As the year comes to an end, let's look back at the top stories of 2023 — a year where Bitcoin and the overall market staged a remarkable recovery.
Another year is almost in the books and crypto is back, baby!
This year has been a rollercoaster of emotions for most of us:
While this year might not have been as eventful as last year — remember FTX? Terra? Celsius? — that does not mean we didn’t have one heck of a year! Here are CMC's picks for the top 10 crypto stories of 2023.
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#10: SocialFi Combines Crypto With Social Media
Sometime in mid-2023, when Bitcoin was crabbing in the $20,000s, a new mania captured the attention of the crypto markets: SocialFi.
Friend.tech became the newest, hottest platform everyone wanted in on.
For a few weeks, Crypto Twitter feeds exploded with invite codes and “alpha for keyholders.”
The hype died down, but be prepared for Friend.tech 2.0 in 2024.
Read also: What is SocialFi?
#9: Real-World Assets Make A Real Impact
Real-world assets (RWA) have made a strong bid to become one of the top narratives of the 2024 bull market. In our explainer of the real-world asset sector, we highlighted that this vertical could grow significantly in the future.
And it did!
Several countries have launched real-world asset programs:
- The Philippines launched the first tokenized treasury.
- Singapore is expanding efforts to tokenize assets.
- Brazil plans for a tokenization program in 2024.
Big banks, such as UBS, are also getting into asset tokenization. And, of course, crypto-native protocols like MakerDAO have experienced a big revival thanks to the RWA narrative. With greater institutional adoption expected, real-world assets are primed to grow in 2024.
#8: Ethereum Upgrades Itself Again
Ethereum had a quiet year overall – but it's biggest story happened right at the start of 2023.
The impending Shapella upgrade sparked an initial frenzy around Liquid Staking narrative as the community rushed to prepare.Shapella finally enabled stakers and validators to unstake and withdraw ETH rewards. This marked Ethereum's full transition into a proof-of-stake chain.
It finally went live in April, marking a highly anticipated milestone. However, Ethereum took a backseat for the rest of 2023 as Bitcoin ETF mania went into overdrive. But make no mistake, the next upgrade is already on its way: EIP-4844 could finally boost layer-2 adoption to the next level.
#7: Tether Reinvents Itself
Tether has long faced controversies around the opacity of its reserves. But 2023 marked a major shift towards transparency and cooperation for the stablecoin giant.
Former CTO Paolo Ardoino was appointed as the new CEO of Tether. The firm invested heavily in Bitcoin mining, including a $500M stake. It reported record levels of cash reserves in Q3 of 2023.
Tether is also actively cooperating with regulators these days. It announced cooperation on freezing and blocking OFAC-sanctioned entities, even assisting the FBI and Secret Service. Critics have long predicted Tether's demise, but under Ardoino, everything points to a more ethical and sustainable future. This story flew under the radar in 2023, but it is of remarkable importance for the crypto industry, given USDT’s position as the stablecoin with the largest market capitalization.
Read also: What is Tether?
#6: Coinbase Makes A Stand
Coinbase stepped into the crypto spotlight in 2023 amidst regulatory uncertainty in the US.
It was an eventful year for the exchange. Coinbase launched its own layer-two blockchain called Base. It went back and forth with the SEC, including lawsuits and counter-suits.
The company's stock rallied from its lows. ARK Invest sold its Coinbase shares at an 18-month high, possibly to stronger institutional hands like the South Korean pension fund which bought in.
Of course, the biggest story may only come next year, as Coinbase is the proposed middleman acting as custodian for a possible spot Bitcoin ETF. It has been far from a quiet year for Coinbase. But 2024 could become even rowdier.
#5: CZ Steps Down
Changpeng Zhao has been the main character of crypto ever since he founded Binance. In less than 5 years, CZ took Binance from a startup to the leading crypto exchange in the world.
In 2023, a legal judgment led CZ to step down from the CEO role as part of an agreement with authorities. He passed the CEO reins to Richard Teng as Binance entered a new phase.
#4: SBF Rides Off Into Prison
SBF’s story arc has been going from bad to worse in 2023. There are too many subplots to sum this one up in a few lines, but some of the juiciest ones include:
- SBF considered paying off Donald Trump not to run for President.
- Caroline Ellison throwing SBF under the bus in her testimony.
- SBF being unanimously convicted of fraud and money laundering.
Yikes, dumb situation. Reportedly, SBF is making the best out of his situation and is trading mackerels in prison, while waiting for his sentence. How long he will stay behind bars will be decided in 2024 – but it could be anywhere between a few decades and forever. A story that crypto should write the final chapter about as soon as possible.
#3: AI Sends Everyone Into A Frenzy
2023 may become the year of BC in crypto: before ChatGPT and after ChatGPT.
Ever since OpenAI launched ChatGPT at the beginning of the year, the AI hype train has been running full steam. The top AI coins by market capitalization currently trade around $20B. Everyone is scrambling to find the next undiscovered AI crypto gem. Telegram bots are falling over themselves to help traders trade with AI.
Now imagine what will happen when retail interest comes well and truly back. AI and crypto – a match made in heaven. Especially when Arthur Hayes is bullish:
Read also: Blockchain and AI
#2: Ordinals Frenzy On Bitcoin
NFTs on Bitcoin?
*Larry David voice* Meh, I don’t think so. And I’m never wrong about this stuff ever.
If you had made that prediction at the start of 2023, boy would you have been wrong! NFTs on Bitcoin is, kind of, a real thing now. Enter Ordinals.
Ordinals are a way to inscribe sats, sort of like writing on your dollar bills to distinguish them. They kicked off a massive hype in 2023 and were, probably, in no small way responsible for the surge in price. The trading volume of Ordinals made another leg up after Binance listed them. ORDI, the first memecoin on Ordinals, is now trading at a multi-billion dollar market capitalization.
This story could just be getting started.
Read also: What are Bitcoin Ordinals?
#1: Wen Spot Bitcoin ETF?
The undisputed biggest crypto headline of 2023 was the remarkable Bitcoin price recovery. The King is back.
Bitcoin, yet again, left every other major asset in the dust, as it posted a cool 155% YTD return. Most of this price recovery can probably be attributed to the anticipation around a possible spot Bitcoin ETF. 2023 may be remembered as the year when everything aligned for the spot ETF to finally be approved.
Wen ETF?
Soon! Very soon, by the looks of it.
If the timeline for a spot ETF holds up, we might kick off 2024 with a bang and a round of approvals by the SEC. VanEck already filed $HODL as a ticker, as the market prepares for the approval potentially in January 2024.
Thanks to Bitcoin, we are, once again, so back.
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