian Armstrong became the biggest figure still in trouble.Brian Armstrong is Co-founder and CEO of Coinbase, and he also has considerable influence on the crypto industry.
First, Coinbase launched its own Layer2 blockchain Base and derivatives exchange Blade this year, and is expected to launch Bitcoin ETFs in 2024, undoubtedly in an active preparation for the next wave of crypto markets.
At the same time, like BN, Coinbase also faces regulatory challenges and is accused of illegal transactions.Previously, the SEC regarded all tokens as securities, which had an impact on the entire cryptocurrency industry.Armstrong is also moving forward vigorously, comparing Coinbase to local sheriffs, calling for action to resolve regulatory issues led by US agencies.Armstrong once posted on social media platform X, saying: “We can’t always grow as fast as other companies, the nature of the industry determines that compliance operations are more difficult and costly. (About BN) news further proves that choosing to do itThe right decision is the hardest thing to do.”
In fact, as early as January of the year, Coinbase acquired FairX, a derivatives exchange regulated by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), and the acquisition is a key step in Coinbase’s provision of crypto derivatives to U.S. retail and institutional customers.He also formed the “Stand With Crypto” organization, hoping to protect the industry from government criticism.
From a macro perspective, as BN received regulatory suppression and another competitor Kraken was also faced with similar accusations, it is a positive factor for the development of Coinbase individuals, causing Coinbase prices to rise by 200% this year, with a market value of more than US$25 billion.However, Coinbase’s development has not been smooth since then. What we have to face next is the bad development of the overall crypto market. Although some settlement agreements have resolved some major crypto problems this year, it still needs to boost the overall market.catalyst.
At present, the next important catalyst is the possibility of regulatory approval of Bitcoin ETFs.BlackRock mentioned above announced that it would apply to launch a Bitcoin ETF that happened to be custodialized by Coinbase. The hope of approval of ETFs has driven the rise of Bitcoin and Coinbase. The specific developments in the future are worth paying attention to.
AI cheating – OpenAI CEO
Since the release of ChatGPT on November 30, 2022, it has quickly become one of the fastest growing consumer applications in history just two months after its release, with a monthly active user count of 100 million. Sam Altman, CEO of its producer OpenAI, alsoTherefore, it has attracted much attention.
However, in addition to the popularity of ChatGPT at the beginning of the year, a letter sent by several researchers to the board of directors last month said OpenAI had made a major AI discovery and could threaten humans, which caused the board of directors to remove Altman..
On November 18, 2023, OpenAI announced through its official website that Sam Altman, the current CEO and known as the “father of ChatGPT”, will resign from his position as CEO and leave the board of directors.As soon as the news came out, a large number of employees announced that they would advance and retreat with him and chose to resign. The news came suddenly, and then he announced shocking news, saying that he would join Microsoft with his assistant.However, again, after five days of being fired, Sam Altman was once again the CEO of OpenAI.
Altman said on X that his decisions over the past few days, including opting into Microsoft, are all about preserving OpenAI’s team and mission.Now that OpenAI has a new board of directors and has received support from Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, Altman looks forward to returning to OpenAI and maintaining an excellent partnership with Microsoft.
Translation: I love OpenAI, and everything I have done in the past few days is to keep this team and its mission intact.When I decided to join Microsoft last Sunday, it was obvious that it was the best choice for me and the team.With the new board and the support of Satya, I…
In addition, in July this year, Altman created and launched the Worldcoin project and Token, which aims to provide online identity authentication and income inequality around the world.Since most people around the world cannot verify their identities through digital means, Worldcoin hopes to build the world’s largest and fair digital identity and monetary system to help everyone enter the global financial system, but the project is currently facingSome regulatory resistance.
As one of the directions worth paying attention to in the field of encryption in 2024, Sam Altman has to mention it.
The big cake finally made a profit – President of El Salvador
It is reported that as of December 4, 2023, El Salvador President Nayib Bukele said that according to the current market price of Bitcoin, if sold, not only can it recover 100% of the investment, but it can also make a profit of more than $3.6 million.All this cannot be separated from the promotion of El Salvadorian President Nayib Bukele.
As a small Central American country, El Salvador has no fiat currency of its own and chooses to use the US dollar.This has had some impact on the economy. People who work outside need to pay expensive remittance fees, which is not conducive to increasing GDP. Moreover, about 70% of people in El Salvador do not have bank accounts or credit cards. In addition, for the government, the Ministry of Economic Affairs is stable and turmoil continues.It is not a good situation. In order to repair the economy to a certain extent, El Salvador needs to attract new investors in capital.
Apart from external factors, Bukele is also a true enthusiast of Bitcoin.Therefore, under the promotion of Bukele, on June 9, 2021, El Salvador voted in favor of the formal passage of the bill with an “absolute majority” to make Bitcoin a fiat currency in the country, and El Salvador became the first to announce Bitcoin as the fiat currency.nation.This decision has attracted widespread attention worldwide.Since the implementation of this policy, El Salvador has begun to actively promote digital payments and financial inclusion, hoping to provide residents with a wider range of financial services and convenience through the adoption of Bitcoin. According to reports, the country will be held every day since the policy was announced.Buy a Bitcoin.
Additionally, the move is seen as an innovative attempt to the financial system and may affect fiat monetary policy options in other countries in the future.Over time, the relationship between El Salvador and Bitcoin will become an important case of global digital currency experiments.
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Faithful Believer – Michael Saylor
Michael Saylor, CEO of MicroStrategy, is also an important influential figure in the cryptocurrency field.It is said to have reached a net worth of US$3 billion in 2023, and his total number of Bitcoins held exceeded 120,000, which has made a significant contribution to his target net worth.
Michael Saylor started investing in Bitcoin in 2020.He bought a large amount of Bitcoin in his personal name at MicroStrategy and invested the company’s funds into Bitcoin.In the months since then, Saylor’s bet on Bitcoin doubled or even tripled, borrowing more than $2 billion in debt to buy more volatile cryptocurrencies, and Saylor has been Bit since thenA loyal fan of coins.
As companies such as FTX, Sanjian Capital, and Celsius went bankrupt one after another, last year was undoubtedly a year for crypto investors to grit their teeth.However, even though it is at the “cycle trough” of Bitcoin, it is still supported by Saylor.On November 13 this year, Saylor looked forward to the future of Bitcoin at the 2023 Australian Cryptocurrency Conference.He highlighted the upcoming Bitcoin halving event in 2024,It is also predicted that this is the stage when Bitcoin will enter the “adolescent stage” and it is expected that between 2024 and 2028, large technology companies and banks will widely adopt Bitcoin and integrate it into their respective products and services.
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Just buy big cakes – Robert Kiyosaki, author of “Rich Dad, Poor Dad”
According to the latest news on December 11, Robert Kiyosaki, author of Rich Dad Poor Dad, posted on the X platform that the U.S. government is stealing wealth through people’s money, and it is not too late to realize this.The banking system has gone bankrupt, and you can take action while you can still buy gold, silver and Bitcoin.Robert Kiyosaki also said that his multiple warnings have come true, and the next warning target is S&P, which will smash millions of 401k and IRAs.
Translation: I want to thank Smart Silver Stacker, because since 2010, he has been laughing at me for advocating people’s advice on buying and storing their money.Like Paul Revere or Chicken Little, it is not easy to warn people that the U.S. government is stealing our wealth through our currency.But no matter how long you want to laugh.It’s still not too late, and our banking system has gone bankrupt.While you still have the chance, buy gold, silver, and Bitcoin as soon as possible.Then your friends and family will laugh at you and me like Smart Silver Stacker.By the way, I predicted the 2008 Lehman Brothers crash on Wolf’s show, and you can find me on CNN’s Wolf Blitzer show.Wolf laughed at that time.In 2023, I appeared on Fox Business’s Neil Cavuto show, predicting the collapse of banking giant Credit Suisse and mentioning that United Bank of Switzerland (UBS) could be the next one.If you want to laugh, laugh, the global banking crisis is right in front of you.Remember my warning in 1997’s Rich Dad, Poor Dad: “Savekeepers are losers” and “Your home is not an asset”, which became a reality in 2008.People are still laughing at the 1997 prophecies.Wait and see my next warning.The S&P index will be next, which will have a serious impact on millions of 401k and IRA accounts.Take care of yourself.
I believe that people who are a little interested in financial management have read the book “Rich Dad, Poor Dad”. It was published in 1997, sold no less than millions of copies and was translated into more than 50 languages, which made the bookAuthor Robert Toru Kiyosaki became a famous figure in finance.He had a connection with crypto in 2017, when he began to express his interest in Bitcoin, and at that time he began to suggest paying attention and understanding cryptocurrencies.
Moreover, this month’s call is not the first time that Robert has promoted Bitcoin. Robert Kiyosaki also posted a tweet in 2022, pointing out that Bitcoin is almost like a commodity, more like gold, silver or oil.Second, the SEC also classifies Bitcoin as a commodity, while other cryptocurrencies are considered securities.
Translation:
Q: Are you investing in Bitcoin?A: Yes, I’m investing.I’m very excited about Bitcoin.Why?Because Bitcoin is classified as a commodity, just like gold, silver and oil.Most crypto tokens are classified as securities, and the SEC rules will destroy most of them.I’m buying more bitcoins.
He is just publicly expressing his support for crypto assets such as Bitcoin, except to indicate that he is a Bitcoin investor, but has not disclosed the specific investment.
summary
Although 2023 is a trough in the encryption cycle, both crypto speculators and real Builders are pushing the crypto industry forward in their own ways.
The influence of these influential figures not only affects the market direction, but also plays a leading or driving role in the future development of cryptocurrencies.No matter how the industry develops, they are undoubtedly an important part of this historical picture over time.
