Throughout 2021, cryptocurrency heavyweights like [Bitcoin](/news/category/bitcoin-news) and [Ethereum](/news/category/ethereum-news-today) experienced sharp declines in value, however, the market showed remarkable resiliency and ended the year in bull market territory.  As we begin another new year, cryptocurrencies are _again_ experiencing sharp declines (hardly anything new for the month of January) and, while the most heavily capitalised cryptocurrencies, like Bitcoin, decline in value, other digital assets, referred to as “altcoins,” are gaining an increasing amount of attention from new investors. 

## What Are Altcoins?

Altcoins, an abbreviated way of saying “alternative coins,” are nothing other than digital assets **not** called Bitcoin.  As of November 2021, there were over 14,000 altcoins trading across a wide array of crypto-exchanges operating on the market.  The rate at which Millennials and members of the Gen Z demographic are piling into altcoins, more than any other generation, is sure to make 2022 an especially big year for these digital assets.  These two groups account form a portion of society that has never known a world _without_ the internet and their accelerated level of digital adoption and keen interest in digital assets is expected to drive the popularity and adoption of altcoins to new records. 

## Market Cheerleaders

The lot of these two groups account for the majority of the market’s “cheerleaders” or the digital asset crusaders loudly promoting their belief that cryptocurrencies are the vanguard of a financial revolution.  And why not?  It’s easy to understand how cryptocurrencies fit the lifestyle of these two groups.  If we examine them a bit more closely, we see how technically adept they tend to become at a very young age, and this is what drives their preferences for financial transactions that are achieved through digital means over other more traditional methods. 

Vendors haven’t failed to notice.  Organizations, large and small, are recognizing the widespread adoption of cryptocurrencies among the younger generations as an opportunity to grow their own businesses.  The list of organisations announcing their acceptance of cryptocurrency as a form of payment is steadily growing.  The rapid adoption of altcoins by younger investors also sheds a bit more light on why mega-retailers, like Amazon, are investing so heavily in cryptocurrency and blockchain technologies.

## Expect a Steady Rise in Altcoin Popularity

In the new year to come, it’s safe to anticipate that altcoins already experiencing a steady rise in popularity will pick up _even more steam_.  Perhaps most notable of all, investors should develop a keen interest in the “metaverse” and the role it is playing not just in the lives of the younger generation, but in all our lives.  These virtual reality worlds are developing economies all their own and many, like Decentraland and The Sandbox, have their own cryptocurrencies that players use to exchange online goods and even purchase virtual real estate.

Here are a few of the more popular altcoins to watch in 2022:

[**Solana (SOL)**](https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/solana/): Up more than 13,000% in 2021.  Logically, most think their opportunity to buy in has long since passed, but Solana has a reputation as a low-cost platform that can be very competitive with Bitcoin meaning there is room yet to grow. 

[**Decentraland (MANA)**](https://decentraland.org/): We mentioned the metaverse earlier, and MANA is what they mean when they say “buying the metaverse." In the [Decentraland](https://decentraland.org/) metaverse, one can purchase virtual real estate, buy shop fronts, and so much more.  MANA is the currency of this virtual world.

[**Chainlink (LINK)**](https://chain.link/): As the use of smart contracts continues to increase, so too will the value of Chainlink. 

Altcoins give us many reasons to be excited about the future as these smaller coins offer more upside potential, but this market hasn’t yet matured – altcoin prices can be significantly affected by rampant volatility and it’s important for investors to keep this in mind.

Altcoins Drawing Interest from Millennials

Polarity.  Volatility.  Even Mass Hysteria.  A wide array of terms can be used to explain the phenomenon of cryptocurrencies in 2021.  Whatever the term, it’s most certainly the type of phenomenon capable of creating new millionaires, which the market most certainly did in 2021.  Of course, celebrity tweets played a role in promoting the popularity of the market, but what a year it’s been for those with an iron stomach. 

Wall Street has always been fond of saying that “volatility works both ways” and you can ask the investors who bought into altcoins like AXS, SAND, or FTM back in January if truer words were ever spoken.

Though rocky at times with a couple of monumental dips, it was a fine year for the cryptocurrency market as it made huge strides towards mainstream adoption and gained $30 billion in new investments.  Those are remarkable achievements for a market that hasn’t yet adopted a regulatory framework and was all but outlawed by a global superpower (China). Still the popularity of digital assets continues to grow _no matter what_ the world seems to throw at investors. 

## A Look Back at 2021

A look back at the top-performing digital coins of 2021 reveals one thing about the future – get to know **[metaverses](/news/category/metaverse-news/)**.  Facebook's recent re-branding as “Meta” ignited a _powder keg_ that thrust every coin that was metaverse related into the stratosphere.  Essentially, a metaverse is a virtual world where people socialise, go to virtual shopping malls, buy virtual real estate, and do pretty much anything they would do in the _real_ world.  Most of the top-performing coins of 2021 are playing an increasingly crucial role in these metaverses:

### Gala (Symbol: GALA) – Revenue from the global gaming market is expected to reach $200 billion in 2024. At the center of it is a blockchain-gaming platform, GALA – a digital currency that shot up an absurd _51,000%_ in value in 2021.

### Axie Infinity (Symbol: AXS)– Another metaverse-related cryptocurrency that took early investors on a Nantucket sleighride in 2021.  Axie Infinity posted a gain of nearly 19,000% this year. 

### The Sandbox (Symbol: SAND) – Rage on, metaverse coins!  Sandbox has locked arms with mega-boosters, like Snoop Dogg who incidentally built his very own virtual mansion in the Sandbox platform.  Tallying a 14,530% pump in value since the start of the year, SAND enjoys its rightful place as one of our top performers of 2021.

### Fantom (Symbol: FTM)– Best described as a provider of ledger services to global businesses, Fantom has posted a surge of almost 9000% in 2021 and, with its very strong fundamentals, there could be more room to grow in 2022. 

### Decentraland (Symbol: MANA) – [Decentraland](https://decentraland.org/) is a wildly popular virtual world with 300,000 monthly participants (and growing).  Many of them wanting to purchase land or trade their digital wares in the platform.  To do it, they’re using Decentraland's official digital currency, MANA.  The surge in popularity was able to boost the value of MANA by almost 4000% in 2021.

As we march into the new year, we all aspire to discover the next coin best-positioned for a 50,000% gain.  Be prudent about your research, and understand this market is still young, extremely volatile, and oh-so exciting.

Momentum Behind 2021’s Crypto Gaming Coins

Early December was a brutal period for the crypto market, as it crashed substantially. While it has recovered since, crypto assets like BTC, MANA, SAND and GALA are yet to hit the highs they experienced in November. 

Causes include the volatile period for traditional financial markets and skewering inflation.

There is a silver lining though. Terra (LUNA) surged in price and Terra-TVL grew considerably in the past week or so. Why are people choosing Terra stablecoins over other US$-backed assets?

## TerraUSD, a truly decentralised stablecoin

TerraUSD (UST) is a decentralised, algorithmic stablecoin that offers a scalable solution for DeFi. Decentralised stablecoin leaders like DAI face severe scalability problems and UST offers a viable solution. 

People are finally realizing UST’s potential, which also includes easy exchange, passive income potential and interoperability. The ability to earn income off stablecoin deposits is a key factor currently driving its acceptance. The fact that UST held its peg during the crypto crash is big news and a significant event for the DeFi ecosystem at large. 

While stablecoins like USDT, USDC, BUSD and TUSD failed to do so, UST held strong. Earlier this year, it was impossible to think of an algorithmic stablecoin outperforming the above-mentioned stablecoins. More and more exchanges are introducing UST pairs, the latest being KuCoin with SOL/UST and MATIC/UST.

Now, one of LUNA's capabilities is ensuring the price stability of Terra stablecoins. 

## LUNA burning drove scarcity

From 26th November to 5th December for example, roughly 10 million LUNA tokens were burnt! The reason is simple. As more people are purchasing UST and exchanges are introducing UST pairs, a larger number of UST will have to be minted to meet growing demands. 

This in turn leads to LUNA burning, most of which is done by buying LUNA off the open market. 

## Conclusion

Confirming fundamentals means LUNA should be a key part of your core holdings and at the top of your ‘buy the dip’ coin list. LUNA surged to an ATH recently, so do not rush and buy the coin now.



LUNA Continues to Shine Despite Crypto Crash

We have been here before.  The “flash crash” that occurred the morning of December 4th can likely be attributed to many factors, but the lesson is the same - investing in cryptocurrency requires the wherewithal to deal with extreme volatility.  [Bitcoin](/coins/btc) continues to reign as the industry titan and when the price suddenly plummets, like it did Saturday morning, altcoins and other cryptocurrencies are likely to follow suit. 

Crypto-investors found themselves having to deal with that exact scenario this past weekend.

## Omicron Variant Effects Prices

Hopes of seeing Bitcoin achieve a year-end price level of $100,000 were dashed in only moments when monetary policy rumours and speculation about the new Covid-19 variant, Omicron, sent tremors through the cryptocurrency marketplace.

The world’s original cryptocurrency suddenly lost more than 18% in value, dropping to as low as $42,875…_all within the span of a single hour_.  As the new week begins, Bitcoin has already recovered some of that value back, creeping just above $50,000.  But, still well below the $55,000 - $59,000 price range the digital coin traded in the week prior to the crash.

Don’t act surprised.  Experiencing a 30-40% price fluctuation within a single month is something to be expected as the cryptocurrency market continues to mature.

## Buy The Dip- Opportunity?

Following closely behind Bitcoin, the world's _second-_largest cryptocurrency by market capitalisation, [Ethereum](/coins/eth), declined to $3,525 per coin – the digital asset’s lowest price in a month, though it has since recovered some of the lost value. 

There are investors among us who have waited patiently for this opportunity.  The more experienced crypto-investors among us are seeing a familiar pattern – a significant and sudden market decline “washes out” the crypto-newbies who’ve been playing the cryptocurrency market like a casino, and while those players are making for the hills, the more prudent among us view the market carnage as a buying opportunity.

In other words, is this an opportunity to “buy the dip?” 

Even if we take Saturday’s precipitous drop into consideration, Bitcoin was trading just over $29,000 when 2021 began so it is still up over 65% on the year.  Lately, we seem to have been standing on the edge of what many would consider “mainstream adoption” of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum.  But those aren’t the only two “would be” buying opportunities right now. 

## Rise of The Altcoin

Last weekend’s sell-off affected other altcoins that had been riding a trend of popularity in 2021, making such affected digital assets no less enticing in terms of “buying the dip.”  [Polkadot](https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/polkadot-new/), which trades under the symbol DOT, looks especially appealing right now.  The digital asset lost nearly 10% of its value in the first 24 hours of the sell-off, but most suspect the decline had come as a result of the broader market sell-off.

At present, Polkadot is showing signs of recovery which would suggest strong investor support for this suddenly popular digital asset.  Polkadot has evolved to find a place on the list of the top-ten largest cryptocurrencies by market capitalisation, we assume for a reason.  Investors looking for solid projects to invest in that demonstrate future potential might have a reason to consider Polkadot right now.  Like, _right_ now…

Popular Altcoin Prices Drop in Unison

What an incredible year for the value of altcoins and lesser known digital assets. It would seem that all that is needed for them to go from complete obscurity to front page news is the connection to the right meme or to benefit from a well-timed tweet from some quirky and eccentric billionaire.

A cryptocurrency called Omicron is currently enjoying such notoriety, if only momentarily.

## Beast Mode

While treading water for much of the past week, the popularity of Omicron went into full ‘beast’ mode once the media announced a coronavirus variant that had been discovered in southern Africa and was given the same name as the coin.

From what we can determine, Omicron was launched on or around November 8th but already it’s identifiable by much of the mainstream public. The coin shot up 10 times in value from last week Friday till Monday as the news of the virus permeated all the major news outlets.

‘Experts’ said the rapid rise in popularity was likely attributable to the fact that both the new coronavirus variant and the coin share the same name. Good guess.

### There are other coins, once relatively obscure, that have quickly risen in popularity as well:

**SAND** – A digital asset that’s being mega-hyped by metaverse enthusiasts. SAND are tokens that can be traded or earned upon completion of certain adventures within the popular virtual gaming world called [Sandbox](https://www.sandbox.game/en/). The digital coins recently traded at around $7 and have enjoyed an eye-popping 80%+ increase in value in the past week alone.

The metaverse, which is a combination of multiple technologies, including virtual reality and augmented reality where users can hypothetically ‘live’ within the technical platform, is gaining attention from some very big, highly recognisable companies that are considered industry leaders. According to a recent statement from one such company, Adidas, they are keenly focused on how the metaverse develops saying that it is ‘…currently one of the most exciting developments in digital, making it an interesting platform for Adidas’.

**MANA** – Another coin that’s riding the Metaverse wave of popularity. The MANA coin is associated with the [_Decentraland_](https://decentraland.org/) Metaverse and rose from $2.81 to $4.67 during the month of November. If metaverse environments pique your curiosity, Decentraland is an interesting story. There were many headlines that mentioned Decentraland last month which has a tendency to happen when a nation like Barbados starts to make remarks that it is taking steps to setup a virtual embassy in Decentraland’s metaverse.

The increase in value of altcoins mentioned above seem to have been initiated by Facebook’s announcement in October that the company would be adopting a new name - Meta, a new mission that hopes to ‘bring the metaverse to life’.

Overall, the cryptocurrency market demonstrated mixed results this week.

As we close out 2021, Bitcoin was projected to reach a year-end value of $100,000, but in terms of reaching that value, the market’s key digital asset would need to stage more than a 75% rally in the next four weeks.

BTC Set to Miss Expectations; Altcoin News

David Marcus will leave [Meta](https://about.facebook.com/meta/) (formerly Facebook) at the end of the year, with the company’s stablecoin project – Diem, formerly Libra, still not fully launched.

He confirmed he was stepping down as Meta’s crypto lead on Twitter.

The former president of PayPal joined Facebook as the vice president of the company’s Messenger division and took over the firm’s blockchain work in 2018.

Libra has faced regulatory scrutiny since its announcement in 2019, with Marcus becoming the face of the project in front of the US authorities.

## New Head for Novi

The project appeared to undergo cutbacks, with key staff leaving, before it was rebranded Diem. Recently, the Meta-owned cryptocurrency wallet subsidiary Novi launched a pilot that used the Paxos-administered USDP stablecoin instead of Diem.

Stephane Kasriel, also ex-PayPal, will be the new head of Novi

Confirming his departure on Twitter, Marcus said: ‘Personal news: after a fulfilling seven years at Meta, I’ve made the difficult decision to step down and leave the company at the end of this year.

‘While there’s still so much to do right on the heels of launching Novi — and I remain as passionate as ever about the need for change in our payments and financial systems — my entrepreneurial DNA has been nudging me for too many mornings in a row to continue ignoring it.

‘The one thing I’m the proudest of during my time here is the amazing kickass team we’ve assembled over the last three years. This is the most resilient, passionate, determined and talented group of humans I’ve ever worked with.

## Greatness Ahead 

‘I find comfort and confidence in knowing that they will continue to execute our important mission well under @skasriel’s leadership, and I can’t wait to witness this from the outside. I know there’s greatness ahead.

‘I’ll keep a special place in my heart for some of the most fun and stimulating years of my life building Messenger with so many talented people. In turn, the Novi years were the most mission-driven and intellectually stimulating ones.

‘I’m incredibly grateful to Mark for the opportunity and privilege to share a bit of the journey over the years. I’ll keep lifelong memories and friendships from my time at the company, and I wish it well in the years to come.

‘I now look forward to having more free time in the months to come before I start building something new and exciting again. Onward!’

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