The first day of this year’s TOKEN2049 cryptocurrency conference kicked off Wednesday in Singapore, its second edition as an in-person event since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic.
If the virus failed to put a damper on the 2021 event at the peak of pandemic peril last year, its organizers weren’t likely to be cowed by Covid this time around as most of the world slowly learns to live with it.
A more obvious cause for concern is the lingering Crypto Winter, ushered in by a slump in crypto prices and the US$40 billion dollar collapse of the Terra-Luna stablecoin project in May, all of which coincided with broader turbulence in the global economy.
Indeed, the opening session bore the no-nonsense title “Global Macro Uncertainty: The Crypto Narrative.” Yet attendees at the event, which drew thousands of people, weren’t showing obvious signs of concern amid the prevailing gloom.
TOKEN2049, the mainstay event of this year’s Asia Crypto Week in the Southeast Asian city-state, stood out for its forward-looking, upbeat approach, with sessions on its first day covering issues including why the slump in cryptocurrency valuations isn’t as bad as it looks, the rise of stablecoins, how the crypto industry can drive mass adoption, and the opportunity presented by the Crypto Winter.
Zaheer Ebtikar, a portfolio manager at digital asset quant firm LedgerPrime, told attendees that risks and returns were being mispriced.
“Whenever you have a perpetual stream of just negative news for the last nine months, it’s really hard to constantly wind up that negative string, right? So it’s like, you had the Russia invasion, you have like the energy crisis, you’re getting really cold during the [European] winter,” he said.
“[But] I think we have a much more compelling case to imagine why crypto has probably bottomed and why traditional markets may be uncertain … so going into year-end, I’m fairly optimistic. I think positioning should still be cautious, generally speaking, but I think you’re getting to the tail end of this really peak bearishness.”
Foreshadowed
Darius Sit, a managing partner at crypto asset trader QCP Capital, echoed that sentiment, saying he remained positive as the year drew to a close, and that he thought next year would offer moderate upside.
Selini Capital Chief Investment Officer Jordi Alexander said: “I think that in the next few months, we’ll see some crazy stuff – crazy headlines like we’ve seen recently with the pound. So [I’m] very cautious longer term. The thing that makes me extremely bullish are things like Bitcoin, ETH, for example, where you have a limited supply and you have kind of a generation that’s more and more interested in these assets.”
He added that since crypto is so liquid, it typically foreshadowed moves in other asset markets, and that he expected crypto values to return to positive territory before equities.
Other speakers at the conference expressed similar sentiments, with Pantera Capital founder and Chief Executive Dan Morehead saying that blockchain was positioned strongly over the medium to long term.
“I’ve been through three massive bear markets in 10 years, and I’ve got to admit, in the first few days, I was really sweating and I was, like, I don’t know if blockchain is going to work … Maybe something really bad happens,” he said.
“This cycle is totally different – the fundamentals are so strong. …….
Source: https://forkast.news/cryptocurrency-crowd-shrugs-off-market-woes-at-upbeat-token2049-conference/