For a long time, the crypto ecosystem has firmly believed in a "rule": The overall market performance of the crypto ecosystem is dictated by Bitcoin: when Bitcoin rises, the overall market rises; when Bitcoin falls, the overall market falls. However, a recent, rather "contrarian" phenomenon has made me seriously question this rule and further convinces me that the future of the crypto ecosystem will not be bound by Bitcoin's market capitalization and price. Before sharing my views, I want to emphasize again: I am not denying Bitcoin's value; I still believe that Bitcoin will reach $1 million per coin in my lifetime. What I mean is: The future of the crypto ecosystem as an ecosystem is vast and boundless; its value will never be anchored or capped by Bitcoin's performance. In previous articles, I've occasionally shared my thoughts on the Hyperliquid project. Although it's not a project I particularly like, and the sector it operates in isn't one I'm especially interested in, and I've never bought its tokens, a recent performance of this project has suddenly shown me something worth paying attention to. What is this performance? The perpetual contract market it's built on has continued to grow against the trend in this bear market. Although it still lags significantly behind the major players in terms of absolute size, its activity and trading volume are clearly catching up. Even more noteworthy is that, while the entire crypto market continues to slump, especially with Bitcoin's price plummeting, its price, while also declining, has remained remarkably resilient overall. This is quite remarkable, particularly because it demonstrates strong resilience, withstanding immense pressure from Bitcoin and the external environment. The key reason I can think of is this: its active trading market, especially its continuous adoption of trading in US stock tokens and other commodity tokens, has maintained the prosperity and activity of its ecosystem. This generates substantial cash flow to support token buybacks, thereby supporting the price's stability. This demonstrates the strength of the project's fundamentals. In fact, this phenomenon has occurred before with Ethereum. During the 2021 bull market, due to the explosion of DeFi and NFTs, Ethereum's price reached as high as one-tenth of Bitcoin's price. But that happened during a bull market, and it only proves that the prosperity of the crypto ecosystem during a bull market can allow project tokens to outperform Bitcoin in terms of price increases and potential. Aside from that, I don't seem to have seen any project outperform Bitcoin during a bear market. However, Hyperliquid's performance during this period, in my opinion, is excellent proof of this in a bear market. It proves that: A project with strong fundamentals can absolutely make its token outperform Bitcoin, both in a bull market and in a bear market. Hyperliquid's advantage lies in trading, but it only supports perpetual contract trading, which is a rather niche market within the broader crypto ecosystem.
If you believe the future of the crypto ecosystem will be much larger than the perpetual contract market, then there is every reason to believe that if the entire crypto ecosystem prospers, then Ethereum, which supports the mainstream crypto ecosystem, has every reason to outperform Bitcoin.
Furthermore, Hyperliquid's recent "counter-trend" performance further confirms a view I have always held:
The fundamental reason why the crypto ecosystem has now become a "follower," completely swayed by the US stock market and the external environment, is that the ecosystem lacks sufficient innovation and the new business models and scenarios ignited by such innovation.
Once the crypto ecosystem sees the emergence of new business models and application scenarios, it will undoubtedly shed its current "follower" status and achieve a higher level of success.
JinseFinance
Bernice