How The Geopolitics Of 2021 Will Shape The Year Ahead For Bitcoin

By Bitcoin 杂志 - 2 年前 - 阅读时间：10 分钟
5 年 2022 月 11 日，星期三，下午 00:XNUMX

How The Geopolitics Of 2021 Will Shape The Year Ahead For Bitcoin

Developments around the global regulation, hash rate and adoption of Bitcoin made for a unique year in 2021. So how will 2022 play out?

This past year was certainly a unique one for bitcoin. We saw the first bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) get approved in the United States, the largest-ever Bitcoin conference in Miami, the much anticipated Taproot upgrade, all-time highs nearing $70,000, oh, and a nation state made bitcoin legal tender. Despite all this exciting news, some things never change — the FUD was as prevalent as ever. Bitcoin saw a variety of bans throughout 2021 and, to no one’s surprise, China stole the show in this regard.

下面是一个列表 bitcoin bans in 2021 alone:

With 2021 nearly in the rearview mirror, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what geopolitical bitcoin moves will occur throughout 2022. Below, I offer up a few questions to think about as we approach the new year:

这些问题分为三类：哈希率、监管和采用。我在下面更详细地讨论了每个问题。

税法法规

If we step back and look at 2021 regulation on a global scale, would you think the overall trend was friendly or hostile? Even with the passing of El Salvador’s Bitcoin law, I’d say the global regulatory environment is still quite hostile toward Bitcoin. Iran, Turkey and Nigeria all made hostile moves in 2021. 印度 和 纽约州 也被视为敌对监管行动。我们都知道中国发生了什么。

While the news of bans and corresponding FUD was prevalent, there is still a sense of optimism in the air. After the dust settled post-El Salvador’s bitcoin law, the obvious next question was: Who’s next? Many assumptions have been made about it being another Latin American country. This certainly makes sense.

回想起来，萨尔瓦多几乎是实现这一巨大飞跃的完美国家。它是一个经济困难的小国，对其货币没有自主权。作为一个美元化的国家，萨尔瓦多人受到美元和美联储的影响。我不会争论 2001 年切断与冒号的关系是否是正确的举动（亚历克斯·格拉德斯坦（Alex Gladstein）很好地讨论了这个话题 此处), but I certainly think taking a step toward a Bitcoin standard was.

与许多拉丁美洲国家一样，萨尔瓦多经常受到美国外交政策和国际货币基金组织（IMF）干预的伤害。美国制造的坎蒂隆效应通过抬高当地货币（萨尔瓦多人看不到这种隐性税收带来的任何好处）、实施制裁和控制贸易政策，伤害了萨尔瓦多人民。国际货币基金组织让萨尔瓦多负债累累，降低其信贷质量，以确保未来的贷款条件不利（甚至扣押未来的贷款前景），从而损害了萨尔瓦多人民的利益。

“El Salvador bond spreads to U.S. Treasuries hit a record high on Thursday on growing investor fears the Central American nation will not reach a potential $1 billion loan agreement with the International Monetary Fund and faces negative credit implications linked to its use of bitcoin设立的区域办事处外，我们在美国也开设了办事处，以便我们为当地客户提供更多的支持。“

–路透社

那么，萨尔瓦多对此做了什么？它选择退出（尽管不是完全退出）。它朝着金融主权的方向迈出了一步，也相应地远离了邪恶的美国治国手段和国际货币基金组织的金融暴政。但萨尔瓦多并不是拉丁美洲唯一陷入困境的美元化国家。那么，我又要问了，下一个是谁？

拉丁美洲的政治家们 装备激光眼, starting to engage with the bitcoin community and proposing pro-bitcoin legislation. Little has materialized as of this writing (on the surface, at least), but we all know bitcoin acts “gradually, then suddenly.”

国会议员 巴拉圭的卡利托斯·雷贾拉， 墨西哥议员爱德华多·穆拉特·伊诺霍萨, 巴拿马国会议员加布里埃尔·席尔瓦 和 巴西联邦副议员奥雷奥·里贝罗 have all signaled support for bitcoin 以这种或那种方式。

It very well could be one of these countries that becomes the next Bitcoin hub, whether it be via a legal tender law or otherwise friendly regulation. And just maybe, we won’t be talking about another single country making bitcoin legal tender, but a handful when we look back at 2022.

即使 亚历山大·霍普特纳的预测 of five more developing countries adopting bitcoin as legal tender by the end of 2022 turns out to be accurate, there will still be FUD (there will 时刻 be FUD). We likely haven’t seen the last of Bitcoin bans and they may become more sophisticated and more strictly enforced as financial elites across the globe feel the increased pressure put upon them by this new freedom money.

“事实上，美国的经济治国手段在该地区依然有效，并助长了引发最近一波起义的严峻形势。”

–亚历山大·梅因经济与政策研究中心国际政策主任谈拉丁美洲最近的抗议活动

哈希率

2019年秋季，中国大陆控制 approximately 75% of the global Bitcoin 散列率。这个数字下降了， 但在 50 年伊始，这一比例仍超过 2021%。现在，在 2022 年初， 占0％.

This was one of the best stories in bitcoin in 2021. Sure, the FUDsters were sounding the alarm when China banned bitcoin mining this past summer, but that was to be expected and they failed to zoom out. China enacting a legitimate and all-out ban on bitcoin mining certainly hurt the overall hash rate at the time, so the price dropped accordingly. Alarms were sounded. Articles were written. The death of bitcoin was yet again declared.

Not so fast. Many bitcoin knew this would actually be 好东西。从外面看可能并不明显，但对于那些了解它的人来说却一目了然。 A mass exodus of bitcoin mining from China would result in a greater distribution of global hash rate. This is a huge deal. Not to mention that this does away with one of the most prominent anti-bitcoin arguments — that China has too much control of Bitcoin infrastructure or might co-opt the network by a hostile miner takeover.

如下图所示，许多国家受益于中国的采矿禁令：俄罗斯、哈萨克斯坦和美国是其中的主要受益者。今年年初，美国约占全球算力的 11%。这个数字（截至 35 月份，根据最新数据）为 XNUMX%。这个数字继续增长的可能性有多大？什么时候它会从值得庆祝的事情变成令人担忧的事情？

作为一名美国人，我很高兴看到矿工来到美国。但是，退一步并认识到美国哈希率增长两倍的速度，我相信有一些令人担忧的理由。我不希望任何一个国家声称中国已经腾出全球算力主导者的宝座。有没有可能 75% 的算力集中在美国实际上会比同样集中在中国时更糟糕？

美国在可持续发展监管方面可能落后于欧盟，但它似乎有意迅速缩小这一差距。随着越来越多的企业开始关注 ESG， ESG 和 Bitcoin is certainly not going anywhere. This would call into question bitcoin’s fungibility if “green bitcoin” were to be priced at a premium. It would also be in direct conflict with the free market ethos that Bitcoin naturally promotes.

While the Chinese regulatory environment was uncertain and oftentimes really harsh toward bitcoin, it ultimately decided to push miners out as opposed to co-opting them. Since miners benefit from economies of scale, they’ll likely trend toward centralization over time. This makes regulatory capture more of a concern, whether it be in China, the U.S. or another other country. The next time a major geopolitical move is taken by a global mining power, it might take the form of state control rather than a ban. Even though El Salvador mining bitcoin with geothermal energy is undoubtedly really cool, state-owned bitcoin mining facilities is not a trend I want to see emerge.

This might be a bit farther out than 2022. It might be unrealistic altogether. Maybe it’s even one of those chances bitcoin would be willing to take, as it might not arise until we’re at or near hyperbitcoinization. Still, it’s worth some consideration as we look ahead to the short- and long-term futures of bitcoin.

采用

Bitcoin adoption has exploded over the years and is now 估计用户数量超过 100 亿. Bitcoin users include institutional and retail investors, humanitarians, bankers, government officials, large and small businesses, refugees and everyone in between. Even if we were to say “that 100 million seems really low” and infer it might be closer to double that, we’d only be at roughly 4% to 5% of adults owning bitcoin 全球。 这相当于 1999 年的互联网。

If we continue the trends seen in Bitcoin adoption over the past couple years, the number of global users will reach one billion sooner than we know it. Trying to predict what will happen to bitcoin’s price, hash rate or adoption in the short term is a fool’s errand, but we can say with near certainty that Bitcoin’s user base will expand over longer periods of time.

不可能确切知道有多少用户，但以下一些趋势清楚地说明了采用率是如何快速增长的：

The final bullet point above goes hand in hand with the growth of the Lightning Network. This has been my personal favorite trend in Bitcoin adoption this year. Nation state and institutional adoption will certainly have a greater upward pull on bitcoin’s price, but the Lightning Network is how we onboard millions and eventually billions around the globe, enabling near-instant and zero-cost micropayments. The Lightning Network has more than tripled in capacity this year and the below image shows just how robust development is within the Lightning ecosystem.

The velocity with which Bitcoin is adopted by the average person may have less impact on the price compared to when whales make big splashes, but it is a signal that needs to be closely monitored. The President of El Salvador cited bitcoin’s adoption in Bitcoin Beach as a use case for the country’s legal tender law. Regulation and adoption go hand-in-hand, and often it is assumed that regulation will impact adoption, and not the other way around. That statement might sound logical, but bitcoin has been known to challenge our assumptions.

Places like Nigeria, Pakistan, India and China have all been quite hostile toward Bitcoin and yet, their citizens are among the most prevalent users. Why is that? That’s because bitcoin is freedom money. The 需要 bitcoin in each of those countries is higher than that in the West. 

Bitcoin is not just number go up (in monetary terms) technology, it is adoption go up technology. I’ve heard the phrase “bitcoin is inevitable” frequently used within the community. I’m not one to take things for granted, but that is a statement I agree with given a long enough time horizon. If I game out polar scenarios, one with favorable and one with unfavorable regulation, I end up at the same result of increased adoption.

许多个人甚至更多的机构需要友好的监管才能加入，而金融暴政、极端通货膨胀和社会镇压将迫使被剥夺权利的人选择退出当前的货币体系。

Closing out this point with one of my big questions for 2022: Will bitcoin adoption explode this upcoming year? Or will it go up at a more controlled pace?

I highly doubt I’ll be looking back at 2022 a year from now and be writing an article about how the number of global bitcoin users actually went 向下 自从我写了这篇文章。相反，我要关注的是某些多米诺骨牌倒下，这会将采用率推向我们以前从未见过的水平。

总结

虽然我在本文中分别讨论了算力、采用和监管，但它们在现实生活中肯定是不能分开的。这三个想法中的每一个都有内在的联系。

I’m incredibly bullish on bitcoin looking ahead to 2022 and even more so as we look farther out. That doesn’t mean we don’t have anything to be weary of and that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a lot of work left to do, people to onboard, and FUD to fight, but I remain as optimistic as ever. My hope is that 2022 is another great year for Bitcoin and that one year from today I can pen a similar piece as we head into 2023.

这是 Nick Fonseca 的客座文章。所表达的意见完全是他们自己的，并不一定反映 BTC Inc 或 Bitcoin 杂志.

原始来源： Bitcoin 杂志