Crypto is in an... interesting place to say the least. With Bitcoin prices crashing down to $60k we’ve seen a lot of excess get washed out. The token experiment isn’t looking great when the grand daddy (Bitcoin) comes crashing down bringing everything else down with it.
A lot of people are right to be skeptical of crypto: what real demand forces does it have? The thing that was meant to be a hedge against inflation has underperformed Gold in a way that hurts anyone who is significantly exposed to crypto.
So... where does this lead us?
In my mind it comes down to the two camps of crypto that people once referred to:
Money Crypto: defined by crypto being a strong monetary instrument
Tech Crypto: defined by crypto being rails for internet money (Internet Capital Markets these days)
I wouldn’t say one is better than the other but rather that they have this sort of ying/yang relationship. When the tech wasn’t that impressive, money was the main narrative. I sense we are slowly approaching a point of tech crypto being “the thing”.
In a world where AI has a CAGR of 40% and useless SaaS/tech companies dying: utility matters. Cashflows. Margins. Number go up and memes unfortunately won’t cut it as the opportunity cost of having capital parked elsewhere is too high.
In this world, crypto needs technical excellence. We already see this with the payments & prediction market crowds that closer to real world utility. There’s a lot of technical plumbing needed but it has to be built well and not under the promise of some token going up.
It’s going to be exciting to see what emerges from this period of Tech Crypto and the subsequent.
