G'day mates! 

I'm Iggy and this is my first shot at participating in a Publish0x contest. The thing that attracted the most and the main reason for me to do so, is the fact that by participating, we donate to charity so yeah... win-win and 100% worth it.

TLDR; Too Long Didn't Read

This year is weird but we have seen lots of swings in the market, and probably this could mean that we will enter the feared bear market (maybe by the end it). Cardano will see some traction this year through the project that will be launched but also by his innovation with the ERC20 token converter and the Hydra scaling solution. If everything goes as expected and planned many eyes will shift to this blockchain. This year we will see institutions going crazy over NFTs and what does it mean for the business, trying to decypher and intregate with their business model. Also lots of companies will try to either get into a metaverse or build their own. 

For us, what matters is BitYard because it's fully regulated and accepted internationally. This platform allows a user to trade and even play some basic crypto "mining" game. More over, for each post on the contest, they are giving away money to charity through the giving block organisation that help non-for-profit companies raise the required capital and funds with crypto.

More in detail

I am not going to lie, Q4 and mainly the end of 2021 had been rough. We expected many things from different coins. People on different social media platform were really bullish. We saw some a sort of "dog wars" with Doge, Shiba and Floki. ADA released successfully the smart contracts but no developer knew what or how to use those. Also BTC and ETH where headed to the moon but they never reached it... Ouch!.

As we saw in the new is a mix of broken dreams with negative news sprinkled with hopium free on each market movement. The upcoming inflation, the Evergrande crisis, or the infrastructure bill really made a dent in the crypto market. 

Even with all this, the future is bright. More and more people started to shift their interest into cryptos instead of going to the traditional markets. Financial institutions started to invest heavily as well and even started applying for ETFs. El Salvador made legal Bitcoin legal tender and started buying dips. How about that?

So, hang in there. You are not alone.  There are 2 types of persons in the market: traders or hodlers. Remember which one are you and don't let emotions get you. Align with your plan and stick with it. If it doesn't work, change the approach, but stick with it.

The Trending Coin

Now, which coin is going to be trending in 2022? I am going to be full on straight: Cardano (ADA). I am pretty bullish on ADA Cardano. I know some people don't feel the same, but as a dev, I can see the benefits of using that coin, and once they release this year's 2 main key features, ADA is going to be a game changer. Those features are the ERC20 token converter and Hydra solution. 

ERC20 token converter 

Most of all the tokens that we currently see in the market have been created with Ethereum as the base, and therefor they suffer from the same issues: high gas fees. If Cardano releases the converter, that will make a shift. People will use the converter to get ADA and in return lower fees and higher speeds for validating transactions.

Hydra

Hydra is Shields' enemy in the Marvel universe but in the crypto world is Cardano's scaling solution. If Hydra gets released, the Cardano blockchain will be able to handle tons of transactions in one go. If we also add off-chains (or parachains like in the Polkadot ecosystem) that can be re-hooked to the mainnet, the result is going to be massive. This will remove lots of pressure on the main chain. Basically, the off-chain will do all the heavy lifting, while the mainnet validator will do... well... that: it will validate the smart contract code and transactions. 

To sum up Cardano has a long road ahead but it's looking really great. And I think, the many other blockchains are jealous of the Cardano community that is very active.  

What will the 2022 crypto market will look like?

This is a tough one. I think we will see some hype and momentum built by the end of Q1 and the beginning of Q2. After that we might start seeing signs of governments trying to regulate crypto further more, and depending on how the XRP case goes, it could go bonkers. Otherwise we will see more and more companies hiring cryptoexperts to build their vision of a metaverse, because... why would anyone build on someone else's metaverse when you can spend all the money in building yours? I think there will be a time where you could go to a virtual Macca's (sorry for the Aussie Jargon. Maccas = McDonalds) in a metaverse, buying a burger with an virtual-for-real-life nft, pay it with crypto, and get it into your door by the next UberEats available. Retail industry is not yet in, so once they do, it will be a game changer.

Which coin will be used in the metaverse?

No clue. I think the metaverses will have a dependency on DEXs or probably would be more likely to depend on CEXs (just in case anything goes sideways). However they could just use their own ERC20 issued token for anything in the game. Still an in-game exchange feature would be super handy dandy.

No metaverse is complete without NFTs

NFTs will play in another key role on the metaverse, and even on the crypto market because as per right now, no one has historic data! There is no way to know how they will perform if we hit a bear market. They seems to follow their own thing. If we take a look at the recent BTC Dump, we could see that NFTs prices went higher instead of down. NFTs will play a major role on the gaming and indie games industry, and even during winter or bear market times, people play games for entertainment, if they can also create wealth by playing, they will do so. And this is also a part of the metaverse experience, you sould be able to play and earn some coins. Otherwise what else can you do? Pay for some services or some sort? People pay a visit fee if they go to  your property? And of course NFTs are starting to feel like deeds in the property market space (but yeah... people actually sell virtual lands)

No metaverse is complete without games

Metaverses need games. Otherwise is the same as going physically to a shop. I think metaverses are really focus on the entertainment side and of course there will be people around providing services of some sort. Some interesting mentions of this type of metaverses with games are Sandbox (with all the different worlds you can go, play, and interact with it), Cornucopias (still in development but looks like a nice metaverse to be involved in...), or the Netwrk Metaverse (also pretty interesting).

Thank you Bityard. Nice to e-meet you.

I'm going to be honest here. I didn't knew much about BitYard and that's on me! I should have! Because they are fully registered in Australia!!! Ok, not only they fully compliant to operate in Australia but they can operate in many other parts of the world. So yes, that is a plus for me. I have seen in the past (or really recently around August or so) companies that had a valid license, got them revoked. But hey, long story, short: BitYard = Good. 

Coming back to my point, Bityard added a play to earn mining game in their website, which allows user to "mine" coins by clicking on them daily. Worth checking it out on the link below.
https://www.bityard.com/en-US/mining  

Also if you want to Join Bityard you could do it by using my referral link below:
https://www.bityard.com/en-US/account/register?ru=na3vzt

TheGivingBlock

Finally, but not least, we have to talk about TheGivingBlock. TheGivingBlock is a company that helps other non-for-profit organisations, charities, etc raise funds through cryptocurrencies. How do they help? Well, users can give or donate cryptocurrencies to either a specific organisation, to any organisation that you are a supported of their cause or by donating to the movement. This donation could be done on a specific point in time but, if you want to go further, you could take "The crypto Giving Pledge", which basically is a way to register with the giving block as a donor, and you commit to donate 1% of your yearly crypto holdings no matter the size. Someone I was surprised to see among the people who took the pledge is Tony Hawk, the Profesional Skateboarder!

I think this is a good initiative, and we need more people withing the crypto space to help others and it doesn't really matter how much they contribute but the fact that they are doing something that will have a meaningful impact without needing to get something back in exchange. To me, that is the best thing of this contest. So yeah BIG, BIG SHOUT OUT to BitYard and Publish0x so we could have the opportunity to be part of this. More information about the pledge could be found on the link below:
https://thegivingblock.com/campaigns/crypto-giving-pledge/

So that's it! Let me know what do you think we are going this year in the comments below. I'm curious to see what your thoughts are.

Until next time, stay safe.

Iggy out!  

(PS: By the way, cool stylish top Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko from Pexels)