The top ten crypto events in 2023: review, review and summary

2023 has passed, and 2024 has dropped. What happened in 2023 that passed by in vain? Here we review the top ten events of 2023 to draw a successful conclusion to 2023, which is about to become history.

2023 will undoubtedly be a world of ice and fire for the encryption market.

For most of this year, the market has been trapped in the black swan event of 2022. It has continued to slump amid heavy losses, and demand has also been re-evaluated this year. The industry reshuffle is accelerating. The tightening macro environment is accompanied by the continuous strengthening of compliance. After the two major exchanges were sued, the market is once again teetering on pessimism. A wave of corporate layoffs is coming. Meme coins are prevalent. After the new regulations in Hong Kong were short-lived, , the crypto market was once only an alternative casino.

In the second half of the year, the market finally began to bottom out and rebound. Spot ETFs served as a shot in the arm and the market began to rejuvenate. The entry of traditional institutions has excited the industry. The explosion of the Inscription ecology has given birth to a new round of bull market. Under the universal Inscription, public chains have also begun to use this to break through. The surge of Solona proves the resilience of demand for public chains, and the possible restructuring of FTX has once again attracted a lot of attention.

2023 has passed, and 2024 has dropped. What happened in 2023 that passed by in vain? Here we review the top ten events of 2023 to draw a successful conclusion to 2023, which is about to become history.

01. The banking industry ushered in a wave of bankruptcies, and USDC was temporarily unanchored

Macroeconomics, There is no doubt that it has become the most important theme this year. What can be seen is that almost everyone in the industry in the market has begun to learn how to understand inflation and pay close attention to the US interest rate meeting and the dot plot. Starting from March, US interest rates have become The life and death line of the global economy. In 2023, the United States raised interest rates four times, from the already high benchmark interest rate of 4.25%-4.5% at the beginning of the year to the range of 5.25-5.5%. The tight market environment caused the liquidity crisis to quickly spread in the financial world.

When crypto-friendly bank Silvergate Bank postponed its annual report, the market was still under control. But on March 10, Silicon Valley Bank in the United States was shut down by financial regulators due to insolvency. The California Financial Protection and Innovation Authority announced that it would take over in accordance with the law and assigned the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to conduct liquidation management for Silicon Valley Bank. , a chain of bankruptcies swept across.

Due to Silicon Valley Bank’s deposit-friendliness in the industry, many crypto institutions such as Circle, a16z, Ripple, The Struck Crypto Master, and BlockFi also have business cooperation with it. This caused resonance in the currency circle. After it declared bankruptcy, Circle issued a statement via Twitter, confirming that Silicon Valley Bank is one of six banking partners used by Circle to manage approximately 25% of USDC cash reserves, with $3.3 billion of approximately $40 billion in USDC reserves remaining Stay with Silicon Valley Bank. Risk exposure directly promoted a run on the stablecoin USDC. More than $2 billion worth of USDC was withdrawn from the U.S. dollar stablecoin market. The price of USDC fell to a minimum of $0.8776, an intraday drop of nearly 14%.

Although the currency subsequently rebounded rapidly, the heavy damage also caused USDC’s market share to fall again. Currently, USDC’s market share has dropped to less than 19%, which is far lower than The level was last December when the company withdrew its public listing.

02, Arbitrum is reborn, and ARB has the largest airdrop in history

Can it survive in a bear market? It is a blessing to remain standing, but it is even more difficult for a token to be online and highly sought after. Arbitrum has successfully achieved this.

As the leading project of Layer 2, the comparison between Optimism and Arbitrum has never stopped. As early as June last year, OP was online and set off an airdrop frenzy. Therefore, Arbitrum tokens are also highly anticipated by industry insiders. On March 23, Arbitrum officially launched the token ARB and opened airdrops. There are 625,143 addresses eligible for Arbitrum airdrops, accounting for approximately 23.5% of the total 2.66 million addresses on the chain. Although the scale is large, the airdrop rules are not suitable for woolists. Not friendly, and can even be considered very harsh. The design pays more attention to the participation of ecological participants. It not only formulates an anti-witch strategy, but also allocates qualification points through Nansen’s on-chain data. Therefore, it is also said to be one of the largest airdrops in history.

Regardless of the airdrop, Arbitrum's development this year is still relatively stable. There is also a wave of liquidity in the Layer 2 concept at the end of the year. The current ARB quotation is $1.35, which is as low as At OP’s $3.39.

03. Ethereum completed the Shanghai upgrade, and the unlocking of the pledge amount caused controversy

From Ethereum Judging from the results, this year’s new hot spots are really lackluster. The most important one is undoubtedly the Shanghai upgrade in April. After the upgrade was completed, the previously pledged amount began to be gradually unlocked, and the market attention soared.

At 22:42 on April 12, Ethereum officially completed the Shanghai upgrade. The "Shanghai upgrade" allows users to withdraw pledged Ethereum and unlock it for more than two years. Over 16 million Ethereum staked on the network. Ten days after the upgrade was completed, data showed that 1.3 million ETH had been withdrawn, worth approximately US$2.5 billion, of which 65.8% were staking rewards or partial withdrawals, and 34.1% were principal or full withdrawals. However, contrary to the previously expected selling boom, in addition to the high-frequency withdrawals of 14,249 validators on the day of the upgrade, the market withdrawal wave gradually declined thereafter. In the week after the upgrade, the price of Ethereum even climbed to $2,110, showing an extremely strong economy. toughness. In fact, this year, although the price of Ethereum continues to be on an upward trend, the increase is far less than that of Bitcoin, and even worse than Solana this year, and has been criticized by some people.

The next step for Ethereum is the Cancun upgrade. Industry insiders expect it to be officially implemented between March and April 2024, which will increase the number of transactions per second on the Ethereum network. The transaction volume that can respond will also open a new stage of development of Ethereum's data storage and retrieval capabilities. Perhaps this will be a turning point for Ethereum.

04, Hong Kong rallies erupted with emotions, and the new encryption regulations attracted attention

In the entire In April, Hong Kong became a keyword in the Chinese crypto market.

Since the release of the policy declaration in October last year, Hong Kong has attracted the attention of the encryption market. In April, it was led by Wanxiang Blockchain Labs and HashKey. The "Hong Kong Web3 Festival 2023" co-organized by the Group was the first shot of Hong Kong events. Catalyzed by 146 surrounding derivative activities, the crypto market's emotions that had been suppressed by the epidemic for several years exploded. At this event, social venues, event tours, and business banquets emerged one after another. Insiders socialized and outsiders checked in, making Hong Kong a famous gathering place for Web3 Internet celebrities.

After that, on June 1, the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission issued the "Guidelines Applicable to Virtual Asset Trading Platform Operators" and "Guidelines on Combating Money Laundering" ( (hereinafter referred to as the "Guidelines") was officially implemented. Hong Kong has moved from a voluntary licensing system to a compulsory licensing system. Securities No. 1 and 7 licenses and VASP licenses have become necessary supports for exchanges to establish themselves in Hong Kong. Currently, only HashKey Exchange and OSL Exchange have obtained the required licenses, and HashKey Exchange also officially opened retail investor services at the end of August. As for the introduction of the Hong Kong ecosystem, more than 180 Web3 organizations have settled in Cyberport.

Although it seems to be hot, the development of Hong Kong's Web3 is not satisfactory. It is a fact that it is difficult to open the money channel in the mainland, which has led to Hong Kong's global competition. Lack of strength. At the end of the year, the continuous thunderstorms of JPEX, Hounax and other institutions also made people realize that Hong Kong’s local education on encryption is far from enough. On the other hand, driven by compliance, securities institutions have taken action. So far, more than 60 securities institutions, including Shengli and Futu, have begun to get involved in the virtual asset business.

05. MEME currency became popular again, and BRC-20 took the stage

May The keywords are BRC-20 and MEME.

BRC-20 officially entered the stage of history this month, which also laid the foundation for the national inscription craze at the end of the year. The representative project Ordinals was the first to bear the brunt. The token $ordi rose from US$0.002 to US$25.78 that month, an increase of more than 10,000 times. Many BRC tokens have emerged one after another. The total number of inscriptions minted by the Bitcoin NFT protocol Ordinals exceeded 10 million in just one month. Quickly causing Bitcoin congestion.

Under the depressed mood at the time, the noisy market was once again occupied by altcoins. With the slogan "It is better to speculate in the air", Ethereum went up The MEME coin became popular. Counterfeit MEMEs such as PEPE, AIDOGE, and The highest increase exceeded 2143.75%, becoming the fastest growing ERC-20 token in the history of cryptocurrency. As the amount of meme coins minted increased, Ethereum congestion continued and Gas soared. According to data, Ethereum Gas hit its highest point this year at 150Gwei in mid-May. To a certain extent, the emergence of MEME currency this month is just a catharsis for the bear market.

At the end of the year, Inscription once again became a hot topic in the industry, setting off a crazy craze for national casting. The market values ​​of Ordi and Sats soared, and mainstream exchanges Binance and OKX successively On-line inscriptions, animal inscriptions represented by Rats are constantly emerging. Against this background, at the end of the year, there was even a phenomenon that public chains saw an increase in the use of inscriptions.

06, Bitcoin spot ETFs debuted, BlackRock ignited market enthusiasm

Bitcoin Coin spot ETF is the biggest topic this year. Regarding this product, since the first application in 2013, no organization has ever been successfully approved, at least in the United States, and the market is not looking forward to it. In fact, in April, Cathie Wood’s ARK Invest submitted its third application for a Bitcoin spot ETF, but there was no splash in the market at that time.

In June, after BlackRock’s high-profile official announcement, ETFs instantly became hot. As the world's largest asset management institution, BlackRock manages funds of up to 9 trillion U.S. dollars. It has outstanding political skills and economic status. Its record of only one failed ETF application out of 575 previously gave the market confidence again. Driven by this news, Bitcoin rose sharply and successfully exceeded $30,000 for the first time this year.

Currently, 13 institutions have applied for Bitcoin spot ETFs. In the past week, the SEC has met with Grayscale, Fidelity and many other institutions. , which also makes the market believe that spot ETFs are approaching the deep water zone of approval. The latest review date is January 15, 2024, and the latest deadline is March 15. Although the pre-review is Ark Invest, from Cathie Wood’s remarks, the first does not mean the only one, and there may be more than six The application is approved in one go.

07, Coinbase, and Binance were sued by the SEC one after another, causing a significant impact on compliance

6 In addition to ETFs, compliance is also the highlight of the month.

Coinbase and Binance were sued by the SEC one after another, and the market fell into a panic of compliance uncertainty. The SEC stated that Coinbase violated the regulatory structure and did not meet the disclosure requirements established by Congress and the SEC to protect the country’s securities markets and investors. It also filed 13 charges against Binance and Changpeng Zhao, including mishandling customer funds and violating regulatory agencies and investors. Misrepresenting its operating conditions, etc.

After being accused at the time, Changpeng Zhao posted "4" on the X platform, saying that this was just FUD news, which set off a counterattack in public opinion. Coinbase, which focuses on the United States, is facing an existential crisis due to the accusations and has also stated that it will fight to the end.

Currently, the complaints between the two and the SEC have not yet been resolved, but it is worth noting that Coinbase has become a popular custodian in spot ETF applications, with 9 Several institutions have included it. Does the adoption of ETF mean the end of Coinbase’s lawsuit? The outcome remains unknown.

08. Three years of litigation came to an end, and Ripple "put out fires" in the encryption market

6 After experiencing severe regulatory crackdowns in July, market sentiment has become increasingly negative, but Ripple's victory in July seems to have brought a glimmer of hope to the industry.

Ripple’s feud with the SEC began in 2020. Due to frequent selling and cashing out, coupled with its aloof status in the industry, the SEC took note of Ripple. On December 21 , the SEC filed a lawsuit against Ripple Labs, CEO Brad Garlinghouse, and co-founder Chris Larsen, accusing them of selling more than 14.6 billion units of unregistered securities XRP in exchange for assets worth $1.38 billion, officially launching the first shot of the lawsuit. On January 29, 2021, Ripple submitted a response to the SEC complaint, denying that XRP is a security and accusing the SEC of harming the interests of XRP holders.

Since then, the litigation between the two has never stopped. Ripple was once at a disadvantage. Many institutions believe that Ripple will lose the lawsuit in their predictions for 2023. But uncharacteristically, in July, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York ruled in a judgment that using XRP to invest in others, using XRP to issue grants, and using XRP to transfer money to executives are not considered securities. At this point, Ripple finally gained a glimmer of hope in the three-year lawsuit.

This phased victory has significantly stimulated the industry. After all, if XRP does not constitute a security, SOL, ADA, MATIC, and FIL accused by the SEC may also be Not considered securities. However, the court also emphasized that since the SEC was prosecuting the sale and distribution of XRP for violating securities laws, the court did not discuss whether the secondary market sales of XRP constituted the sale of investment contracts.

In August, the SEC announced that it would appeal part of the ruling made in July. But now, the SEC has withdrawn all charges against Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse and co-founder Chris Larsen and canceled a trial scheduled for next year.

09. Institutions continue to exert their efforts, Paypal releases stable currency, and SEC suffers another defeat

There were frequent institutional moves in August.

On August 7, PayPal announced the launch of PayPal USD (PYUSD), a U.S. dollar stable currency for transfers and payments. The stablecoin, issued by Paxos Trust Co. and backed by U.S. dollars, short-term Treasury bills and cash equivalents, will gradually become available to PayPal customers in the United States. When Coinbase and Bianance were sued one after another, and Paxos was forced to stop issuing BUSD, it was quite delicate for traditional institutions to issue stablecoins.

However, driven by the dual drive of the profit margin crisis and the decline of the stock price, PayPal still picked up the stability that had begun to appear in January 2022 but was shelved due to regulation. currency business. Although there were talks of changing the stablecoin landscape and high centralization at the time, even though PYUSD has been listed on multiple exchanges such as Crypto.com, Bitstamp, Coinbase and Kraken, its current performance is still mediocre. According to Coinmarketcap data, the current market for PYUSD The total value has reached 158 million U.S. dollars, and the 24-hour transaction volume is 4.88 million U.S. dollars, which is still relatively insufficient compared with mainstream stable coins.

Another key event in August comes from Grayscale. Following Ripple, the SEC suffered another defeat. The background of this incident was that Grayscale requested to convert the closed-end Bitcoin trust fund GBTC into a Bitcoin spot ETF, but was blocked by the SEC. On August 29, the U.S. court ruled against Grayscale. A ruling was made on the Bitcoin spot ETF lawsuit between Grayscale and the SEC, and the SEC lost the lawsuit. The judge believed that the SEC's refusal to Grayscale's issuance of the Bitcoin spot ETF was unreasonable and asked the SEC to reprocess Grayscale's request. This incident has greatly increased the industry’s expectations for the adoption of Bitcoin spot ETFs, and also made the market re-examine the impregnable SEC.

10. CZ exits, Binance and the United States complete the reconciliation of the century

The most sensational end of the year The latest incident is Binance’s reconciliation with US regulators.

On November 22, Binance issued an announcement stating that it had cooperated with the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CTFC), and the Office of Foreign Assets Control ( OFAC and the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) have reached a resolution regarding their investigation into historical registration, compliance and sanctions issues at Binance. CZ admitted to violating the Bank Secrecy Act, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, and the Commodity Exchange Act by conducting unlicensed money transfer operations, conspiracy charges, and prohibited transactions, including providing funds to designated terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Al Qaeda. funds, channels for fund flows in violation of U.S. sanctions against countries such as Iran and Russia, and illegal provision of transaction services to U.S. citizens.

Subsequent results Binance paid approximately $4.368 billion to the four major U.S. regulatory agencies, setting a record in crypto history, and founder CZ announced Withdrew from the game and was replaced by Richard Teng, Binance officially entered the 2.0 era. Although there was an outflow of funds from Binance on the day of the incident, it quickly recovered. This incident is generally positive in the industry. It is believed that this represents a concession from supervision and laid the foundation for subsequent compliance and ETF adoption. . For Binance, it has got rid of its historical baggage through reconciliation. Not only does it still have the opportunity to return to the United States to seize the compliance market, but it can also continue to expand its influence to peripheral areas. But despite this, Binance's market competitiveness still faces challenges. According to data from The Block, Binance's share of the spot market has dropped to 37% from more than 62% at the beginning of this year.

Conclusion

In fact, no matter from the perspective of characters or events, the 2023 The review is far more than just a few lines. The bear market at the beginning of the year, the advent of compliance, and the departure of big bosses have had an impact on the industry that is far from being limited to frivolous discussions. But at least this year, we know that there is no bank that is too big to fail, but there is a wave of hype that will never die. We know the importance of expectation management, and we also understand the objective law of the business world that flowers can only last a hundred days.

Personally, as the dominoes fall one by one, even a slight gust of wind is enough to make the gravel fly in the wind. In this bear market, there are many people who have lost their jobs, lost money, and even gone to jail. However, there are also people who have seized the opportunity and made it a hundred times a thousand times to achieve the freedom of wealth.

But overall, the industry is undoubtedly cold enough this year. Fortunately, even in such a cold winter, there are still countless contributors emerging one after another, and institutions are once again knocking on the door of encryption.

What will the future hold? It’s still unclear, but what is certain is that 2024 will definitely be better than this year.