The Rise of New Powers: Global Digital Assets Report 2021

The era background of the rise of digital assets In recent years, countries around the world are vigorously developing the digital economy. China has written the digital economy into the top documents of various countries and implemented it in government work at all levels. Other countries with relatively advanced digital economy development, For example, the United States, the European Union, Germany, and Japan have also introduced relevant policies to encourage industries to apply new-generation technologies such as artificial intelligence and big data to agriculture, medical care, manufacturing, and finance to promote industrial digital transformation. In this process, the United States realized the importance of the digital economy earlier, coupled with its relatively large overall economic volume and relatively fast technological development, the digital economy has the largest scale. China ranks second. In 2019, the scale of the digital economy in the United States probably exceeded US$13 trillion, and that in China was US$5.2 trillion. Image source: conference speech In the process of rapid digitization, the development of blockchain technology is particularly important. It solves some key issues faced in the process of data confirmation, transfer, and capitalization in the development of the digital economy, such as security issues, trust issues, and rights confirmation issues. Issues such as controllability of data sources, privacy protection, and auditable data use have been gradually improved, making the entire data transfer process transparent and secure, recordable and priceable, and enabling data value to be truly realized on the technology platform. Since 2020, under the joint influence of multiple internal and external factors, global encrypted digital assets have ushered in explosive growth, and the industrial ecology surrounding encrypted digital assets has also undergone tremendous changes. In particular, the prices of several major encrypted digital currencies have risen sharply, and the entire market The market value has risen sharply: on January 1, 2020, it was less than 200 billion U.S. dollars, but by December 31, it had reached 76 million U.S. dollars, and today it has exceeded 1.6 trillion U.S. dollars. Tencent has applied for patents related to encrypted chat using private keys: According to news on July 19, Tianyancha showed that Tencent Technology (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd. applied for a patent for "chat message display method, sending method, device, electronic equipment and media" announced. It provides a chat message display method, sending method, device, electronic equipment and medium, and relates to the field of computer technology. The method for displaying the chat message includes: displaying the encrypted chat message sent by the sender in the conversation interface; obtaining the private key of the first user; decrypting the encrypted chat message according to the private key of the first user to obtain the decrypted chat message; Decrypted chat messages are displayed in the conversation interface. The embodiment of the present application solves the problem in the prior art that there is still a high risk of leakage of chat messages. [2022/7/19 2:23:08] There are many reasons for such a short-term skyrocketing, we believe that the main points are as follows: 1. The rapid rise of decentralized finance (DeFi) is the intrinsic factor driving the development of encrypted digital assets one of the factors. 2. Traditional investment institutions continue to deploy, and encrypted digital asset investment channels continue to expand. 3. The attitudes of major countries in the world on the supervision of encrypted digital assets are becoming clearer, and the overall trend is also more open, which brings a clearer external environment for encrypted digital assets. Specifically, we will discuss the new trend of global digital asset development in five aspects. First, the increase in the value of the virtual currency is significant. The price of the virtual currency with the largest market value has risen from $7,200 at the end of 2019 to $29,000 at the end of 2020 (as of December 31, 2020), an increase of 302.78%. It has recently exceeded 60,000 US dollars, far exceeding the gains of major global stock indexes, bonds, foreign exchange, bulk commodities and other alternative investment products. Today's panic and greed index is 11, and the degree of panic has further deepened: Jinse Finance reported that today's panic and greed index is 11 (14 yesterday), and the degree of panic has further deepened, and the level is still extremely panic. Note: The threshold of the panic index is 0-100, including indicators: volatility (25%) + market trading volume (25%) + social media popularity (15%) + market research (15%) + bitcoin in the entire market Proportion (10%) + Google hot word analysis (10%). [2022/6/13 4:21:29] Second, the development of Ethereum. Ethereum is currently the most active-zce public chain network, and its average daily transaction volume has increased by 90% in 2020. The number of new addresses increased from 84 million in 2019 to 131 million in 2020, an increase of more than 56%, and the number of active-zce addresses also showed a clear upward trend. About 10.7 million smart contracts were created, a 55% increase from 2019. From the perspective of ecological landscape, financial DApp is the fastest growing and most important application type of Ethereum in 2020. The proportion of financial-related products such as exchanges, security services, and wallet services has also increased significantly, while the proportion of early active-zce applications such as games and gambling has declined. From the perspective of price trends, Ethereum has risen steadily in 2020, from $129 at the beginning of the year to $737, an increase of nearly 471.32%. In December 2020, the ETH2.0 beacon chain was officially launched, kicking off the prelude to Ethereum 2.0. Ethereum 2.0 is an important stage in the development of Ethereum, which will fundamentally change the consensus algorithm (PoW→PoS), introduce a fragmentation mechanism and update the execution environment. Ethereum 2.0 is dedicated to solving the scalability and transaction efficiency issues that have been criticized by the Ethereum network, which will help improve the usability of Ethereum and enrich the application ecological landscape. 10 domestic and foreign museums including the Dunhuang Academy and the Louvre released 25,000 pieces of digital collections on Tmall: According to news on May 18, when the "5.18 International Museum Day" is approaching, the flagship stores of the top 10 museums and libraries at home and abroad Launched digital collections on Tmall for the first time. There are a total of 20 digital collections of these cultural relics, with a total of 25,000 pieces. It is reported that this time there are 10 museums including the National Library, Dunhuang Research Institute, Xi'an Forest of Steles, Maijishan Grottoes, Henan Museum, The World in the Palace, the National Grand Theater, People's Literature Publishing House Humanities Treasure, and the Louvre Museum. Museums and libraries distribute digital collections in their Tmall flagship stores, and the first central media cultural and creative brand "People's Cultural and Creative" also participates in it. The cultural and creative digital collections covered include secondary cultural creations of world-famous cultural relics such as Dunhuang Supplements, Zizhi Tongjian, Tianlong Babu-Naga, and the Louvre Victory Goddess. There is also a music digital collection of fragments of the world classic "Spring Waltz", which records and preserves this kind of "moment" art. (China Daily) [2022/5/18 3:24:16] Third, the outbreak of DeFi. DeFi refers to a decentralized financial protocol (product/service) built through smart contracts based on public chains such as Ethereum. This type of financial activity does not rely on centralized financial institutions, and has the characteristics of no access, composability, globalization, openness and transparency. In 2020, it will usher in an outbreak and form a relatively complete ecosystem. The locked-up value of DeFi surged from US$850 million in 2020 to US$17.56 billion, an increase of 1965.88%. The application ecology involves lending, stable coins, decentralized exchanges (DEX), derivatives, insurance, etc. Liquidity mining is one of the main reasons driving DeFi growth in 2020. Liquidity mining refers to the process of obtaining income (governance tokens, transaction fees, etc.) by providing liquidity for DeFi projects. It is essentially a token distribution and incentive mechanism. Although DeFi still has challenges such as security and compliance, DeFi has significant advantages in reducing transaction intermediate links, lowering financial access thresholds, and improving business transparency. As a new technology-driven financial model, DeFi's open, credible, and fair business philosophy and service awareness of protecting user data are also affecting and changing the traditional financial market. Chainlink Labs hires former product management director of Google TensorFlow as chief product officer: Jinse Finance reports that decentralized oracle provider Chainlink Labs announced that Kemal El Moujahid, former product management director of Google's open source software library TensorFlow, has joined the company as chief product officer . Before working on TensorFlow, El Moujahid worked at Meta (ex-Facebook) and was responsible for launching the Messenger platform. El Moujahid said: I am very excited to join Chainlink Labs at a critical time in blockchain and oracle development. I believe smart contracts are fundamentally changing the world for the better, and Chainlink is uniquely positioned to take this innovation to new heights by supporting millions of developers and builders. [2022/5/17 3:21:41] Fourth, the influx of professional institutions. Traditional companies/institutions such as Tesla and Meitu clearly purchased major encrypted digital assets as an important asset allocation, which enhanced the social awareness of digital assets; well-known financial institutions such as Grayscale Assets and PayPal, Rohinhood, and Goldman Sachs successively The introduction of encrypted digital assets and derivatives trading services has greatly reduced the investment threshold for digital assets, improved the convenience for ordinary investors to participate in digital asset investments, and strengthened the connection between the digital asset market and the traditional financial market. Australian Senator: There is a huge opportunity in DeFi: Golden Finance reported that Australian Senator Jane Hume talked about cryptocurrencies and decentralized finance (defi) in a speech at the Australian Financial Review Super & Wealth Summit in Sydney on Monday. Jane Hume said that we need to admit that cryptocurrencies are not a fashion, and there are huge opportunities in DeFi. We should proceed with caution, but not with fear, and Australia must not be abandoned by fear of the unknown. Cryptocurrency will not disappear, there are \"incredible" opportunities in Defi. A recent report by an Australian Senate committee, which claimed that 17% of Australians are investing in cryptocurrencies, Hume emphasized: "It's an asset class that has captured hearts, but beyond that, it doesn't matter what you personally think about it." It is a technology that will not develop and will go away soon. (news.bitcoin) [2021/11/23 7:06:36] Fifth, the promotion of regulatory measures. Although the global supervision of the digital asset market has not reached a unified consensus , but currently most markets have relatively clear regulatory frameworks, and countries and regions such as South Korea, Singapore, the United States, Canada, and Hong Kong have formulated corresponding regulatory models. These regulatory models are in a state of being enforceable and followable. For example, Hong Kong, China has formulated a license and sandbox supervision model for encrypted asset exchanges, and will issue an encrypted asset exchange license to OSL in 2020. Supervision is gradually clear and open, providing a better environment for the growth of encrypted digital assets. In addition to encryption In the currency market, the development of legal digital currency is also very rapid in 2020. The promotion of legal digital currency digital currency allows us to get at least two pieces of information: First, no matter what economic model or regulatory model it is based on, digitization is irreversible and irresistible , and it is accelerating; the second means that our traditional and existing transactions will be carried out with digital currency, whether it is industrial digitization or asset digitization, the degree will be greatly improved. At this stage, the research and development of legal digital currencies in various countries around the world The work is accelerating. The BIS report "The Rise of Central Bank Digital Currency: Driving Factors, Methods and Technologies" pointed out that: as of mid-July 2020, at least 36 central banks around the world have issued retail or wholesale CBDC work; 18 The central bank has published research on retail CBDC. In the next three years, 1.6 billion people around the world will use the central bank’s digital currency. Among them, the Central Bank of China has made the fastest progress. At present, the country has carried out several rounds of digital renminbi pilots, and it has already been launched in 10 Pilots were carried out in 1 city and 1 scene, and seven rounds of digital renminbi red envelope pilots were carried out successively, and 150 million digital renminbi was issued. Countries that are undergoing internal testing of CBDC projects include Singapore, Ukraine, Turkey, Sweden, South Korea, France, etc. There are also some Small countries, because the economy is more flexible, based on various reasons, most of the countries that have launched CBDC in the world are non-major economies, such as Ecuador, Uruguay, Seganel, Venezuela, Marshall Islands, Bahamas, etc. Among them, the CBDC projects in Ecuador and Uruguay have ceased operation. Data assetization and asset digitization continue to broaden asset boundaries, and data elementization accelerates data assetization. From a global perspective, there are tens of thousands of various digital asset trading platforms , in China, both the government and the market are aware of the trend of data elementization and data assetization. In fact, there are already many data exchanges in China, but now they are still in terms of trading products, trading mechanisms and trading scale. In its infancy. Recently, China Southern Power Grid Co., Ltd. The Data Asset Pricing Method (Trial) (hereinafter referred to as the "Method") was released, which stipulated the basic characteristics, product types, cost components, pricing methods and related fee standards of China Southern Network's data assets. This is the first central enterprise in the energy industry. The data asset pricing method is also a major measure to promote the marketization of data elements. The digitization of industries has led to the digitization of various assets. There are two types here. One is the digitalization of assets, that is, the presentation of non-digital assets in digital form, including physical assets or equity assets such as property rights, equity, creditor’s rights, other property rights, and copyrights, may all become digital assets. The other type is data capitalization (or data assets). Transaction data and behavioral data generated based on the Internet have gradually become new asset classes. First, we believe that there are three challenges in the future development of digital assets: 1. Compliance: With the rapid development of encrypted digital assets and the entry of many traditional financial institutions and investment institutions, how to monitor such digital assets Reasonable supervision and the establishment of matching market and trading rules have gradually attracted the attention of regulatory authorities in various countries. However, at present, countries have not yet reached a complete consensus on the supervision of encrypted digital assets. In some countries and regions, encrypted digital assets still have compliance issues. 2. Security: On the one hand, encrypted digital assets have the characteristics of decentralization, anonymity, and transnationality, which brings challenges to anti-money laundering and anti-terrorist financing; on the other hand, data leakage and data abuse frequently occur , the problem of data security needs to be solved urgently. With the continuous expansion of the data scale of various institutions, once data security issues occur, it will have a huge impact on business operations and user interests, and will restrict the release of data value. 3. Professionalism: Digital assets are new things, and the professionalism of investors, regulators, and the construction of supporting infrastructure needs to be improved.

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