Inventory | 50 major keywords affecting the crypto industry in 2020

The ups and downs of 2020 are coming to an end. During this year, the international situation has changed dramatically and the COVID-19 pandemic has swept the world. The blockchain and crypto industry has witnessed the fear of "Black Thursday", the excitement of setting new historical highs, the madness of the DeFi boom, and the greed of institutional capital.

Bitpush also reviewed the major and minor events that occurred in the past year and sorted out the 50 most frequently appearing keywords in the blockchain and encryption industry.

COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic is the "black swan" event of 2020. It has had a profound impact on the lives of nearly 8 billion people around the world, and every country and industry has had to make changes. However, for the crypto and blockchain industries, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Digital currencies and payment systems are developing rapidly, blockchain technology is being used more widely, and cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin have become the only choice to hedge against fiat currency inflation.

Black Thursday

When the nest is overturned, the eggs will not remain intact. On March 12, against the backdrop of the global asset market crash, crypto assets were not immune. Bitcoin, the cryptocurrency with the highest market value, was almost halved, which made people think again about the relationship between crypto assets and traditional assets. However, it is gratifying that although there is still a strong correlation between crypto assets and traditional assets, crypto assets quickly recovered from the sharp drop.

Negative oil prices

In the early morning of April 21, the price of the May delivery contract of WTI crude oil futures in the United States fell to -37.63 US dollars. This silenced those who questioned the excessive price fluctuations of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin. In fact, for most of 2020, the price fluctuations of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin were not large, and the maturity of crypto assets was visible to the naked eye.

Sino-US relations

Geopolitics has always been an area of ​​particular concern for the crypto industry and crypto market. Against the backdrop of the deterioration of relations between the United States and Iran at the beginning of this year, the conflict between the two major powers, China and the United States, also affected the crypto industry. From the signing of the first phase of the trade negotiations to the closure of each other's consulates, crypto assets are often used as "safe haven assets" when geopolitical relations are tense.

Brexit

The uncertainty brought by Brexit in crypto and digital regulation is greater than the impact on the crypto market. Although this may cause some investors to convert fiat currency assets into cryptocurrencies, the greater impact on the crypto industry is that some companies that were previously headquartered in the UK are moving to other countries in Europe to avoid the risk of regulatory policy uncertainty.

US election

Trump or Biden? In the second half of this year, the crypto industry has conducted countless simulations for these two different US election results, but in the end it was found that no matter who wins the election, it will not change the general trend of the crypto industry and the market. Under Trump, the US stock market performed well, which is good for the crypto market, and Biden may bring regulatory certainty, which is also good for the crypto industry.

Halving

In addition to the US election, Bitcoin’s block reward halving also happens every four years. In May, the halving, which came as expected, affected the trend of the entire crypto market like a blunt knife cutting meat. Although the price of Bitcoin did not soar immediately that month, we can see the impact of the supply reduction caused by the third block reward halving of Bitcoin in the entire crypto bull market in the second half of the year.

Digital Gold

In a report after the Bitcoin halving, Bloomberg said that 2020 is a critical year for Bitcoin's transition to digital gold. In a year when the global epidemic spread and the economy was hit hard, Bitcoin delivered a fairly satisfactory answer. Although it failed to make rapid progress when the traditional asset market collapsed in the first half of the year, Bitcoin's excellent performance in the second half of the year made investors exclaim that "digital gold" is replacing "real gold."

$10,000

This is the most fiercely contested price between long and short sides in 2020. Before September, $10,000 was the most important technical and psychological resistance level for Bitcoin. For more than half a year, Bitcoin has been trying to break through this price level. After more than ten attempts, Bitcoin finally broke through and entered the upward channel with great momentum.

All-time high

On December 1, Bitcoin finally broke through its previous historical high set on December 17, 2017, and has since broken through $20,000 to set new historical highs several times. This is a milestone event in this year's crypto bull market, marking the maturity of Bitcoin and mainstream recognition of crypto assets.

mechanism

The mainstream recognition of crypto assets is reflected in the inflow of institutional funds. Industry insiders believe that if the crypto bull market in 2017 was driven by individual investors and the ICO craze, then the bull market in 2020 is rational and sustainable, driven by the need for institutions to hedge against inflation and depreciation of fiat currencies.

Grayscale

If you want to do your work well, you must first sharpen your tools. Institutional funds will not choose cryptocurrency exchanges that may face security, regulatory and other risks. Grayscale's regulated Bitcoin Trust and Ethereum Trust provide institutional funds with the tools to invest in Bitcoin with the lowest risk. The inflow of billions of dollars in funds in 2020 is the best recognition of Grayscale's crypto investment tools.

MicroStrategy

MicroStrategy represents the "smart money" on Wall Street. The company announced in the second half of this year that it invested $425 million in Bitcoin and made a 50% floating profit three months after the investment. This is the best endorsement of Bitcoin and crypto assets. After the price of Bitcoin hit a new historical high in December, MicroStrategy has not stopped investing in Bitcoin. The company issued convertible bonds worth $650 million to continue to increase its holdings.

Square

Unlike MicroStrategy, Square has always been a deep participant in the crypto industry. Its Cash App provides investors with a convenient way to invest in cryptocurrencies. In the second half of this year, Square announced that it had invested $50 million in Bitcoin. In addition, Square has established the Cryptocurrency Open Patent Alliance, which aims to increase access to crypto technology by creating a collaborative patent library.

PayPal

PayPal's entry is a key step in bringing cryptocurrency to the mainstream in 2020. Although crypto transactions on its platform are currently only available to US users, it has already demonstrated huge purchasing power. Once PayPal's billions of users and 28 million merchants around the world support crypto payments, it will unleash unimaginable demand and applications for the crypto industry.

Paul Tudor Jones

In 2020, cryptocurrency evangelists are no longer just insiders. Billionaire Paul Tudor Jones has become the latest one, not only saying that he has invested in Bitcoin, but also recommending that everyone add Bitcoin to their portfolio. As a Wall Street asset trader and macro investment giant, his lobbying has made more investors more convinced of the value of Bitcoin.

JK Rowling

Bitcoin's frequent "out-of-circle" this year is an important signal that crypto assets are going mainstream. Many people in the entertainment industry have expressed interest in crypto assets or have already invested in Bitcoin. The most influential among them is JK Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter series of novels. She tweeted on May 16 to inquire about the situation of Bitcoin, which also triggered replies from Vitalik Buterin, Brian Armstrong, Elon Musk and others.

Central Bank Digital Currency

Under the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic that has spread across the country, the decline in the use of paper money and the popularity of digital payments have forced central banks around the world to conduct research on digital payment systems and central bank digital currencies. Among them, China is in the lead in the development of the central bank digital currency, the digital renminbi, but the digital dollar and digital euro of the other two major economies, the United States and the European Union, are also at a critical stage.

Digital RMB

China's central bank digital currency, the digital RMB, seems to be making progress every day in 2020. From closed testing, to pilot testing, to digital RMB wallets and digital RMB red envelopes, China's digital RMB is moving step by step towards large-scale application, which has also triggered a central bank digital currency development competition around the world.

Digital Dollar

The United States regards China's development of the "digital RMB" as a huge threat to the dollar's monetary hegemony. This year, the discussion on the digital dollar in the United States has been extremely heated. Many hearings in the U.S. Congress are related to the digital dollar, and the Federal Reserve has also stated that it is conducting research in this area.

Digital Euro

The digital euro is also one of the ECB's priorities this year. ECB President Christine Lagarde believes that the digital euro will be a symbol of the ongoing European integration process and will ultimately help unify Europe's digital economy. Although no final decision has been made on whether to issue the digital euro, conditions in all aspects are ripe and the digital euro is also imminent.

Libra (Diem)

In 2020, Libra is trying to make people not forget about it (publishing a new version of the white paper), while at the same time trying to make people forget about it (changing its name to Diem). In order to get the go-ahead from regulators, Libra (Diem) abandoned its original plan of a multi-currency-supported stablecoin and instead launched a single-currency stablecoin. It is expected that the new US dollar stablecoin Diem will be launched next year.

USDT

USDT, the largest stablecoin by market value, issued an additional $16 billion in 2020, quadrupling from around $4 billion at the beginning of the year to around $20 billion at the end of the year. The importance of USDT stablecoin in the crypto ecosystem is unquestionable, but it still needs to face questions about the non-one-to-one support of assets and the big stick that regulators may drop at any time.

Ethereum 2.0

The creation of the Ethereum 2.0 Phase 0 Mainnet Beacon Chain may be one of the most important developments in the crypto industry in the field of technology in 2020. Ethereum, the second largest blockchain network, has finally taken the first step in its evolution to a proof-of-stake network. If the problems of Ethereum network congestion and high fees can be solved within a few years as planned, then Ethereum 2.0 will have an endless future.

Filecoin

Filecoin is another important project launched this year that has postponed its mainnet launch time many times. As the incentive layer of IPFS, Filecoin aims to solve the problems of IPFS by introducing the design of blockchain and economic model. Blockchain itself is not suitable for storing large amounts of data. If IPFS and Filecoin can provide a long-term storage method for blockchain that is low-cost, secure, and highly privacy-protective, it will surely become an important infrastructure of blockchain.

BSN

In April, the Blockchain Service Network (BSN), led by China, was officially launched. BSN aims to solve the problems of high blockchain learning costs, long development cycles, high application deployment costs, and difficulty in connecting different underlying application data. As part of China's "new infrastructure", BSN will serve as a blockchain infrastructure to nurture countless application innovations.

Polkadot

Polkadot, dubbed the "Ethereum killer", is another project that has performed well in 2020. On the one hand, the Polkadot ecosystem is making great strides in the crypto industry, and on the other hand, the development of Polkadot's parachain is also proceeding intensively. In the crypto market, DOT's market capitalization has also strongly entered the top ten this year.

Chainlink

As the leader in oracle projects, Chainlink has performed well this year. Especially with the booming development of DeFi this summer, oracles have become an indispensable or even crucial part of the entire ecosystem. In 2020, Chainlink cooperated with multiple projects or companies inside and outside the industry to provide oracle services, and the market value of its token LINK also entered the top ten.

JPMorgan Chase

JPMorgan Chase represents the attitude of Wall Street banks towards the crypto and blockchain industries. In a report released at the beginning of the year, JPMorgan Chase did not recommend investors to invest in cryptocurrencies, but it is actively embracing blockchain technology. After selling its blockchain platform Quorum to ConsenSys, JPMorgan Chase established its own blockchain department Onyx and actively promoted the application of its own digital currency JPM Coin.

Visa

In 2020, bank card giant Visa launched a crypto bank card in cooperation with several crypto companies, which also accelerated the popularity of cryptocurrencies. In addition, Visa has applied for patents in digital currencies and started to integrate USDC stablecoins into its platform in cooperation with Circle, supporting its global payment network with 60 million merchants for USDC payments.

Coinbase

In the middle of this year, there were rumors that the major cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase might be listed on the Nasdaq. This news was confirmed in December. If successful, Coinbase will become the first major cryptocurrency exchange to be listed, which will also be a sign of encryption entering the mainstream. In addition, this year Coinbase's institutional custody business is growing and MicroStrategy's $425 million Bitcoin acquisition was completed through Coinbase.

DeFi boom

In the summer of 2020, the DeFi craze in the crypto industry was even hotter than the weather. Various DeFi projects continued to recreate various parts of the traditional financial system on the blockchain like ants moving their houses, and showed amazing potential. In less than a year, the total value of locked assets in DeFi soared from US$675 million to nearly US$15 billion, an astonishing 20-fold increase.

Liquidity Mining

Liquidity mining is the darling of the DeFi craze this summer. A large amount of funds have poured in, and new projects have launched the economic model of liquidity mining every week or even every day. This has led to the popularity of some income aggregation projects such as Yearn Finance and Harvest Finance. However, as the DeFi craze faded after September, the sustainability of these projects still needs to be further verified.

Compound

Lending protocols have always been the most popular application in the DeFi field, and Compound’s issuance of the governance token COMP in mid-June this year completely activated this field. The total value of locked assets in lending protocols such as Maker and Aave has also remained high. Especially driven by the surge in COMP prices, DeFi projects have followed suit, triggering a large influx of funds.

Yam

Yam witnessed the craziest week of the DeFi craze, and also confirmed the worrying side of the DeFi craze. Due to the unaudited code with bugs, the Yam project was found to have problems immediately after experiencing a surge in the initial launch. After 24 hours of efforts, it still could not be solved. Yam became a negative example in the DeFi craze this summer.

YFI

Yearn Finance (YFI), a yield aggregation project, is one of the hottest DeFi projects this year, and it is still maintaining its development momentum after the heat has subsided. The price of the YFI token once exceeded $40,000, which was four times the price of Bitcoin at the time. And YFI founder Andre Cronje has also become an Internet celebrity in the DeFi field, and continues to use his influence to launch new DeFi projects.

SushiSwap

SushiSwap and its anonymous founder Chef Nomi tell the story of how a "centralized" DeFi project became decentralized. After being accused of security issues and suspected scams after its launch, Chef Nomi was discovered by community members to buy coins to cash out, which ultimately led to the founder of the SushiSwap project transferring control.

Uniswap

Decentralized exchanges (DEXs) have not missed this round of DeFi craze. Uniswap, the leading DEX, dominates the market share of non-custodial exchanges. Due to its widest range of assets and permissionless listing process, Uniswap has benefited greatly from this summer's DeFi craze.

NFT

After the DeFi craze, NFT is considered to be the most likely to become a new hot spot in the industry. In 2020, many digital artworks and crypto collectibles were sold at high prices, and more and more digital artists entered this field to create. Currently, NFT-related projects are still heating up, which is very likely to become a hot spot in the industry in 2021.

Russia

Russia has made a lot of progress in the regulation of crypto assets this year. Starting in 2021, citizens of the country can use digital financial assets for transactions, but they still cannot use cryptocurrencies for payments. Russia also plans to require crypto miners to report mining data, cryptocurrency traders to file taxes for crypto assets, and civil servants to declare crypto assets. In addition, the country will also use blockchain in regional voting.

OCC

The U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), led by former Coinbase exchange executive Brian Brooks, is trying to provide a favorable operating environment for crypto businesses. The proposed rules will allow cryptocurrency businesses to use banking services more unless they involve certain specific risks.

SEC

This year, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has stepped up its pursuit of initial coin offerings (ICOs) that it considers to be unregistered securities. Its enforcement division has collected more than $4.68 billion in illegal proceeds and fines in the first 11 months, with more than a quarter of the fines coming from Telegram's Gram token sale. In total, $1.26 billion in unregistered ICO funds have been turned over to the SEC.

Telegram

On May 13, Telegram founder Pavel Durov posted on the official Telegram channel that Telegram's long-running and troubled blockchain project TON was officially shut down due to obstruction from regulators. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sued Telegram last year to stop the company from distributing TON tokens to U.S. investors.

BitMEX

In 2020, the crypto derivatives exchange BitMEX also encountered regulatory sanctions. On October 1, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) believed that the exchange illegally operated a cryptocurrency derivatives trading platform and violated anti-money laundering regulations, and also filed a lawsuit against four executives including BitMEX CEO Authur Hayes. This incident once caused a shock in the crypto market.

Bitmain

The palace intrigue between Jihan Wu and Zhan Ketuan, the founders of the mining machine giant Bitmain, lasted from the beginning of the year to the end of the year. Both parties used the Bitmain platform they controlled to launch an offensive against each other, and went to court over legal person changes, shareholder meeting resolutions, etc. Although news of an agreement between the two parties came out in December, this obviously affected Bitmain's competitiveness. On the one hand, Ebang and Canaan, two of the three giants, have already gone public, and on the other hand, Shenma Mining Machine behind them is still catching up. Bitmain urgently needs to quickly save the situation.

Craig Wright

Another suspenseful drama in 2020 is the $10 billion Bitcoin dispute between Craig Wright and Ira Kleiman. Although the Tulip Trust mentioned by Wright expired this year, various evidences show that he provided untrue evidence in court. Currently, the trial of the case has been postponed to 2021.

Flash Loans

Flash loan attacks are becoming the most feared killer of DeFi projects. In 2020, many projects such as bZx, Balancer, Harvest Finance, Value, Cheese Bank, OUSD, etc. suffered flash loan attacks, with losses reaching tens of millions of dollars. This highlights the importance of DeFi protocol security, which is particularly important when more and more funds flow into DeFi.

Twitter is under attack

On July 16, the social media Twitter suffered an "epic" attack. The Twitter accounts of crypto exchanges such as Coinbase, Gemini, and Binance, as well as celebrities such as Buffett, Obama, Biden, and Bezos were stolen and "Bitcoin scam" information was posted, which caused concerns within and outside the circle about the security of centralized platforms.

OKEx suspends withdrawals

On October 16, the cryptocurrency exchange OKEx suspended withdrawals because some of the company's private key holders were cooperating with the public security authorities in the investigation and were currently out of contact, making it impossible to complete the authorization. This caused a small shock in the cryptocurrency market. Although OKEx finally resumed withdrawals on November 27, it still had an irreversible impact on the exchange, with a large amount of Bitcoin flowing into competitors such as Binance.

PlusToken

PlusToken, the largest Ponzi scheme in the cryptocurrency world, caused users and investors to lose about $3 billion in 2019. In September this year, six key members were prosecuted by the procuratorate. This year, all 27 main suspects and 82 key members have been arrested. In November this year, according to the criminal ruling, all the seized digital currencies have been sold and converted into cash according to law.

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AuthorLiang Che