How Blockchain Will Get Us Back to the Bull

As we see lately both traditional and alternative financial markets (namely stocks and crypto) are plummeting in a surprising unison.

The trend you would never expect to envision is becoming a reality.

Implications are several:

Small Picture — Crypto market appears to be responding to the same market conditions as traditional financial asset markets which shows its by now its universal permeation of the economy and its interdependence with the overall economic activity

Bigger Picture — Both dips are signaling the beginning of an approaching period of worldwide financial crisis which, as we can see from the table is happening pretty much each 10 years (the last 2 being caused by the burst of a dot.com bubble and the most recent one by the failure of American mortgage system)

There are several factors currently contributing to a bear market today:

• Overall fear and sell-off of the overpriced assets (around USD 20 trillion of extra cash flooded financial markets in 2017 accelerating the approaching of an inescapable sell-off period)

• Worldwide political instability with Trump worsening the image of the US as a world arbiter, Britain approaching its biggest financial shock this summer, European Union crumbling under the separatist and authoritarian tendencies of Central European states and terrorist threat getting out of a shade and taking a world agent function (If ISIS is purely and simply anything, it is a pseudo-state led by a conventional army)
• Overpopulation which are already causing Millennial struggles in keeping up a mere resemblance of financial well-being when compared to previous generations. The point can be further elaborated on taking into account the probability of bankruptcy and an inability to afford property. Check out 2017 jewels of Huffpost, — “Millennials Are Screwed” and “The Premium Mediocre Life of Maya Millennial” for more information

It’s like 90% true. We’re 90% of the way towards the brave new world. Utopia is always just 10% away. It just takes the other 90% of the time to get there (taken from Maya Millennial Article)

• The coming of a massive unemployment caused by the automation and AI (previously highest-paid financial jobs are among the first to see the cuts just as Lloyds Bank 3-year plan has shown)

• Slow but sure crumbling of previously unbeatable “big 4” caused by the trust issues, — with Facebook massive loss of its users due to an exploitation of its addictive potential for an untapped self-enrichment, Apple losing its investors and clients due to an acknowledged unfair market practice of slowing down one’s older iPhones with the new software releases

Both big 4’s power abuse and assets overvaluation are caused by the unproportioned human greed and last for enrichment, which has dominated the Silicon Valley for the last decade or so. The net neutrality violation is probably among the most outrageous manipulation of Internet time since its invention.

Trust and ethics, clearly have been put on hold for the last years preceding the currently unfolding economic crisis.

Thus, the solutions that will address trust issue and create a non-speculative contribution to the world economy are going to be those that get us back to the soaring economy in the coming decades.

Here I would like to highlight the solutions that will get world economy back on track:

Blockchain

Some people argue it will become as big if not bigger than Internet.

At this moment of time it clearly looks like an exaggeration. It is worth noting, however, that Blockchain is currently still in its “middleware phase” with some small players creating an ecosystem around cryptocurrencies and sporadic start-ups popping up on the wave of a confused enthusiasm.

The very moment Blockchain gets into mainstream application and revolutionizes numerous spheres of peer-to-peer interaction we are going to see the amount of international trade soaring and fraudulent activities getting pretty much impossible.

The Blockchain “app phase”, which we are now witnessing as a result of dot.com of 2000s, is what is waiting for us in 3–5 years’ horizon. This phase is going to create thousands of new jobs and lift millions out of poverty. More importantly, Blockchain will further empower independent agents and economically vulnerable population to stay afloat among the coming era of robotics-caused unemployment.

Artificial Intelligence

We are now going through the time of a rapid commercialization of narrow AI potential. What is waiting for us, however, is the advent of broader AI applications as well as potent machine learning, which will open the doors to such discoveries as quantum computing, World of Autonomous Things (WAT) and numerous diseases’ cure as algorithms for disease prediction are approaching 100 % precision. Obviously, robotics go hand in hand with the AI advancement as a natural spin-off and a touchable application of the above.

The potential for human race becomes pretty much limitless once we tap into the potential of General AI. Improving the economy is an understatement for what can factually become a paradise on Earth.

BioTech

Already now the biological discoveries are reminiscent of science fiction books, with cloning, gene editing and nanotechnology opening unthought-of opportunities for the world nation. These will not be Internet-based companies that will whose stocks will be in an upwind spiral for the next decades to come. Those will be pharmaceutical and biotech companies that will get our economy back to the bullish phase, with millions betting on the cancer-curing and life extension industries. Taking into account the worldwide ageing population and transhumanist desire of immortality (as mind uploading and cryogenics initiatives show) biotech is going to be huge. It is going to be immense! AI-based biotech industry will leave once prominent manufacturing and energy-generating industries on its knees.

Green Energy & Engineering

As I mentioned, trust and ethics will have to get back into scene. Green economy, now perceived as “good to have” whim of Greenpeace and “vegetarians” will very soon be brought and carefully scrutinized on the UN agenda, as mega cities start facing the flooding threat and global economy sees billions losses in real estate and industrial ecosystems.

Civil engineering (floating cities, dam, seawall constructions and artificial land creation) is going to claim its role on the height of the world economy just as it has been happening during the post-WWII construction boom. This time the importance of civil engineering will be not only the creation of new riches but the preservation of the world order and billions of lives. This is going to be way bigger and pressing than the competition for the highest skyscraper in 2010s.

While there are many industries that will contribute to the world economy in 2020s, the described 4 will see the biggest rise in investments and the biggest impact potential for getting the economy back to its bullish trend, which will last way longer as the majority of world population will find their ways into freelance and investments.

Before you go…

If you enjoyed this post, you will love KateGoesTech (my blog on futurism and philosophy of technology). I am planning to start vlogging as well — @kate.goes.tech. Looking forward to your comments and suggestions.