As most of us had been having fun with some R&R over Christmas break, Coinbase Cloud protocol specialist Elias Simos was scouring the online for probably the most fascinating crypto charts of 2021: 69 of them to be actual.
Within the newest Round The Block podcast, we sit down with Elias and focus on a few of the most fascinating information factors from the yr, and what all of it means for the longer term. (Excessive degree takeaways beneath)
Metaverse and good contract property outperform
Worth isn’t every part, however the two high performing property in 2021 are indicative of broader tendencies all year long. 2021’s greatest performing property had been:
- Metaverse gaming tokens
- Good contract platform tokens
The governance tokens of gaming worlds Axie Infinity (AXS) and The Sandbox (SAND) every posted 16,000 and 13,000 p.c beneficial properties respectively. In the meantime, platform tokens from Polygon, Terra, Solana, and Fantom, all posted 8,000% beneficial properties or extra.
Provided that play-to-earn gaming had a breakout yr, and layer 1s not named Ethereum noticed robust adoption, these tendencies must be of no shock. Now let’s dig a bit deeper.
The state of Layer 1s
Ethereum’s native token (ETH) did a modest 2X over the yr, whereas it was considerably of a tough yr for Ethereum DeFi blue chips, with the DeFiPulse index down 80% over the yr vs ETH.
The value of DeFi property doesn’t inform your entire story, nonetheless. TVL of Ethereum DeFi functions confirmed super progress over the yr, and the variety of distinctive Ethereum addresses interacting with DeFi protocols 4x’ed.
Regardless, ETH killers and sidechains gained the yr when measured by progress of general market share.
The good migration & the EVM normal
In Might, there was $200M sitting in Ethereum bridges. That quantity climbed to $20B by the tip of the yr, underscoring the good migration of worth from Ethereum to different ecosystems.
The flipside, nonetheless, is that regardless of this migration away from Ethereum, most worth nonetheless sits in EVM (Ethereum Digital Machine) appropriate environments.
Do not forget that the EVM is basically the mind of Ethereum that performs computations for the community. When different Layer 1s undertake the EVM, it makes deploying current functions on new networks simpler for builders, along with making it simpler for customers emigrate to those new chains.
The dominance of worth on EVM appropriate chains (Avalanche, Polygon, and many others) counsel that an ordinary is forming across the EVM. This could finally hold Ethereum because the gravitational middle of the good contracting world, as ETH functions and property might be natively interoperable with most different chains.
Rise of the app chains
Whereas EVM chains nonetheless dominate the panorama, the tip of 2021 noticed an increase in worth on Tendermint chains. Recall that Tendermint is an ordinary popularized by Cosmos, that lets builders construct software particular blockchains which are able to interoperating with each other.
Constructing app-specific chains previously got here with important alternative price, as a result of they had been minimize off from most liquidity and customers. With the progress of Tendermint chains like Osmosis (AMM), Umee (lending), and Stargaze (NFTs), that’s changing into much less of a problem.
Now that these app particular chains have a widening array of use circumstances and liquidity that they’ll interoperate with, search for extra builders to make the most of customizability that these chains supply in 2022.
The ENS airdrop + DAOs
In 2021, ENS reminded everybody of Web3’s native consumer acquisition technique: the airdrop.
ENS (Ethereum Identify Service) addresses are greatest regarded as e mail addresses which you could ship cash to (e.g. Jimbo.eth). After 5 years in growth, the undertaking shifted to a DAO mannequin, and airdropped ENS governance tokens to each consumer with an ENS tackle.
After the drop in November, consciousness of ENS and registration of .eth addresses skyrocketed.
For the reason that ENS DAO treasury collects income from new .eth registrations, income for the newly minted ENS DAO treasury ramped up considerably: one other testomony to how a lot a effectively orchestrated airdrop can transfer the needle.
Past ENS, DAOs had a robust yr, evident by the rising utilization in key items of DAO infrastructure. Gnosis Secure, which is the most well-liked multisig pockets DAOs use to handle their treasuries, noticed 3x progress in each the variety of Safes and transactions executed in 2021. Snapshot, a instrument that helps DAOs execute off-chain votes with on-chain verification, exhibited robust progress as effectively.
EN-EFF-TEES
Exercise on the dominant platform for NFTs tells you all it’s essential know in regards to the breakout yr NFTs loved.
OG NFT CryptoPunks noticed 60x YoY progress, reaching a complete quantity of 650K ETH, or $1.7B at present costs. This determine nonetheless, features a flashloan powered $500M wash sale — a robust reminder of how a lot subjectivity there’s in on-chain information.
The second most notable NFT undertaking of the yr was Bored Ape Yacht Membership, which went from a distinct segment neighborhood to the celeb NFT of selection, together with the likes of Steph Curry, Shaq, Justin Bieber, Jimmy Fallon, Paris Hilton, amongst others. At one level the BAYC ground (value of the most cost effective NFT within the assortment) momentarily flipped the CryptoPunks ground.
Within the warmth of recent issuances flooding the market, and older NFT collections reaching billion greenback market caps, the common value of NFTs altering arms did a 150x from 0.1 ETH to roughly 15 ETH by yr finish.
One of the fascinating NFT launches of the yr was Loot (coated right here), which let anybody mint 1 of 8,000 NFTs that would type the premise of a Dungeons and Dragon type RPG recreation. Preliminary pleasure was skyhigh, earlier than really fizzling out as time went on.
Whereas Loot’s flame might have dimmed, it was nonetheless a landmark yr for NFT based mostly gaming, with the breakaway success of Axie Infinity bringing play-to-earn and GameFi narratives to the forefront. As the information reveals, Axie Infinity NFT quantity dwarfs that of any prior NFT based mostly recreation.
Lastly, whereas Ethereum was the middle of the NFT present, marketplaces seem like arising throughout a number of chains. The information reveals that decrease charge environments are enabling several types of consumer exercise. Solana’s Magic Eden, for instance, has extra transactions than OpenSea since customers are unencumbered by exorbitant gasoline charges.
Extra in Elias’s epic thread
Past being chock-full of illuminating information factors on the yr in crypto and Web3, the total thread underscores the fantastic thing about on-chain information and the elevated maturity of the business. The power for one individual to place collectively a dataset this wealthy is a testomony to all the nice information suppliers the business now has at our disposal.
For those who haven’t already, try the full thread which covers Bitcoin, Ethereum, MEV, L2 adoption, ETH2, staking, Web3, memecoins, DEXes, stablecoins, and an entire lot extra.
~Written by Connor Dempsey & Justin Mart.
