We began with macroeconomic slowdowns then 3 Arrows, Celcius & Voyager & finished with FTX. Meanwhile, Eth completed the Merge, new blockchains appeared & the user base grew globally. 2023 could be the year the institutional investors move in.
As we have often said Crypto grows in dog years and what happened this year could well have taken 9 years in traditional finance. The takeaways for 2022 were that Central Finance "CeFi" fraud smashed the reputation of an asset class based on trustless decentralized solutions - ironic hey. This has resulted in movements to cold wallets and custodians and to the increased use of DEX'S or decentralised exchanges. This will be little comfort for the 1 million+ investors who had their money and tokens rehypothecated, lent out, and frankly stolen by the likes of FTX and Celcius. More robust regulations and penalties are welcomed and now expected! On the brighter side, we see 2023 being led by the professional class of investors and institutions first with the acquisition of distressed exchanges and funds and then infrastructure projects. Emotion does not tend to dominate insto's so "while all around are losing their heads" they are calculating entry strategies.
Finally a big thank you to our listeners who have listened to or viewed Beyond Bitcoin 35,000+ times in 2022. Have a great holiday break and see you in 2023!