For the crypto industry, 2019 was held under the auspices of unjustified expectations

Overall, the crypto industry demonstrated significant growth in 2019, but it only managed to partially realize its potential.

Over the past 12 months, the Bitcoin price has risen almostdoubled, from $3,700 to $7,200, but in June it also reached $13,880. The exponential growth at that time was caused by Facebook's announcement of the launch of its own cryptocurrency Libra, backed by a basket of fiat. However, regulators in the EU, the US, and a number of other countries began to use various levers of pressure on the project team and the company as a whole. As a result, Facebook announced that it was postponing the launch of the stablecoinfor an indefinite period, the fuse of investors began to fade, and cryptocurrency rates fall.

At that time, the flames of hope supported the approachBakkt Launch and First Delivered Bitcoin Futures. Many expected the actively promoted trading platform to attract the attention of many institutional investors who would start working directly with the MTC. On September 29, it became clear that the launch of Bakkt did not cause significant interest from large players and did not lead to an explosive jump in the course. In fact, in the first week of trading, the delivery volume of bitcoin futures amounted to only $ 5.2 million. The launch of digital asset-oriented products Fidelity Digital Asset Services also did not change the situation.

At the same time, the cryptocurrency projects themselves are nothave fulfilled many of their promises. The platforms still face serious scalability issues, technical failures, hacks, and ordinary users still have difficulties working with them. In addition, there are still no uniform standards in the industry, most projects cannot interact with each other, and are often designed to solve a narrow range of problems. These facts are the main obstacles to the mass distribution of cryptocurrencies and their widespread use.

However, 2019 should not be consideredfailing. During this period, many projects significantly expanded their activities, a number of central banks began to study and develop their own digital currencies, more than half of the leading universities in the world introduced courses related to blockchain and cryptocurrencies, the regulatory framework is gradually being formed (although slowly). More and more institutional investors are interested in the industry.

You shouldn't be disappointed eithercrypto industry. Despite the current downward trend, analysts predict a significant increase in the Bitcoin rate after the halving in May 2020. Although Facebook has postponed the Libra launch date, it has not stopped working and is looking for a compromise with regulators. Products from Bakkt, Fidelity, Coinbase and other companies continue to develop.

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