With the huge changes in market structure, which tracks deserve special attention?

Original author: Meng Yan (X: @myanTokenGeek )

The current state of the Web3 industry and the crypto market can be summed up in one sentence: the price of coins is OK, but the industry is in a deep bear market. This situation has never happened before in this industry. In the past, both the volume and price have risen or fallen. Now, this situation of serious divergence between volume and price is the first time in more than ten years since the crypto market appeared.

Although the situation seems strange, the reason is not complicated. It is still insufficient liquidity. Many people are asking, why the price of the currency and the total market value seem to be okay, but the industry is so depressed? In fact, this question is asked in reverse. Dont forget that the current US federal funds rate is still at a historical high, and macro liquidity is in a tightening cycle. In this cycle, the stock market and the currency market should have been a bear market. So what is really strange is why the price of the currency is still okay when the industry is in a deep bear market?

1. Dramatic structural changes

There must be something wrong when things are abnormal. Behind the appearance of the divergence between the coin price and the industry is a huge change in the underlying market structure. Few people realize that the crypto market has undergone a fundamental and structural change at the beginning of this year. The passage of the Bitcoin ETF marks the emergence of a digital currency market with almost completely independent liquidity outside the originally free-flowing crypto market: the U.S. stock market. This is actually a watershed event in the history of crypto development. The current divergence between the coin price and the industry is a new phenomenon that has emerged under this new market structure.

Because two markets have emerged, two seemingly contradictory scenes have emerged. The okay coin prices are created in the US stock market, while the not okay industries are created in the crypto market.

The rise of Bitcoin since the second half of last year was mainly driven by ETFs. The funds that entered the ETF basically remained in the hands of Wall Street and did not enter the free crypto market, let alone nourish innovative crypto projects. On the contrary, the crypto market is still in a capital shortage caused by high interest rates and AI oppression. The lack of external liquidity injection will inevitably lead to industry involution. The various embarrassing situations that have emerged in the crypto industry are all manifestations of capital shortage.

The real bull market will only come when liquidity becomes loose. Conversely, when liquidity is loose, funds will be injected into the crypto market again, and the bull market will surely come.

There are more and more signs that the Feds rate cut cycle is only a few months away. Federal interest rates are currently at historical highs. Optimistic estimates suggest that this rate cut cycle may last for a long time, providing a relatively long period of stability for the industry. Pessimistic estimates suggest that after a period of rate cuts, inflation will soar, and the Fed will be forced to raise interest rates again, confirming the era of chaos. I personally am cautiously optimistic about the future, but even in the era of chaos, 2025 will most likely be a good year.

In the long run, there will be a big battle between the two markets, but it will just be a showdown between the two, and the two will coexist for a long time.

2. Four tracks with great opportunities

Now many people are guessing what themes will emerge in the next bull market. I also give some of my own opinions and reasons here, which do not constitute investment advice and I am not responsible for the results.

BTCFi

The best people are chosen regardless of their relationship. Solv Protocol and Babylon are now listed as the two leading companies in BTCFi. If we break it down, Babylon is the leader of BTCFi on the native BTC stack, while Solv is the leader of BTCFi on the EVM stack. The two have a good cooperative relationship. So as one of the co-founders of Solv, I am optimistic that BTCFi is listed as the first of the four major opportunity tracks. It is definitely a case of self-promotion. If you don鈥檛 make a point, you will definitely not be able to convince others.

Let me explain why BTCFi will be one of the most anticipated tracks in the next round.

First of all, BTC is the only consensus asset that can span the U.S. stock market and crypto market in the next cycle. ETH cannot do that for now, and the others have to lag behind. Only BTC has the potential to connect the consensus and liquidity of the two markets.

Secondly, the scale of BTC is very large. As long as BTCFi mobilizes 5% of BTC assets in the next cycle and adds some derivatives, the scale may reach hundreds of billions.

Third, the infrastructure issues that have long hindered the development of BTCFi have been basically solved, whether it is the Lightning Network, sidechains, BTC L2, or bridging BTC to the EVM chain through a cross-chain bridge, whether it is a multi-signature wallet or BTC Script smart contract, the current technical level is incomparable to the previous round. Now in BTCFi, basically there is nothing that cannot be done.

Fourth, the mentality of the BTC community has changed. In the development and operation of BTCFi, Solv realized that BTC hodlers and ETH fans are two completely different groups, with very different growth paths, concepts and mindsets. In the past, BTCFi could not develop, largely because BTC hodlers had no interest in it at all. However, with the outbreak of the Inscription Ecosystem last year, two changes occurred in the BTC community. First, a group of active members who had been baptized by DeFi joined the BTC community. Second, among the originally very conservative BTC hodlers, a small number of people began to change their mindsets and were willing to actively participate in the construction of BTCFi.

In addition to the above four reasons which are relatively easy to understand, there is another deeper reason why I am optimistic about BTCFi.

Those who have been in this industry for a long time still remember that before 2018, many project financings were directly carried out in BTC, and BTC liquidity and activity were very sufficient at that time. However, with the tragic collapse of the ICO bubble in 2017-18, especially the rise of stablecoins, BTC basically retreated to the position of digital gold, and its activity dropped significantly, so that many people think that BTCFi may be a false proposition. But those who are familiar with the history of world currency and finance know that this is actually a problem that humans have faced and solved perfectly in history.

During the centuries-long gold standard period, gold, as the standard currency, also faced similar contradictions. The core issue is that, on the one hand, gold is credible because it maintains value and resists inflation, which is the consensus basis for it to become the standard currency. But it is also because of this consensus basis that the public tends to store gold in their vaults. However, currency is to be circulated, and illiquid currency is not a good currency. In other words, there is a contradiction between the characteristics of gold as a value reserve of currency and its characteristics as a transaction intermediary. What should we do?

In September 1717, as the director of the Royal Mint of the United Kingdom, Newton proposed to link gold to the British pound. This is actually another great contribution of Newton in addition to mathematics and physics. Those economically illiterate people fail to recognize this and accuse Newton of doing nothing in the second half of his life, which is really ridiculous. Newton actually created a flexible reserve for gold. On the one hand, it satisfied peoples desire to properly preserve naked gold, and on the other hand, it used the active British pound as a voucher, and gradually formed a two-tier currency creation system, which not only met security, but also liquidity, driving the economy and trade to operate at a high speed. During this golden age of human economic history, gold rarely appeared directly in economic activities in naked form, but economic activities were inseparable from gold.

I think BTCFi is currently at such a historical turning point. If this round of BTCFi can achieve good development, it will be able to become the mainstay of the entire crypto economy. On the premise of solving its own safe storage, it will actively and actively participate in the crypto economy in the form of vouchers, and strongly and continuously promote the growth of the crypto economy. This is the fundamental reason why I am optimistic about BTCFi.

As an aside, many people asked me how Solv positioned itself. In fact, if you understand the deep reason I mentioned above, then Solvs thinking will be very clear. Solvs goal is to create a flexible reserve for BTCFi, so that BTC can truly activate the crypto economy as digital gold.

Meme

People who know me well know that I am not a fan of memecoin. This is determined by my personal values. But even so, I still want to list meme as one of the four tracks that I am most optimistic about.

This is not because memes are almost the only track that continues to create stories in the bear market, but because the underlying logic of memes is showing increasingly strong advantages in the moral dilemma of the crypto world.

Meme coin has two advantages.

The first advantage is easy to think of, which is the low cost of entry.

The second advantage is relatively profound, that is, meme coin puts fairness and transparency before value commitment.

What is the biggest difference between Meme and so-called value coins? It is that value coins promise value first, while meme coins promise fairness and transparency first. I am not saying that meme coins are really fair, in fact there are many tricks behind them, but in comparison, the information asymmetry of meme coins is generally better than that of value coins.

Which is more difficult, value or fairness? Wang Yangming said, It is easy to get rid of a thief in the mountains, but it is difficult to get rid of a thief in the heart. It is relatively easy to give value to an asset, but it is much more difficult to distribute value fairly. Value coins are easy first and difficult later. Since the regulatory mechanism of this industry has not been established, for every value coin team, once the value emerges, the team will face the temptation of opportunism. This is the real test and challenge. Only a few can pass this level. Once a value coin team betrays its promise, the coin will become neither fair nor valuable. On the contrary, a meme coin can have no value and be completely manifested as a gambling game, but from the beginning, some rules are used to make the information symmetry relatively in place. On this basis, it is even possible to give value to meme coins through secondary development. This is to make it difficult first and easy later, which is much easier than reshaping fairness for a garbage value coin.

Please dont get me wrong, I firmly advocate that crypto should move towards value creation, and I work hard to create a valuable coin. But I must also admit that favoring meme coins is a rational choice for many people.

Therefore, I think that in the next cycle, although the probability of betting on a meme coin as an individual is still low, the meme coin sector as a whole will continue to be popular. Moreover, I think that the meme sector will see some value creation, that is, some third-party teams will develop applications around existing meme coins, thereby injecting value into meme coins.

Stablecoin Payment

Many people think that blockchain has no applications other than cryptocurrency trading, but this is totally wrong. The largest application of blockchain is payment, and the fastest growing application in the payment field is stablecoin payment.

Strictly speaking, I am cheating by putting stablecoin payment in one of the four tracks. Because the outbreak of stablecoin payment is not in the future, not a guess, and there is no need to risk any judgment, but it is an established trend. Previously, in the crypto industry, stablecoins have been widely used as the main token assets for investment and incentives. The latest emerging trend is the gradual penetration of stablecoins in cross-border trade. Especially in the past one or two years, a large number of small and medium-sized cross-border traders have begun to use stablecoins for B2B settlement in their supply chains. In this field, the advantages of blockchain payment and settlement, minute-level clearing and settlement, and lifelong traceability of transaction records are fully reflected. As long as you are familiar with it, you cant stop, and there is no need to spend time persuading.

The only obstacle right now is regulation.

There is a common misunderstanding in the crypto community that major countries will suppress and crack down on stablecoin payments for a long time. As the design team of the ERC-3525 digital ticket standard, we have had in-depth exchanges and cooperation with central banks and multinational financial organizations in many countries in the past two years. I can tell you that this is not the case at all. From the Bank for International Settlements to the World Bank, from the central banks of some countries in Southeast Asia and Africa to some international commercial banks with huge cross-border businesses, they have fully recognized the advantages of stablecoins. Most of them know that this is an unstoppable trend, so they are taking a positive attitude to learn and accept it.

This round is not about the wolf coming, nor about Ye Gong鈥檚 love for dragons. It is based on relatively mature theoretical thinking and certain practices. The main problem they are facing now is how to implement anti-money laundering, anti-terrorist financing and other control obligations that any country under the rule of law and responsible financial institutions should fulfill while generally accepting stablecoin payments as a legal means of payment. A large part of the major research in this field that we are currently exposed to revolves around this issue. Once a breakthrough is made in this issue, stablecoin payments will be like a flood that will sweep the entire financial industry.

Stablecoin payment must be the first successful sector in RWA. Many people believe that RWA will be popular in the next wave, but I think it is not yet popular. Only when stablecoin payment, as the pioneer sector of RWA, is developed, other RWA assets can gradually gain momentum, which will take at least another cycle. However, the overall upward trend of the RWA track is not a problem, and patient capital should gradually begin to deploy RWA.

Web3 Social

In the next wave, there will be a leader in the Web3 social track. This is my boldest prediction. This topic has been hyped for a long time, and every attempt has failed. Why do I think the breakthrough point is in the near future?

This is mainly because new ideas and solutions have emerged, representative cases being Solana Blink and TON.

First of all, we need to understand that the so-called Web3 is the Internet of Value, and the so-called Web3 social network is actually a social network that can perform value operations. In other words, compared with Web2 social networking, Web3 social networking is mainly an increment, not a complete overhaul. From a functional point of view, Web2 social networks have done a good job in content, and there is no need to start anew for Web3 social networks. If you create a new social platform, use 99% of the resources to repeat what Web2 social networks have already done to perfection, and convince users to give up the social assets accumulated over the years and transfer all social relationships and data assets to the new platform, this is not only very difficult, but also very stupid. Why not add a value layer to the existing Web2 social network, allowing everyone to perform value operations such as payment and transactions in the existing social network?

This idea is so simple and natural, but entrepreneurs in the entire Web3 social track could not think of it for several years. Fortunately, with the emergence of TON and Solana Blink, this window paper was finally broken. What do TON and Solana Blink have in common? It is to add a value layer to the social network in the prime location of the Web2 CBD that has been built, instead of going to the wilderness to rebuild the building and expecting everyone to move collectively for such ideology and value propositions. In other words, let Web3 run to find traffic, rather than let traffic run to find Web3. Many people only see the trees and not the forest, only look at the current situation but not the trend, and are obsessed with analyzing data all day long. Sometimes they accuse TON of having traffic but no value, and sometimes they laugh at Blink for making a lot of noise but little rain. These accusations are all right when viewed individually, but they are ignorant of the general trend and fail to see the great significance of the paradigm shift in the construction of Web3 social networks. I am not saying that TON and Blink will definitely succeed, nor am I saying that they are the final winners. Just like there was MiTalk before WeChat and Musical.ly before TikTok, their success does not necessarily depend on them, but they opened up the right direction and will attract more outstanding innovators later, which is the most important thing.

Social networking must be the king of all applications. This was true in the Web2 era and will continue to be true in the Web3 era. There is no logical problem with Web3 social networking. The reason why it failed in the past was because of the wrong way of thinking. Now that this window paper has been broken, Web3 social payment and social transaction products will surely develop rapidly, which will largely determine the basic pattern of the Web3 industry in the next ten years. I have strong confidence in this.

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