Next, translate 2-10 and other honorable mentions
Topic: The 2022 Crypto Thesis - Key trends, people, companies, and projects in the Crypto space to watch, along with predictions for 2022
Original report download link: https://messari.io/pdf/messari-report-crypto-theses-for-2022.pdf
10. Do Kwon, Terraform Labs, and other honorable mentions
As of writing this section (November 8, 2021), I knew I wanted to highlight the "fastest dark horse" in the highly competitive 'Layer 1' race for the year. Ethereum's nearly 10x increase during the year was well-deserved, but the real story of 2021 was the congestion of Ethereum's block space, high gas fees, and subsequently the explosive growth of its first-layer competitors. Avalanche grew 25 times year-over-year, Solana and Polygon grew 110 times, and Fantom grew 160 times. However, Terra took the top spot with an astonishing 170x return.
I include Do here for a few other reasons as well:
Terra is one of the largest crypto investment companies in Asia, it's a project among the top 10 Layer1s, and has the highest market share in the large South Korean crypto market.
Terra is actually used at scale as collateral for UST, the second-largest crypto-collateralized stablecoin, which currently has a market cap of $7.2 billion compared to $0 last fall.
The breadth of Terra’s infrastructure (Anchor for lending, Vega for derivatives, Mirror for synthetic securities, Mars for AMM) rivals any other blockchain not named Ethereum and likely sits on a more stable, interoperable technical foundation (Cosmos’ long-term cross-chain communication protocol).
Compared to other competitors, Do has gained more industry recognition because he is willing to fight back. Minutes before going on stage for a panel discussion at the Mainnet 2021 conference, he received a subpoena from the SEC, which he ignored and decided to challenge the SEC through his own lawsuit. This is a battle he might win, and an inspiring person to see fight regardless of the outcome.
Honorable Mention:
There are many people in the encryption field who can easily make the top 10 each year, but no one has made my list twice. Those who could easily reappear this year include:
Balaji Srinivasan, whose encyclopedic knowledge and raw processing power are astonishing.
Sam Bankman-Fried has become one of the richest people in the world under 30.
Michael Saylor, who increasingly appears to be on the winning side of one of the greatest company trades of all time.
A special shout-out to the Bankless duo Ryan Sean Adams and David Hoffman, who were right about ETH (but don't get me wrong, I was right for thinking they were wrong before ;) ), and for creating one of the most influential podcasts in crypto, which is one of the few things I consume religiously. Translator's note: Their podcast is Bankless, which can be listened to on Castbox - https://castbox.fm/vc/2642451