Winter is over, is spring far behind? 10 charts review how cryptocurrencies recovered from the trough in the first half of 2019

This article is intended to convey more market information and does not constitute any investment advice.

The first half of 2019 has passed, and we miss it very much.

In the past six months, we have witnessed exchanges actively saving themselves through IEOs in the cold winter, witnessed blockchain projects introducing new products, and witnessed traditional technology and financial giants entering the market one after another;

We have also witnessed the increasing maturity of regulatory policies, witnessed Facebook launch Libra and open up the crypto world to 2.7 billion users, and witnessed senior domestic government officials publicly express their concern about digital currencies and crypto assets for the first time and affirm the current development status of the country.

We have also witnessed Bitcoin rise from less than $3,500 to over $10,000, and the total market value of the crypto market rose from $122 billion to $366 billion - more than a three-fold increase.

Behind the amazing growth, we also see the efforts of the cryptocurrency industry, traditional technology and financial companies, and government regulators. When looking back at how cryptocurrencies got out of the trough in the first half of 2019, a thrilling history unfolds.

Bitcoin price more than tripled in 2019

In the first half of 2019, Bitcoin experienced a dramatic market trend.

Over the past year, Bitcoin has been stuck in a bear market, with the lowest price being less than $3,200. In 2019, driven by favorable factors such as the industry's IEO self-rescue, the participation of large technology and financial companies, and the entry of external funds, Bitcoin prices rebounded strongly, with sharp increases in early April, mid-May, and mid-to-late June, reaching a peak of $13,970, more than three times the price at the beginning of the year.

As Bitcoin has repeatedly shown strong upward momentum, mainstream media have also adjusted their judgments on the cryptocurrency market. On June 22, Bitcoin broke through $100 million. The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg pointed out in subsequent commentary articles that this surge in Bitcoin not only shows that the cryptocurrency market has begun to recover, but also shows the driving force behind the market's rapid recovery - in 2017, Bitcoin's rise was mainly driven by retail investors and high speculative sentiment, but this time it is more because of Bitcoin's true value.

Industry self-help, exchanges start IEO boom

In early 2019, with the great success of Binance Launchpad’s restart, the IEO model surfaced.

In March, Huobi, OKEx and other leading exchanges have launched IEO-like services, recommending high-quality projects to users based on their own exchange advantages. The IEO model transfers the risks of the project party to the exchange. Using its own resources and project experience, the exchange can complete the review and investigation of the submitted projects, while also suppressing technical risks such as phishing and malicious attacks. The advantages of users, funds, traffic, etc. of the exchange can provide more effective help for the dissemination of projects and the collection of funds.

With the market still in a bear market, IEO has injected vitality into the market, bringing about a "win-win-win" situation - investors can purchase project tokens at a low price and sell them for profit after the project tokens are open for trading; project parties gain better exposure and marketing opportunities and can better build communities; exchanges attract new users and activate transactions through new IEO projects, thereby pushing up the price of platform coins and obtaining more transaction fees.

A report released by data analysis agency Inwara at the end of May showed that in 2019, IEO projects raised about $375 million more than ICO projects. All IEO projects have raised a total of $1.6 billion so far, of which about $1.4 billion was raised in 2019, accounting for 87.5%.

JPMorgan Chase launches its own cryptocurrency, JPM Coin

On February 14, JPMorgan Chase, the largest financial services institution in the United States, announced the launch of its own cryptocurrency JPM Coin, marking the beginning of the entry of large financial technology companies in 2019.

JPM Coin will be used as a payment transaction tool for instant settlement between users. JPMorgan Chase plans to move cross-border payments and bond issuance to the blockchain. To achieve this goal, it uses faster blockchain smart contracts instead of slow traditional technologies such as wire transfers.

JPM Coin is positioned as a stable currency, pegged to the US dollar at a ratio of 1:1. JPMorgan Chase has positioned it in three major scenarios:

Bakkt, a crypto exchange owned by NYSE’s parent company, will test Bitcoin futures trading on July 22

On May 13, the Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange, submitted two application documents to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFCT), detailing the specific operating mechanisms of two different Bitcoin futures products. Following the footsteps of its parent company, ICE's crypto exchange Bakkt announced that it will test Bitcoin futures trading in July, and the test trading targets are the two Bitcoin futures products introduced in the application documents.

Bakkt was founded in August 2018 by Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange. In January 2019, Bakkt announced the completion of its first round of financing of US$183 million, with a valuation of US$740 million. Investors include well-known companies such as Starbucks and Microsoft.

In June, Bakkt was rumored to be launching a mobile payment app called "Bakkt Pay" to enter the hot payment market. Bakkt Pay is expected to focus on the emerging cryptocurrency payment field, and also reach cooperation with Starbucks, Microsoft, large supermarket chain Whole Foods, telecommunications giant AT&T, chain department store Nordstrom, and the world's largest game retailer GameStop to expand its use scenarios.

The Ethereum Foundation provides a $19 million budget for Ethereum 2.0, and Vitalik announced that all research breakthroughs for Ethereum 2.0 have been achieved

On May 22, the Ethereum Foundation released its budget plan for the next year for the first time. The budget is as high as 30 million US dollars, which will be used in three major areas: Ethereum 2.0, the existing Ethereum network, and engineer training and education.

As a major project for the coming year, Ethereum 2.0 has a budget of $19 million. In response to questions about the high budget, Ethereum founder Vitalik said that the team has achieved all research breakthroughs for Ethereum 2.0.

Ethereum's early promise was to create a decentralized world computer that would execute anyone's code in exchange for fees. In order to realize its potential and scale DApps to millions or even hundreds of millions of users, Ethereum must solve key issues related to scalability and performance. To this end, Ethereum developers launched an ambitious "Ethereum 2.0" roadmap, which includes key designs such as PoS and sharding.

The collapse of the cryptocurrency market in 2018 was largely due to the failure of Ethereum's coin issuance function, and a large number of blockchain projects based on Ethereum were falsified. However, in the "Blockchain 50" list released by Forbes in April, 22 well-known companies developed blockchain services based on Ethereum, proving that Ethereum still has a strong consensus foundation. Therefore, the important good news that Ethereum 2.0 continues to spread not only affects the fundamentals of ETH, but also improves the cryptocurrency market.

EOS launches Voice social network to expand usage scenarios

On June 1, EOS launched the social product Voice at its first anniversary conference. It is said that Voice can ensure that high-quality content will receive more rewards, and the proceeds will not be taken away by the commercial companies behind it, but will be used to promote community development. In addition, Voice also stated that it will encourage real users to be active on the network and actively combat robot accounts.

After entering 2019, the activity of DApps has dropped significantly, and most of them are still gambling applications. In this context, EOS has created usage scenarios and expanded the boundaries of DApps by launching the social network Voice. Voice is issued based on the EOS public chain network, but has its own token Voice Token. Users who create, share, discover, and spread content on Voice will receive Voice Token rewards. BM, the founder of EOS, said that Voice is based on the EOS public chain, but users do not need to pay for RAM, CPU, etc. themselves. The EOS development team Block.one will provide these resources for users.

VISA launches blockchain payment B2B Connect to enter the $12.5 billion cross-border payment market

On June 12, the US payment giant VISA announced the launch of the blockchain-based cross-border payment network "B2B Connect". B2B Connect is based on blockchain and integrates Hyper Ledger technology. According to VISA, B2B Connect has covered 30 trade channels around the world and will expand to 90 markets by the end of 2019. It has only one goal - to make cross-border payments faster and cheaper.

Today, most cross-border payments are still made through the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT). SWIFT is a Belgian organization founded in 1973 that currently has more than 10,000 financial institutions as members. Despite its long history, the SWIFT system is very inefficient because few banks can connect directly to each other. A payment from Kansas City, USA, to Nairobi, Kenya, must pass through banks in multiple places such as New York and London before reaching its destination. Each bank charges a fee. Therefore, it is difficult to track the progress of the transfer and predict how much this cross-border payment will cost. Considering the exchange rates between different countries, it is undoubtedly even more of a headache.

B2B Connect is said to be a good solution to these problems. The distributed ledger technology it uses allows banks to connect directly, and the transferor can also see the cost of a cross-border payment in advance. Cross-border transactions can be quickly settled within 1 or 2 days, which is more efficient. VISA said that B2B Connect focuses on high-value B2B transactions above $15,000. This scale of transfer accounts for about 10% of the global cross-border payment market, which is about $12.5 trillion. The launch of B2B Connect provides a good illustration of the application and value of blockchain in the financial field.

UBS and 14 other international financial institutions jointly issue cryptocurrency USC

On June 4, 14 financial institutions, represented by UBS Group AG, launched a "bitcoin-like" cryptocurrency for cross-border transaction settlement. The highly anticipated cryptocurrency is called "utility settlement coin", or USC.

Facebook launches cryptocurrency project Libra, opening the crypto world to 2.7 billion people

On June 18, Facebook's cryptocurrency project Libra's white paper was officially released. According to the white paper, Libra's mission is to build "a simple, borderless currency and financial infrastructure that serves billions of people."

Specifically, Libra aims to become a stable digital cryptocurrency that will be fully backed by real asset reserves. It inherits several characteristics of new digital currencies: fast transfers, encryption to ensure security, and easy and free cross-border transfers of funds. Libra is scheduled to be released in the first half of 2020.

Facebook Libra has attracted worldwide attention after its release. Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin believes that Facebook Libra is a big boon to the crypto industry, with its influence, more than 2 billion connected users, existing funds and developer resources, and huge opportunities.

Chen Yulu, Deputy Governor of the Central Bank: China is paying attention to the application of digital currency and encrypted assets in the financial field

On June 24, on the eve of the G20 summit, Chen Yulu, deputy governor of the central bank, delivered a speech at a briefing of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Chen Yulu said, "China is concerned about the application of new technologies in the financial field, including digital currency, encrypted assets, etc. China has done a good job in this regard. "

With Facebook launching its cryptocurrency project Libra and Bitcoin price exceeding $10,000, the central government's attention to cryptocurrencies has also been increasing. The speech by Chen Yulu, deputy governor of the central bank, was the first time that senior central government officials publicly expressed their concern about digital currencies and encrypted assets, while affirming the current development status of the country.

On June 25, the English version of the Global Times, a subsidiary of the People's Daily, published a commentary, pointing out that "China cannot be absent in the era of global digital currency competition." The Global Times believes that China must participate in this round of digital economic competition. "With the advent of the era of global digital economic competition, it is necessary for Chinese industries and regulators to have more dialogues on digital currency, understand and even encourage digital currency. Otherwise, China may fall behind in the new financial landscape."

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