Highlights 

• Enthusiastic investors have seen exciting highs and lows in 2021.
• The year also saw many cryptocurrencies reaching their all-time highs, and also non-fungible tokens taking the centrestage in the world of cryptocurrencies.

The year 2021 has been the most existing year for cryptocurrencies so far. The enthusiastic investors have seen exciting highs and lows and have cashed in on the hype. The crypto community has grown multifold, and the digital currency popularity has increased with more and more people and firms adopting digital assets for transactions than ever before.  The year saw the bitcoins touching its all-time high price mark of US$60,000, with the total market capitalisations of cryptocurrencies touching US$2.25 trillion as of 29 December, as per CoinMarketCap.

Here are the 10 top quotes that some of the most influential people said about the exciting cryptocurrencies this year.

1. Crypto will replace dollar

Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey is one the supporter of cryptocurrencies in recent times. Recently in a conference, he said that he believes Bitcoin would replace the dollar. Earlier this year at a conference in Miami, he said that the cryptocurrencies “changes everything” for him. He said: “I don’t think there’s anything more important in my life to work on, and I don’t think there’s anything more enabling for people around the world.”

In 2019, Dorsey said he invested thousands of dollars each week to buy Bitcoins and according to a recent report, his company Block held 8,027 bitcoins in total.

Also Read: 8 investing tips by Warren Buffett you can follow in 2022

2. Cryptocurrencies do not need Buffett’s Support

Michael Saylor, CEO of software company MicroStrategy, said that the cryptocurrencies do not need ace investor Warren Buffett’s support to be widely successful and stated that he sees a bright future for a range of cryptocurrencies. His company claimed to own around US $6 billion worth of Bitcoins and he believes that dollar is the world currency and cryptos are the world reserve asset.

3. Dogecoin is the people’s crypto

Dogecoin prices surged more than 50% in February after Tesla CEO Elon Musk tweeted: “Doge”. And later tweeted: “Dogecoin is the people’s crypto” in February. According to Coindesk, Dogecoin prices jumped to US$0.05798 after the tweet.

4. You can now buy a Tesla with Bitcoin

In March again, Musk tweeted that people can buy a Tesla car with bitcoins, which pushed its prices to new highs and the prices reached US$44,200. He also revealed that he had purchased US$1.5 billion worth of bitcoin.  

But in less than two months Musk changed his mind and tweeted that Tesla will no longer accept Bitcoin as a method of payment, due to concern over the carbon footprint of bitcoin.

In June, Musk tweeted again that Tesla will start accepting bitcoin as payment method for its car when over 50% of the bitcoin network will run on clean energy to reduce the overall carbon footprint. This tweet prompted Bitcoin’s price to touch US $40,000.  

In December, Musk said that Tesla will accept dogecoin for some merchandise on test basis which led to surge in dogecoin prices by 24% to US $0.195. The company sells merchandise such as mini models of its vehicles, apparel, quad bike ‘Cyberquad’ for kids and belt buckle. The meme-based coin has seen its price to surge by 5,859% over the past one year, largely fueled by the Musk’s statements.

Also Read: 5 Altcoins Outshining Bitcoin

5. 99% of cryptocurrencies are overpriced

Barry Silbert, CEO of Digital Currency Group, revealed his bearish view on cryptocurrencies and posted on his social media handle that “99% of cryptocurrencies are overpriced”.  His company is a parent company to Genesis, CoinDesk, Foundry, Grayscale and Luno. Additionally, he is the founder and CEO of SecondMarket, which was acquired by NASDAQ.

6. Cryptocurrencies have potential to improve a lot of people’s lives

Sam Bankman-Fried, founder of Almeda Research and CEO of FTX Exchange, revealed that he believes cryptos have the potential to improve people’s lives, it just required understandable guidance from regulators to make it happen.

He added cryptocurrencies offer potential way making cross-border payments with lower fees and faster transaction time.

7. Ethereum Upgrade Sets Stage for Energy Usage Cut

Vitalik Buterin, Ethereum founder and one of the youngest crypto billionaires, said that the network is all set to switch over to proof-of-stake (POS) and cut 99% energy usage. The software is known as London Hard Fork that includes a fee reduction feature called EIP 1559, which will eliminate US $2 million of Ether in a couple of hours.  

Quotes most influential people said that rocked the crypto world this year

8. The safe haven of crypto with one huge advantage

Mark Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks, said that bitcoin has a major edge over other cryptocurrencies, and it has a great advantage as it has zero competition and has a store of value due to its algorithmic scarcity, which makes it limited in supply by design. He also said that bitcoin is a better store of value than gold.

Previously, he pitched Dogecoins as the preferred digital currency against bitcoin and also advised that a person should put minimum 10% of their portfolio into Bitcoin but then indicated that he would rather have bananas than the bitcoin.

Also read: Are cryptocurrencies a sinking ship?

9. Betting on total collapse

Microsoft founder Bill Gates said that investing in cryptocurrencies may not be a sound investment as people are buying them because of hype in the market, but not considering if the coins have any potential in future. He added you should only invest in cryptocurrency if you have more money than Elon Musk.