Twelve Years After the Bitcoin White Paper, the Future Has Never Been So Bright

Today marks the 12th anniversary of the release of the Bitcoin whitepaper. Bitcoin was created 12 years ago in response to the dangers of a global recession in 2008, and the world is now in its second deepest recession since the turn of the millennium.

Below, five leaders from the blockchain and cryptocurrency industry reflect on the past 12 years. How has Bitcoin shaped the new innovations we see in the blockchain industry today? As the world continues to struggle with an economic recession, what impact might this have on Bitcoin? How will Bitcoin philosophy help us overcome today’s biggest challenges?

Eran Haggiag, co-founder and executive chairman of Clear, a developer of a blockchain-based settlement and clearing network, said,

“In 12 years, Bitcoin and its underlying technology, blockchain, have proven that it has the potential to permanently change the way we do business. Blockchain is beginning to transform the way businesses conduct business across a wide range of industries – from telecommunications to pharmaceuticals, healthcare to insurance – by increasing transaction speeds through instant settlement and improving transparency, trust and traceability between enterprise partners.
Just as Bitcoin is proving itself to be a very successful ‘digital gold’ application of blockchain technology, I think we will see blockchain technology create huge benefits for the enterprises that will create the next generation of fintech infrastructure in the coming decades.”

Ali Mizani Oskui, founder and chief investment officer of Switzerland-based asset manager FiCAS AG, the world’s first Swiss asset manager to actively manage ETPs, said:

“The Covid-19 pandemic has had a massive impact on economies around the world, necessitating unprecedented fiscal and monetary stimulus measures that will inevitably increase inflation rates in most corners of the world. These inflationary and macroeconomic pressures will allow Bitcoin to emerge as a new asset that can serve as a recognized store of value against inflation. This is already evidenced by a clear trend among corporations and institutions that are allocating a significant portion of their reserves into digital assets, most notably Bitcoin. Keeping these trends in mind, and with the added economic uncertainty brought on by the pandemic, it is very possible that Bitcoin could approach $20,000 by the end of the year.”
Massive market adoption, a large influx of investors, and favorable market fundamentals will see Bitcoin’s market cap reach $1 trillion in the medium term. The growth in Bitcoin’s market cap means that volatility will decrease, and as a result, we will see Bitcoin being recognized as a legitimate asset class by both retail and institutional investors.
One of Bitcoin’s greatest benefits is its ability to open borders and provide new possibilities for users through frictionless payments and a broad and diverse population that gains from productivity and innovation. This will ultimately be a catalyst for wider market adoption.”

Quyna Qu, co-founder and COO of DeFiner, a decentralized financial network focused on digitized lending, savings, and payments, said,

“What is needed is an electronic payment system based on cryptographic proof rather than trust… — Satoshi Nakamoto
Twelve years ago, Satoshi Nakamoto published this sentence in the Bitcoin white paper.
That year, 2008, happened to be the worst economic year in more than a generation. Now in 2020, we face a new economic crisis due to the shutdown of businesses and institutions caused by COVID-19. The market collapse, the need to print large amounts of inflationary money multiple times for bailouts that dwarfs 2008, and then the difficulty the US government has in distributing these funds to citizens - all of this reinforces the truth behind Satoshi's words and the existence of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
Naturally, we now ask what the future holds for Bitcoin. By 2032, blockchain and cryptocurrencies will be as ubiquitous as smartphones are today. All major companies are likely to adopt blockchain technology in multiple areas of their operations (inventory, accounting, billing, and payroll). At the same time, individual lives will be enhanced by the direct benefits of blockchain - more ways to make money, easier access to money. In developing countries, where making money and capital (not to mention banking) has long faced severe barriers, these benefits and improvements will be obvious.
The genius of Bitcoin is in overcoming these barriers — the ironic convergence of which is to remove the middleman (and eliminate trust altogether) so we can all become more connected and more prosperous.”

Nick Cote, senior analyst at gamified crypto trading platform Hxro Labs, said:

The COVID-19 pandemic caught many governments and institutions off guard, and their knee-jerk reaction to address the problem was to implement massive stimulus packages, followed by an expansion of money supplies to historic levels. Actions lead to consequences. While some of these consequences may take years to become apparent, the COVID-19 pandemic has both boosted the growth of digital payments and propelled Bitcoin into the mainstream as a digital store of value and even a de facto hedge against inflation. This rapid shift toward digital currencies has put Bitcoin and central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) at the forefront of the digital revolution. As the institutionalization of this asset class accelerates, Bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies are likely to continue their upward trajectory as other fiat currencies continue to inflate.
We hope that Bitcoin continues to gain traction in the institutional world and that Bitcoin appears on the balance sheets of more public and private entities. Ultimately, the price of Bitcoin will continue to appreciate.
Without Bitcoin, there would be no altcoins, which have been one of the main drivers of innovation across the space. This is reflected in the decline in Bitcoin’s share of total market capitalization in the cryptocurrency space. Bitcoin has led to the decentralization of money and most financial services, such as lending, form the bedrock of most economies. Bitcoin has laid the foundation for the next generation of money while showing that central banks are not necessarily needed as managers or gatekeepers.”

Zahreddine Touag, co-founder of Paris Blockchain Week Summit and Woorton, said,

“The current pandemic crisis has been marked by unconventional monetary policies, resulting in massive injections of new liquidity by central banks to support the economy. We believe Bitcoin is well positioned to hedge against future negative impacts of these types of macroeconomic policies, and we are bullish on the asset as a result.
In the short term, we believe that Bitcoin will be democratized as centralized players enter the market aiming to offer cryptocurrencies, digital corporate currencies, or digital central bank currencies to their customers or citizens. The centralized aspects of these players could artificially recreate the types of problems Bitcoin was designed to solve, such as censorship, trust in intermediaries, and control. Therefore, in the long term, we see a wave of liberation of such players to re-adapt to Bitcoin's original philosophy, while at the same time seeing greater usage in daily transactions as a result of this first democratization.
In our opinion, the most outstanding moment in the past 12 years was the Bitcoin boom of 2017, when large institutions such as JP Morgan or politicians suffering from a crisis of confidence attacked Bitcoin. Today, the same companies and countries have plans to work with Bitcoin in some way and have created or are in the process of creating innovative regulatory frameworks.
Bitcoin showed the world that software could be open source, censorship-resistant, decentralized, permissionless, and borderless. It attracted many talented developers and entrepreneurs who found these aspects attractive or revolutionary. This global community then innovated on Bitcoin’s impulses in many different aspects, including scalability, privacy, governance, or financial inclusion. Bitcoin’s philosophy lives on in the decentralization of crypto exchanges or lending platforms, as we have recently seen in the DeFi craze.”