Crypto is driven by narratives that capture the market’s imagination and dictate investment flows. As mentioned in previous articles, we sometimes dive into the current trends that try to dominate or are dominating the crypto space. Today, we look back at how, four months into 2024, some of these highly anticipated narratives are doing.
How Has the AI Narrative Performed Recently?
AI has remained a strong narrative from 2023 into the first half of 2024, consistently claiming 30-50% of the overall crypto narrative. This performance suggests a growth trajectory for AI in the crypto sector, probably fueled by developments such as OpenAI’s continuous rollout of ChatGPT models and broader discussions around Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) and hype revolving around traditional finance tech giants like NVIDIA.
What Changes Have Occurred in the SocialFi and Meme Narratives?
SocialFi has seen the most significant positive change in mindshare, driven by platforms like Friendtech and Fantasytop. But the biggest winners are the meme narratives, with no real use case besides speculating and having fun spreading memes. Is this where crypto is headed too? Or is this just a temporary phase?
Which Narratives Have Experienced Declines?
Some narratives that were very highly anticipated and perhaps pushed into the mainstream were the Bitcoin ecosystem narratives, which include BRC20, which are essentially NFTs on the Bitcoin blockchain.
Perhaps due to narrative fatigue following the Bitcoin halving and a drop-off in interest in related technologies like Ordinals and Runes, nothing big has happened yet in this category. Besides this, GameFi also saw a reduction in attention, and the lack of mainstream crypto games, such as Axie Infinity of the last cycle, could be part of the reason why GameFi is not going ballistic in the first quarter of 2024.
Are There Any Emerging Narratives?
DeSoc, involving platforms like Farcaster and DeSo, is gaining ground as a prominent narrative. The sector of DePIN is also on the rise, mirroring the growth seen in the AI narrative, because the two can be linked to one another.
Future Outlook: What Narratives Are Expected to Dominate in the next quarters of 2024?
Both AI and memes are expected to maintain their dominance, given the ongoing developments in AI and the limitless nature of meme culture in influencing market trends. Are these the topics we need to focus on? If so, we’ve got you covered. Check out our updated AI best picks of 2024 here.
What Is the Potential for DePIN and ZK Narratives?
DePIN is also showing steady growth, similar to AI. Additionally, the next discussion around Ethereum ETFs is brewing and is likely to regain momentum when all issues around Bitcoin and regulation are resolved.
Conclusion
Crypto is a narrative game, and tuning into the right one can earn you some money. But there are a lot of chains, developments, changes pushed from VCs, and manufactured hype, so discernment is all we can do. As we move further into 2024, watching these narratives will be an interesting exercise for anyone following crypto. You can stay up to date with some of our articles or check out our AI narrative, which is the first of our narrative collection where we list interesting projects that are related to the set narrative.
