- Bitcoin value rose more than 400% between 2020 and 2024.
- Solana’s value increased nearly 4,500% in four years, from $1.49 to about $166.
- According to Matt Hougan, this trajectory of positivity will continue beyond the 2024 US elections.
Bitwise’s CIO said Washington can change the trajectory of the cryptocurrency market by speeding it up or slowing it down, but it can’t stop it.
In a recent client note, Matt Hougan wrote about cryptocurrencies in an election year and argued that cryptocurrencies have already won, regardless of who becomes the next president of the United States.
Comparing the state of the cryptocurrency market from November 2020 to November 2024, Hougan questioned whether things have gotten better or worse since Americans last went to the polls.
Despite several lawsuits from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), particularly against Binance, Coinbase, Cumberland DRW, Kraken, and Ripple, the cryptocurrency industry has made significant progress.
4 years difference
Looking at two US elections, Hougan points out that Bitcoin was trading at $13,677 in November 2020. Fast forward to November 2024, and Bitcoin is valued at approximately $69,492, representing a change of 408%.
Ethereum has also seen a positive increase from $388 in 2020 to the current $2,492 ahead of the 2024 US elections. However, it is Solana that has seen its price rise by almost 11,000%, from $1.49 in 2020 to approximately $166 in 2024.
Turning to assets under management (AUM), Hougan shows that stablecoin AUM increased from $3.87 billion in November 2020 to $177.83 billion in November 2024, representing a change of nearly 4,500%.
Decentralized Finance (DeFi) Total Value Locked (TVL) has also seen healthy growth, surging from $9.57 billion in 2020 to $139.3 billion in 2024.
“We focus so much on moment-to-moment price movements in cryptocurrencies that we often overlook long-term trends,” Hougan wrote. “The presidential election is a great opportunity to take a step back and see how far we have come.”
What’s next?
A lot has already happened in the cryptocurrency market over the past four years, but will the market continue beyond the 2024 US elections?
In Hougan’s view, the answer is yes. Hougan said that regardless of who becomes the next POTUS, inflows into physical cryptocurrency exchange-traded funds (ETFs) will continue, stablecoins will continue to grow, Wall Street will continue to embrace tokenization and real assets, and blockchain will continue to grow. said. It will become faster and cheaper, and real-world applications like Polymarket will see mainstream adoption.
“What happens in the election on Tuesday is important, especially in the short term,” Hougan said. “But the way I see it in the long term is that Tuesday will be something between a speed bump and a gust of wind. No one is going to stop this train.”