Make a wish: New Year's resolutions from crypto industry insiders
As the new year rapidly approaches, people are thinking about what they can do to make 2022 even better than 2021. With so much anticipation for cryptocurrency in the coming year from government policymakers and market action, it’s no wonder that some in the crypto industry have ambitious resolutions for the new year with how they will help to shape the industry for the better.
National governments have taken steps to increase the global adoption of blockchain technology right up to the end of 2021. Late in the year, governments from Australia, Kazakhstan, Brazil and the Eastern Caribbean launched, or made public, their plans regarding central bank digital currencies (CBDCs). The United States Senate heard testimonies from crypto company executives in December, and Thailand’s government vowed to issue a regulatory framework for crypto by 2022.
As for the bull market, nobody truly knows what will happen. Some analysts believe that the four-year market cycle has been broken, indicating that the bull run will continue well into 2022. However, bearish signals persist despite the strength of Ether (ETH) and altcoins, making a stronger case for the argument that this time around, things are different.
Several industry participants shared their thoughts with Cointelegraph regarding their New Year's resolutions. They range from education and inspiration to healthcare concerns. They even floated ideas of a global metaverse GDP.
Bobby Ong, CoinGecko
Bobby Ong, co-founder of CoinGecko, also shared his resolutions for the new year. As with others in the industry, Ong feels that education is one of the keys to crypto adoption. He told Cointelegraph that his greatest ambition is to see the industry use education to help users keep their digital assets safe.
His concerns regarding user security have genuine merit considering that so far in December 2021, there have been over $149 million in losses due to security breaches at Grim Finance, Badger DAO, MonoX, Visor Finance and AscendEX. At the time of publishing, there is still about a week left in the month for other breaches to be revealed. Ong said:
“I hope to see more people educating themselves on crypto security in 2022. Too many new users have lost cryptocurrencies and NFTs due to bad security practices and I hope more projects and companies will educate their users on best practices.”He went on about how he believes that crypto users — both new and experienced — need access to as much information and education as they can get: “Our motivation in doing this is to help users make sense of the crypto world and we hold the view that anything that can be tokenized will be tokenized.”
Yat Siu, Animoca Brands
Animoca co-founder and chairman Yat Siu voiced his aim to see the metaverse niche mature in 2022. His lofty goals for the new year include bringing metaverses onto a global scale of recognition which could have evolutionary implications for the nonfungible token, or NFT, market as well.
It may be safe to say that the Metaverse have come closer to mainstream adoption than they ever had before thanks, in no small part, to Mark Zuckerberg and Meta. Siu and Animoca, one of the biggest investment firms in the NFT and metaverse space, are counting on the continued expansion of those markets.
Animoca had a fantastic 2021, especially in the last few months of the year when the firm increased its treasury value five-fold from $2.9 billion in September to $15.9 billion by the end of November. As the latest winner of Deloitte Hong Kong’s Fast Technology award, Animoca may have the momentum needed to continue its success in 2022. Siu said his New Year's resolution was:
“To help in constructing an open metaverse with such a significant GDP that closed metaverses are forced open in much the same way that free trade opened up the global economy. Where we are no longer digitally defined as ‘users’ but as metaverse citizens with true digital ownership.”Pradeep Goel, Solve.Care
Next, Solve.Care blockchain-based healthcare platform CEO Pradeep Goel shared his thoughts on what can be done to improve the crypto space in 2022. The telehealth field, which Solve.Care has one foot in, saw a 63-fold increase in utilization through 2021, according to the United States Department of Health and Human Services.
Especially for geriatric patients and those with low mobility who cannot easily make regular doctor visits, the utility of telehealth services was fleshed out over the past 20 months through the COVID-19 pandemic. Solve’s position as a crypto-telehealth leader aided in the launch of its Global Telehealth Exchange and various other services, which Goel hopes will help users obtain the health services they need. Goel told Cointelegraph:
“It is my wish that in 2022, we will see greater utility and adoption of cryptocurrencies, especially for the healthcare sector. Not only can they be used as a payment currency, but they can be programmed to streamline and facilitate seamless interactions between stakeholders like patients, healthcare providers, government agencies and insurance companies.”Jen Buakew, To The Moon Lab
Jen Buakaew, founder of growth accelerator To the Moon Lab, hopes that 2022 will make the crypto space more accessible for laypeople who want to explore its possibilities. In her experience at crypto conferences, many people become befuddled by the NFTs that sell for millions of dollars and the technical jargon tossed around by industry experts. She said, “These things usually mean nothing to people besides making them feel that crypto success is unattainable.”
In her view, people interested in joining the industry as traders, entrepreneurs, or professionals don’t have an adequate support system in place to help them reach their goals should they choose to join the industry. That lack of support is what she thinks keeps some individuals from contributing their valuable input in the first place. Buakaew said:
“My New Year's resolution is to inspire as many people as I can to get themselves into crypto by showing them the simplest ways where they can benefit from being part of the decentralized economy. I would like to change this narrative or the mindsets of the ordinary people, especially those in the less fortunate demographics to 'if Jen can do it, well then so can we.’”