As most of us have been having fun with some R&R over Christmas break, Coinbase Cloud protocol specialist Elias Simos was scouring the net for essentially 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 knowledge factors from the 12 months, and what all of it means for the long run. (Excessive degree takeaways under)
Metaverse and good contract belongings outperform
Worth isn’t every little thing, however the two prime performing belongings in 2021 are indicative of broader tendencies all year long. 2021’s greatest performing belongings have 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 12 months, and layer 1s not named Ethereum noticed sturdy adoption, these tendencies ought to 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 12 months, whereas it was considerably of a tough 12 months for Ethereum DeFi blue chips, with the DeFiPulse index down 80% over the 12 months vs ETH.
The value of DeFi belongings doesn’t inform the whole story, nonetheless. TVL of Ethereum DeFi functions confirmed large development over the 12 months, and the variety of distinctive Ethereum addresses interacting with DeFi protocols 4x’ed.
Regardless, ETH killers and sidechains received the 12 months when measured by development of total market share.
The nice migration & the EVM normal
In Might, there was $200M sitting in Ethereum bridges. That quantity climbed to $20B by the top of the 12 months, 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) suitable environments.
Do not forget that the EVM is actually 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 suitable chains (Avalanche, Polygon, and many others) recommend that a typical is forming across the EVM. This could finally preserve Ethereum because the gravitational middle of the good contracting world, as ETH functions and belongings will likely be natively interoperable with most different chains.
Rise of the app chains
Whereas EVM chains nonetheless dominate the panorama, the top of 2021 noticed an increase in worth on Tendermint chains. Recall that Tendermint is a typical popularized by Cosmos, that lets builders construct software particular blockchains which can be able to interoperating with each other.
Constructing app-specific chains previously got here with important alternative value, as a result of they have been reduce off from most liquidity and customers. With the development of Tendermint chains like Osmosis (AMM), Umee (lending), and Stargaze (NFTs), that’s turning into much less of a difficulty.
Now that these app particular chains have a widening array of use circumstances and liquidity that they will interoperate with, search for extra builders to make the most of customizability that these chains provide in 2022.
The ENS airdrop + DAOs
In 2021, ENS reminded everybody of Web3’s native person acquisition technique: the airdrop.
ENS (Ethereum Title Service) addresses are greatest regarded as electronic mail addresses you could ship cash to (e.g. Jimbo.eth). After 5 years in growth, the venture shifted to a DAO mannequin, and airdropped ENS governance tokens to each person with an ENS deal with.
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 powerful 12 months, evident by the rising utilization in key items of DAO infrastructure. Gnosis Protected, which is the preferred multisig pockets DAOs use to handle their treasuries, noticed 3x development in each the variety of Safes and transactions executed in 2021. Snapshot, a software that helps DAOs execute off-chain votes with on-chain verification, exhibited sturdy development as effectively.
EN-EFF-TEES
Exercise on the dominant platform for NFTs tells you all it’s essential know concerning the breakout 12 months NFTs loved.
OG NFT CryptoPunks noticed 60x YoY development, 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 knowledge.
The second most notable NFT venture of the 12 months 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 (worth of the most cost effective NFT within the assortment) momentarily flipped the CryptoPunks ground.
Within the warmth of latest issuances flooding the market, and older NFT collections reaching billion greenback market caps, the typical worth of NFTs altering arms did a 150x from 0.1 ETH to roughly 15 ETH by 12 months finish.
One of the crucial fascinating NFT launches of the 12 months was Loot (lined right here), which let anybody mint 1 of 8,000 NFTs that might kind the premise of a Dungeons and Dragon type RPG sport. 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 12 months 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 sport.
Lastly, whereas Ethereum was the middle of the NFT present, marketplaces seem like bobbing up throughout a number of chains. The info reveals that decrease payment environments are enabling various kinds of person 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 knowledge factors on the 12 months in crypto and Web3, the complete thread underscores the fantastic thing about on-chain knowledge and the elevated maturity of the trade. The power for one particular person to place collectively a dataset this wealthy is a testomony to the entire nice knowledge suppliers the trade now has at our disposal.
If you happen to haven’t already, take a look at 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.
