The world of cryptography buzzes. If you ask a real believer, they will say that this is only the beginning. Ask a skeptic, and they swear that we look at a bubble swell in real time. Whoever could burst for a second.
I saw first -hand excitement during a cryptographic event in Brooklyn last week. The bar was packed. People were animated. It looked like a flashback around 2020 and 2021, when the crypto-fière seized everyone from twenty-year-old merchants to detail to grandparents. At the time, it was Bitcoin, NFT Flashy like the Bored Ape Yacht Club, and all that is promising wild feedback. It was a digital casino where everyone hoped to hit him rich. Fast.
But then came the crash. The “crypto winter” arrived, marked by the spectacular fall of Crypto Exchange FTX and its poster Sam Bankman Frit. Billions have disappeared. Confidence collapsed. The regulators surrounded.
NOW? The energy is back. And it’s confusing.
During the Brooklyn event, hosted by Wire Network (a startup trying to connect different cryptography systems, or “blockchains”), optimism was palpable. “There has never been a better time to be a cryptographic developer,” said the co-founder Ken Dicross.
On paper, Crypto’s return seems unstoppable. The total market value of the industry has increased by more than 3 dollars by the beginning of 2023. Companies like Robinhood, Coinbase and Microstrategy are on the wave. Circle Internet Group, the company behind one of the largest “stablecoins”, became public in June to an assessment of $ 6 billion. He reached nearly $ 50 billion in a few weeks.
Wait, what is a Stablecoin?
Stablecoin is a type of cryptocurrency designed to contain a stable value, generally attached to something like the US dollar. The idea is to give people the speed and flexibility of the crypto without the oscillations of the wild price of Bitcoin or Ethereum. In theory, you can use stablecoins instead of money to buy your coffee or pay your rent. In reality, we are not there yet.
But the bet of cryptographic companies is clear: one day, we will all use digital dollars instead of paper. This is what leads the gold rush today. The question is: do people become in front of themselves?
The New Crypto Darlings: Defi and Bitcoin Treasury Companies
A large part of the current media shock is focused on DEFI, abbreviated for decentralized finance. Consider it as an attempt to rebuild Wall Street without banks. Instead of a bank approving your loan or by managing your trades, the code does. No intermediaries, no guards. It seems revolutionary, but so far, it is above all a playground for speculators and technological geeks.
Then there are Bitcoin cash companies. These are regular companies that load their balance sheets with Bitcoin instead of dollars, euros or gold. Microstrategy is the child of the poster, spending billions to buy bitcoin and transform a sleeping software company into a sort of crypto designer funds. The idea is that Bitcoin goes beyond inflation and long -term fiduciary currencies.
Bubble or boom?
There is no clear answer. The figures are dizzying. The threshing media is real. And yet, there is still so much uncertainty as to whether the great promises of Crypto will never correspond to reality. Even with a friendly crypto president at the White House, the Raider of Cash or Wall Street is long.
So is it a bubble? Maybe. Maybe not. It depends on who you ask.
