Crypto Market Forecast Predicts 6.2% Annual Growth to 2024

Cryptocurrency will grow to be a $1.4 billion industry by 2024, according to a recent report from MarketsandMarkets. The research group predicts that the digital assets space will experience 6.18% annual growth.

Increasing distributed ledger technology (DLT) transparency, high remittances in developing countries, fluctuations in monetary regulations, and growth in venture capital investments will be the driving forces behind this growth.

Published earlier this month, the report is titled “Cryptocurrency Market by Offering (Hardware: GPU, FPGA, ASIC, & Wallet, and Software), Process (Mining and Transaction), Type, Application (Trading, Remittance, Payment: Peer-to-Peer Payment, Ecommerce, and Retail), and Geography – Global Forecast to 2024.” The researchers predict small and medium enterprises, startups, and entrepreneurs will benefit the most from the development of DLT transparency.

Recognized challenges

Although the report recognizes blockchain’s potential to provide affordable cross-border payments, among other benefits, it also names several challenges lying ahead of the digital assets space. If unaddressed, lack of regulatory certainty and the general population’s lack of understanding of the technical complexities might slow down growth. MarketsandMarkets also points to scaling, privacy, and security issues, as well as the lack of accessibility, especially for non-tech-savvy individuals.

However, the report notes those issues are being tackled, adding that the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and other financial watchdogs are slowly adopting a friendlier attitude towards crypto innovation.

A watershed year

These projections are in line with the view that blockchain technology and cryptocurrency are the most beneficial solutions for unbanked populations, as well as regions with unstable currencies and poor documentation. MarketsandMarkets believes those regions provide the greatest opportunities for growth in the space.

The report suggests that 2019 would be a watershed year for digital assets, which is also the view held by some seasoned crypto investors. With many financial regulators already approving trading schemes and adapting regulations to fit the needs of the crypto sphere, institutional players are starting to get interested, Wall Street veteran Ric Edelman recently told CNBC.