Original source: Ouke Cloud Chain Research Institute
Original author: Matthew Lee
On September 11, just after I arrived in Singapore, I received a question from a journalist friend, The market suddenly dropped 4%. What do you think of this? I rolled my eyes, but I still answered in a very professional and vague manner. Replying to a friend The market decline is not only related to the shortage of market liquidity, but also due to the liquidation of FTX, which has added fuel to the worries of market recession. However, judging from the current economic data and future catalysis (Ethereum upgrade and Bitcoin Production is halved), I personally am very confident in the short- and medium-term market.
After replying to my friend, I immediately opened my OKX account, looked at the glowing red numbers, and silently went to the duty-free shop at the airport to buy a bottle of wine.
The bleak market did not dampen the enthusiasm of participants
September 13th was the first day of Token 2049. I woke up very early on purpose, and when I arrived at the venue, it was already overcrowded. The meeting place is on the fourth and fifth floors, but the queue to receive name badges has already reached the third floor. After entering the main venue, there are at least more than 30 booths in the larger venue, including well-known projects such as OKX, Avalanche, CertiK, Fireblock, OKLink, Bloomberg, etc. The participants could not hide their excitement. They introduced their backgrounds and companies to unfamiliar project parties and participants in the crowded aisles, and their emotions were not affected by market fluctuations at all.
Gathering venue for industry giants
I have made a lot of preparations before attending the conference. The main purpose is to meet some friends and visit some industry seniors, and I hope to gain some new market perspectives from the meetings shared by industry seniors.
I think the three most interesting main topics are: Navigating Blockchain and Web3 Date; Crypto Exchange: Challenges and Opportunities Ahead; Institutionalization of Digital Assets; Banking with Crypto: Insight from The Bankers.
Because the main invited guests of these meetings are company executives or founders of major institutions, such as Standard Chartered Bank, DBS Bank, Temasek, OKX, Chainalysis, etc., they will discuss the future development trends of virtual currencies and market compliance trends. as the main topic. I can simply help you organize the content of these meetings starring industry giants as guests, and clarify the key points of discussion at the meeting.
Navigating Blockchain and Web3 Data topics mainly focus on the development of virtual markets, on-chain data and the current market hot spot - artificial intelligence. The host asked a very interesting question: The SEC is now using AI for compliance. What are your (invited guests) views on this?
Chainalysis founder Michael Gronager’s answer is very accurate.
“This is a very interesting experiment because current on-chain data service providers can explore the similarity of transactions through the transaction characteristics on the chain, and then conduct machine learning through massive blockchain data to more accurately identify each transaction. Characteristics of a Transaction.
This is similar to the labeling services provided by many on-chain data service providers (which is the area that Ouke Cloud Chain focuses on).
The founder of Glassnote is also very much looking forward to the combination of artificial intelligence and web3 on-chain data, because massive on-chain data can provide AI, and AI can also more easily help project parties with data management. The other founders also expressed some views on AI: AI can do things that ordinary people cannot do, such as analyzing massive data behaviors and then labeling addresses.
Banking with Crypto: Insight from The Bankers focuses on the current layout of major banks in the field of virtual currency. However, due to the high market volatility and the bankruptcy of FTX, institutions that have always been more cautious are only in the testing stage. But what is clear to them is dont challenge the regulation", although the current regulatory framework is not clear, if institutions mix operations in the virtual field or treat money laundering with a perfunctory attitude, they will be focused on regulatory attention in the future when operating virtual asset businesses.
The Institutionalization of Digital Assets topic mentioned that many institutions are providing virtual currency services to their customers, but they do not put the assets into the market. Although many institutions are still interested in the market, the high volatility and low liquidity of the market prevent institutions from entering the market. Temasek’s MD also mentioned that in this industry, institutional participation is very important, but some irregularities in the industry may cause institutional and retail investors to suffer losses, and these irregularities require supervision to guide them.
Especially after experiencing severe supervision in the first half of the year, many institutions are waiting to see the virtual asset market. One is to observe the trend of the virtual market in the medium term, and the other is whether there will be a major change in regulatory attitudes.
Feelings from attending the meeting: Projects lack innovation and institutions focus on supervision
The author has also participated in some Side Events, most of which have project team members. Most of the domestic project team members are from Infra project teams, who prefer ZK technology or have more wallets. Foreign projects are more diverse, but not too innovative.
Comparing this years conference in Hong Kong, most of the project parties at the Hong Kong booth focused on DeFi that solved capital efficiency, while the conference in Singapore was more focused on infrastructure, with higher technical thresholds and market scale, but there was also not much innovation. There will be more investors in Hong Kong. When I attended the meeting, I received a lot of gold-rimmed business cards with the founders of such and such capital written on them. In Singapore, the number of investment institutions is far less than the number of project parties. Even if they come The investors who participated in the meeting also complained to me that the project was still too expensive in terms of the current market.
When communicating with a partner of Capital 6 Eagle, regarding so many ZK projects in the field, he also said: “We support the development of ZK, but many ZK application scenarios are overestimated, and in many scenarios ZK technology is not Optimal solution. Overvalued application scenarios have caused the high valuation of most ZK projects, so we will not invest in projects whose current application scenarios do not match the valuation.
Contrary to the project side, most of the main location of the main venue or the topics of the main venue have nothing to do with ZK, RWA, etc. The topics of the organization are mainly biased towards security or compliance infrastructure, such as on-chain data, AI and compliance. Combined etc. Due to the continuous regulatory actions in various countries in the first half of this year, compared with Hong Kong and Singapore, the regulatory regulations proposed have very clear requirements for on-chain data supervision (to prevent money laundering), or the prosecution of various virtual activities by the US SEC has caused some Agencies need to pay more attention to compliance.
write at the end
I have to admit that the focus of institutions now is not at all on wallets, payments or even RWA, but more compliance supervision. This is related to macro market trends and is also related to their main business. Many participants thought wishfully that the institutions actions in the virtual market indicated that they wanted to invest in virtual currencies. In fact, the vast majority of institutions only catered to market effects and made business innovation gestures to their customers. But in essence, it only provides a service of selling shovels and will not personally end the business. When an organization provides the service of selling shovels, it requires a lot of compliance work. This is why the main narrative focus is now slowly shifting towards custody, licenses, and on-chain anti-money laundering.
For ordinary project parties, although the participants were very excited, there was not much innovation in the project, and the convergence was strong. The main development directions were towards wallets, ZK and RWA. When choosing these directions, the project team is not thinking about going far, but about going fast. When everyone is very smart and thinks that they will be the pig on the wind, in the end there may be too many pigs on the wind and they will not be able to fly.
One of the reasons why industry innovation is lackluster is that everyone does not build the industry with a long-term view. Many very innovative projects in the previous cycle are no longer available. This is not because the technology or business model does not work, but because the technology or business model does not work. Because no money can be made in the short term, neither the employer nor the market buys it. But how can a project that has not been built for a long time lead the development of the entire industry, so the narrative in the market is still guided by EIP upgrades and the halving of Bitcoin production.
About Ouke Cloud Chain Research Institute:
The Ouke Cloud Chain Research Institute is a strategic research institution under the Ouke Cloud Chain Group. Its mission is to help global business, public and social sectors gain a deeper understanding of the evolution of financial technology and the blockchain economy, and to output in-depth analysis and professional content. Covering topics such as technology application and innovation, technology and social evolution, and financial technology challenges, it is committed to promoting the application and sustainable development of cutting-edge technologies such as blockchain technology.
