The realization of cryptocurrency value and identity transformation

A few weeks ago (at the time I hadn’t yet read the article “Underground Argentina: Jewish Moneylenders, Chinese Supermarkets, Young People Giving Up, and Middle-Class Reverting to Poverty”), an old classmate I hadn’t seen in a long time called me. During our chat, he suddenly asked:

Are you still paying attention to digital currencies?

This old classmate and I have a very deep connection to the crypto ecosystem. When I first attended an offline Bitcoin lecture, still clueless, I talked to him about my mindset at the time: I didn’t understand what Bitcoin was, but I was very curious and wanted to listen.

Since then, until now, he has been one of the very few people in my real life who knows about this experience of mine.

The difference is that since then, I have fully immersed myself in the crypto ecosystem, while he still fights and struggles in the business world.

Nevertheless, over the years, every time we chat, we talk about the crypto ecosystem and crypto assets.

This time, during his call, we naturally discussed this topic again. His biggest feeling was:

Back then, we both saw Bitcoin, but no matter how much he tried, he couldn’t imagine that Bitcoin would rise to this price now.

At the same time, he asked me:

After all these years, how exactly have crypto assets or crypto technology affected our lives? Besides being an investment/speculation tool, what other practical applications do they have?

I continued to talk with him about DeFi, NFTs, and then we fantasized at length about the potential sparks that could be ignited by the combination of AI and crypto assets in the future.

But he always couldn’t get around one knot:

Artificial intelligence applications are now inseparable from his daily work. When will crypto assets or crypto applications become as indispensable in daily life as AI?

At that time, I just said that this day still needs time and patience, but I believe this day will come.

The reason I recall this experience is because the article “Underground Argentina” gave me inspiration.

It can be said that at least in Argentina, crypto assets and crypto technology have already become tools that a significant portion of the people there cannot live without in their daily lives. To some extent, in that country, the role of crypto assets for a considerable part of the population might currently be more important and valuable than artificial intelligence—people might work less efficiently without AI, but without crypto assets, their lives could face obstacles.

Once crypto assets and crypto technology shed their purely narrative and imaginative aspects and start to land as highly valuable tools and applications, they will undergo a transformation.

At that point, technology will no longer be idle; it will develop around solving real problems. Meanwhile, platforms that lock in technology and crypto assets will find deep roots and a solid foundation in value.

Looking back on this cycle, I most often imagine the new scenarios and applications that could emerge from the combination of AI + Crypto.

But frankly, although I see promising projects and promising development directions in this track, based on actual results and implementation so far, at least until now, this path is still in the stage of “feeling the stones as you cross the river.”

On the other hand, the use of crypto assets by Argentine citizens in daily life and the future RWA assets that are likely to become their necessity are accelerating to become a reality in another corner of the world that we previously couldn’t see.

Perhaps the road carved out by the Argentine people through hardship and suffering will come before AI + Crypto, becoming the first new scene and application of the crypto ecosystem to explode in the next few years?

If that is truly the case, then Ethereum, as the largest platform for stablecoins and RWA ecosystems, will definitely be the platform that benefits the most next.

And this time, this benefit will no longer be based on imagination and narrative, but on its ability to solve real problems and become a necessity for a certain group. Compared to the former, the value built on the latter is more solid and can withstand the test of time and market shocks.

From this perspective, future Ethereum will have more potential and growth space than Bitcoin.