RCL 2021 year in review and 2022 look ahead

Written By Steve aka Drat

Twitter @xDRATx

Telegram https://t.me/RudesCLounge

First and foremost, I’d like to say thank you for stopping in to take a look at this first article for RCL. To be fully transparent this was my first full year in crypto currency So please take any of my thoughts and observations has non-financial advice and see it for what it’s worth which is entertainment and possibly some education.

So how would I sum up 2021 in crypto? I would call it, “The beginning of the breakout”. In 2021 per chainanalysis crypto adoption has grown over 880% since 2020. That number is up significantly from the previous year so the question is what has driven these significant increases. My personal opinion is this is based off three primary movements. 

1) Mainstream companies making crypto exactly the opposite of what crypto represents. In my mind, Crypto was built to be a decentralized finance mechanism (deFi) that allows peer to peer trades skipping the middleman AKA the banks and institutions. However, what I believe has created the wider adoption is the actual centralized aspect of cryptocurrency such as Coinbase and the Coinbase IPO this year and trading platforms like Robinhood and Crypto.com. Don’t get me wrong, those organization have done an amazing job building an awareness and educating the public on some of the use cases (fiat function) but they do not demonstrate nor fully explain the capabilities it unlocks. Crypto should be seen as move then a currency. The real blockchains that are fueled with tokens such as Ethereum are changing the game with smart contracts, staking, transparency, auditability, and most importantly giving every single person the opportunity to create something that the blockchain will forever hold and mint into history. What I’m curious to see as we go forward is if these mainstream companies now providing access to Crypto will allow people to maximize the power of Crypto or just trade it as a revenue generating fee per transaction

2) Shitcoins have exploded in 2021, the pure hype and luster of the rare 1000X gain has brought in billions into smart contracts. It has made millionaires overnight, but its also made people lose everything. When you first see and participate in token projects it does look and have the feel a lot like gambling. The ups, the downs, the huge swings of emotion all fuel the chase.  The most popular of the shitcoin projects are housed on binance smart chain. Binance has made it very easy for people to build and deploy smart contracts so for me Binance is a double-edged sword. It showcases the best and also the worst in Crypto. For example.  every 100 million market cap projects out there, there is 1000 projects that crash and burn, some of them intentionally. What do I mean by intentional? In 2020 about 1% of all the token projects that were launched ended in a rug pull or dev team running with funds. In 2021 that number soared to over 35% on a much higher total amount of funds injected into these projects. To put it into perspective, its estimated that the public was scammed out of around 3 BILLION in funds. The thing is, with most projects there is huge winners and then huge losers. The story of the huge winners will always give hope to those to give new token projects as a shot. Its no different than when you see the pictures of people holding huge lottery checks, the crypto circles are the same way. People talk, share and chase success. Either way if you were a winner or a loser, the exposure to smart contracts and tokens have helped the adoption of Crypto across the board.

3) Adoption and conversations are happening on a level never seen before. In 2021 we now have entire political systems (El Salvador) adopting BTC and major cities talking about creating their own currency. We also have the polar opposite as well; we have entire regimes (China) banning it for what seems like the 100th time and others limiting access every chance they can get like the UK who from a news perspective banned Binance only to show its true face which was to slap a little more regulation on it in the form of mandatory KYC. So, what does this mean? Well for me it’s all conversation which the fact more and more are discussing is a good thing. Major news networks are speaking about it and you can’t go 10 minutes on twitter without seeing something Crypto related. The largest indicator of adoption for me is the emergence of BTC EFTs which was also approved by the SEC, that was a major step forward in acknowledging crypto and its long-term staying power. Did I mention the likes of PayPal and Venmo offering Crypto? The two most adopted peer to peer payment aps now allow crypto buying. These are baby steps in putting it in the hands of every human on the planet but each year we see the total number of people holding crypto go up and up. We now sit at about 4% of the world’s population using it and 16% percent of Americans which has more than doubled in recent times.  All being said, twelve months ago, I was excited to be buying a coin with a picture of a dog on it and seeing it out perform any stock I had ever purchased, today I’m accumulating crypto across several blockchains and even now had a way to spend it with a Crypto.com debit card.  This is not just my story, this in one we hear day after day in RCL.

So what does 2022 have in store for us?  This past year has shown us gains of on average 400% across the top 10 crypto currencies.  In totality we saw a 750B industry jump to 3 trillion. Let’s take a look at some of the big names as far as gain percentage in the last 12 months. (Ascending based on percent gain)

• Ethereum (ETH) has gained 400% and over 400B in MC
• Cardona (ADA) has gained 550% and grown to 40B in MC
• Crypto.com (CRO) has gained 775% and has hit 13B in MC
• Binance (BNB) has gained 1300% and a staggering 85B in MC
• Shiba Inu (SHIB) up 1400% and with 17B in MC
• Avalanche (AVAX)up 2700% and a 25B MC
• DogeCoin (DOGE) up 2800% with 33B in MC
• Solana (SOL) a massive 9000% gain at 52B in MC
• Terra (LUNA) up 9500% sitting around 23B in MC
• Polygon (MATIC) has gained 1100% and now at 14B in MC

With those staggering numbers, will this be sustained, that is the billion-dollar question? Historically speaking the answer is yes. You look at a $2.00 BTC ten years ago and now hovering around $50K. Sure there will be ups and downs and maybe we see a 30K BTC in the coming months but am steadfast in that we will see all-time highs this year and maybe even a 100K within twelve months. Personally speaking and of course NFA, I’m putting the most faith in in CRO and ETH and here is why.

1) Crypto.com is putting their money where their mouth is. Meaning they are not just building a brand they are spending the money to promote it outside of the existing crypto circles. For example, Crypto.com bought the naming rights to the what used to be the staples center the home of the LA Lakers and LA Kings. This $700M deal will give Crypto.com visibility, staying power and become a fixture in the community for the next 20 years. On top of that, they added a new brand ambassador who in my opinion is one of the most recognizable stars in Hollywood, Matt Damon. The commercials are already running and has had several people ask me about Crypto as a result. Lastly, CRO is checking the box for use cases. With CRO I can stake tokens at a much higher APY verse a savings account, they offer a Crypto.com debit card so I can use my crypto not just CRO and they also are showing an increase in the use of the blockchain for smart contracts so as that demand grows so will the need to own CRO tokens. So for me, these are all reasons to keep staking CRO for the long term.

2) Ethereum was the second ever crypto I purchased after Doge and I didn’t really know what I was buying at the time. It’s been roughly a year now since that first purchase and its even more exciting now then the original buy. Eth checks all the boxes for a currency, smart contracts, Dapps (Digital Apps) NFT (non-fungible tokens) and Defi (Decentralized Finance) but what sets them apart from others. What excites me is the move to proof of stake. As the proof of work migrates to proof of work, we should see an overall energy consumption be reduced by 98%, much faster speed times on the blockchain and also a reduction in the fees paid on transactions. All this is being advertised as Eth 2.0.  If you take these factors as well as the growth of Web3 and large retail adoption of the blockchain. I think Eth is sitting in the driver’s seat to be number one on the MC list which would mean overtaking Bitcoin. Will this happen in 2022? I say yes.

Lastly, crypto is something that we need to share and educate people on so its doesn’t feel underground or some secret society that is associated with the dark web. Crypto was built to put power into every single person’s hands. These days it’s easier to obtain a phone then it is a bank account so if every person in crypto shares as story and helps someone new download a wallet we could see adoption rise to 50% within years and with that will be exponential market caps and new generational wealth created.

I’m just a guy in a lounge that has dove headfirst into crypto, if you care to continue this conversion join us in Rude’s Crypto Lounge on telegram at https://t.me/RudesCLounge

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