20 Key Areas to Follow in the Crypto Market in 2024

With the arrival of the New Year, the crypto market is facing new opportunities and challenges. Let's take a look at the 20 crypto narratives worth following in 2024. From underlying infrastructure to top-level applications, these areas will lead the direction of industry development, promising to be a busy and fulfilling year.

1. Parallel EVM

The battle for public chain performance continues to heat up. In November, Sei announced an upgrade to create the first parallel EVM chain. In December, both Neon and Sei saw significant price increases, and are currently undergoing a slight adjustment. In the future, it is important to focus on the progress of projects such as Sei Network, Monad, Neon EVM, and Eclipse.

2. Modular Blockchain

Data availability, consensus mechanisms, and execution layers are flourishing. The industry is gradually moving towards modular design to enhance performance and scalability. It is recommended to follow relevant weekly reports to understand the latest developments.

3. Solana ecosystem

The Solana ecosystem has recently seen an increase in activity, with significant gains in DEX infrastructure such as Raydium and Orca. In the future, focus will be on the development of projects related to asset issuance, circulation, and leverage.

4. Decentralized Internet of Things ( DePin )

Although the hype around the DePin concept is somewhat excessive, it still has development potential. Hardware mining can serve as an entry point, and the key lies in designing an excellent profit-sharing mechanism. Project teams can learn more from relevant experiences.

5. Restaking (

Ethereum POS offers approximately 3% risk-free yield, with leverage up to 8%. Projects like Blast and Manta focus on native yields to attract DeFi liquidity. After the launch of EigenLayer, Ethereum's DeFi ecosystem may achieve higher returns. It is worth following projects like Restake.fi and Agilely.

) 6. Sei ecosystem

After the launch of Sei V2, focus on the development of asset issuance, circulation, and leverage-related projects.

7. Starknet Ecosystem

The issuance of Starknet tokens is highly anticipated. The ecosystem is primarily divided into two development paths: DeFi and full-chain gaming. For the DeFi direction, you can follow the movements of the Starknet DeFi Committee, while for the gaming direction, you can track the analysis reports from relevant research institutions.

8. Atomicals Protocol

More orthodox compared to BRC20. You can follow the development of leading projects like Atom and Quark. Other inscription projects can be participated in according to market sentiment at the right time.

9. Game Finance ### GameFi (

In Q4 2023, multiple high-quality gaming projects emerged and will be launched throughout the year. Notable projects include Gas Hero, Matrix, Shrapnel, Lumitera, and Seraph. You can maintain communication with professional gold mining studios to stay updated on the latest developments.

) 10. On-chain games

The entire chain game fully puts assets on the chain, bringing players a stronger interactive experience. You can follow the analysis reports of relevant research institutions to understand industry development trends.

11. Proof of Work ### PoW (

Miners need to continuously look for new mining opportunities. Follow the new product trends of major mining machine manufacturers. For example, after Bitmain launched the Kaspa miner in May last year, the price of KAS rose by up to 10 times.

) 12. Cosmos ecosystem

Although we haven't researched the Cosmos ecosystem much, the entire ecosystem remains vibrant and is expected to incubate high-quality projects. It is worth following.

13. Derivatives

DeFi protocols are becoming increasingly complex, requiring a higher financial background. However, for traders, it remains a good battleground, allowing for more complex arbitrage and hedging operations on-chain. You can follow projects like Symmiο with excellent fundamental data, as well as platforms like IntentX that offer a good user experience.

14. 意图###Intent( and AI

The concept of "intention" proposed by Paradigm has sparked heated discussions. Although the enthusiasm has somewhat cooled, related projects are still worth following. Key projects to focus on include dappOS, Anoma, and Intent Essential.

) 15. Berachain

Proof of Liquidity will become an important battleground for capital efficiency in the competition of economic models and token economics design.

16. Decentralized Science ### De-Science (

The emerging narrative proposed by Messari is currently focused mainly on the pharmaceutical and AI sectors. You can follow projects like DataLake, as more related projects may emerge in the future.

) 17. Stablecoin

The new stablecoin architecture will bring higher capital efficiency and interest rates. Notable projects to follow include Liquity Protocol V2, Ethena Labs, Agilely, etc.

18. Ponzi Innovation

The OHM fork projects still have room for development, with two projects having increased by more than 20 times in the past 30 days.

19. ZK Proof Hardware Acceleration

Currently, there are relatively few related projects, possibly because the industry is still in its early stages. It is recommended to continuously follow the technological advancements in this field.

20. ZK co-processor

This field is still in the early stages of development, and the concepts are relatively complex. It is recommended to follow in-depth analysis articles by industry experts to understand the latest developments.