5 key takeaways from Huobi 2022 crypto industry report

Published at: Dec. 16, 2022

Over the last year the crypto, and greater Web3 industry has seen a rollercoaster of loss, growth and innovation - and the data shows.

In the latest industry report from cryptocurrency exchange Huobi, "Global Crypto Industry Overview and Trends", trends and stats were pulled from the industry on everything from nonfungible tokens (NFTs) and the metaverse, to centralized exchange (CEX) usage and regulations.

Despite the turmoil of major events like the FTX collapse, LUNA’s implosion, and 3AC bankruptcy, the industry still accounted for approximately 320 million crypto users worldwide in the last year.

While the total amount of investment and financing in the “primary market” surpassed $27.7 billion, the total amount of market capitalization of crypto assets shrank by over $2.2 trillion.

1. NFT becomes the most discussed crypto term worldwide

The report analyzed five of the most googled search terms pertaining to the Web3 industry, which include: “cryptocurrency”, “DeFi”, “GameFi”, “NFT” and “BTC”. Of these terms, searches for NFTs dominated worldwide.

According to the report NFTs show dominance because:

“NFTs can be well integrated with various industries, such as sports, arts, entertainment, cultural creations, expanding the application scenarios on a larger scale."

This last year has seen the focus of NFTs switch from hyped drops to projects with last utility, such as solving diamond certification fraud. Some projects are even targeting the next generation of users with “family-friendly” NFTs.

As for the other search terms, "BTC", "DeFi" and "Cryptocurrency" were most frequently searched in emerging markets including in South America, South Africa and the Middle East.

2 . The United States dominates CEX usage and industry development

Another key finding related to CEX activity, which reportedly has been on a steady decline over the last year.

However there were certain countries which had significant shares of traffic to CEXs. The United States (U.S.) took the top spot with nearly 10% of all CEX traffic followed by South Korea (7.4%), Russia (6.1%), Turkey( 5.6%) and Japan (3.8%).

The U.S. also came in top for crypto market development maturity. This was based on four key indicators which included percentage of crypto users, share of CEX volume, share of DeFi volume and internet population index.

Lastly, the U.S. has the largest total crypto population with over 46 million users and is first for its share of DeFi traffic (31.8%). Of U.S. crypto users over half are between the ages of 18-34.

3. Asia is on top for heated interest in NFTs

NFTs may have been the most searched term globally, but it has been on the decline from the previous year. Nonetheless in Asia the interest in NFTs remains heated.

According to the report, four of the top five spots were occupied by Asian countries. In the top place for NFT interest based on searches was Mainland China followed by Hong Kong, Singapore, Nigeria and Taiwan respectively.

Recently the courts in mainland China declared that NFTs are virtual property to be protected by law. This is a big move considering the country’s harsh crypto crackdown which began in 2021.

4. GameFi and Metaverse dominate investments

Both GameFi and the metaverse have been big winners in the industry over the last year.

Reports have consistently found interest and investment in these two sectors. Many big industry names like Animoca Brands CEO Yat Siu have said GameFi will become the onboarding point for metaverse.

In Huobi’s report, it revealed that for a second year in a row GameFi and Metaverse collectively exceeded the number of investments compared with categories such as tooling, and trading and lending. In these two categories, capital investment has shot up from $874 million in 2021 to $2.4 billion in 2022.

A Q3 DappRadar report revealed $1.3 billion in investment for GameFi and metaverse initiatives combined for that quarter. In the next six years, the GameFi industry alone is estimated to have a valuation of $2.8 billion.

5. Over 100 regulations have been issued for the crypto industry

Lastly, there is no talking about 2022 without talking about the slew of regulations which have been pointed at the crypto industry over the last year.

The report chronicles 105 “regulatory measures and guidance” for the crypto industry from over 42 sovereign countries since the start of this year.

According to the research, regulations from the U.S., the European Union (EU) and South Korea are the most concentrated and intensive.

The U.S. particularly has taken the spotlight in terms of crypto regulations with a total of 22 federal and state regulatory statutes, touching on everything from: crypto transactions and regulatory guidance,to judicial decisions and stablecoins.

After the catastrophic collapse of FTX, global regulators have been calling for more unified crypto regulations with intentions to tame the wild west and protect consumers.