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Caution is warranted in crypto. There’s always risk in any type of individual crypto investment, and some still believe that crypto could lead to financial instability more broadly. Even so, it’s a fascinating market to keep an eye on, and there’s no harm in identifying where the potential lies. It’s also a good idea to be aware of how the market is changing, especially if you’re currently investing or thinking of diversifying through digital assets.
Here, we’ll look at three growth areas in the wide world of crypto that are worth keeping an eye on.
Gaming
You may have heard about NFT- and crypto-based games such as Axie Infinity and CryptoKitties already. And now, more and more games are jumping on the bandwagon in different ways. Some studios are allowing in-game purchases for skins, loot boxes, and other things to be conducted with a properly-linked crypto wallet. Other games allow players to invest crypto in order to win it (and more) back in what has fast become known as a “play-to-earn” model.
In addition to these developments, there are also online casinos that work with crypto, allowing players to buy in-game tokens with cryptocurrency, and some predict that these casinos will also start paying out rewards crypto and/or NFT form.
All in all it’s clear that crypto is here to stay in gaming –– even if it’s difficult to predict just yet what specific assets may have the most to gain.
Sports Fan Participation
For a little while now, crypto has subtly gained ground in sports by way of specific teams and arenas allowing for digital currency payments. Fans have been able to buy tickets, merchandise, and concessions, in some cases, with cryptocurrency. This however simply represented one more space in which mainstream cryptos could be used as functional currency. The participation angle is somewhat more interesting as we look to the near future.
Specifically, the introduction of fan token cryptocurrencies appears to hold interesting potential. These tokens offer a whole different angle to crypto involvement in sports, enabling fans to get closer to their teams by buying specific currencies that double as access keys to team events (polls, merchandise offerings, and the like). These fan tokens are bought from online exchanges or the enterprises that have launched them, and we’re sure they’ll continue to expand throughout the sports sphere, likely with more and more purposes.
Tipping
Twitter announced a short time ago that you can now tip users with crypto coins, allowing you to show your support with some financial incentive. In addition to cryptocurrency, it was also announced that an experimental feature that uses NFTs would be rolled out, allowing users to validate and showcase their own collections of NFTs.
Most of these features are still in beta, but they’re worth keeping an eye on. It might not be long before a whole economy of sorts arises surrounding social media, online content creation, and tipping.
It’s clear that cryptocurrency and the NFT market are still having growing pains, but the potential in certain areas is astounding. It’s up to investors to keep an eye on various markets and industries like the ones listed above, assess developments, and determine for themselves what potential exists.
