The year 2024 in crypto was a damn wild ride. The only way to cover it all is to use the opening refrain from Charles Dickens' novel A Tale of Two Cities.  

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair."

Here we look to the US, because of its high trading volumes and its wildly rich corporations who hold the biggest institutional bags of crypto. The USA is the daddy when it comes to crypto lore. And a lot of crypto shiz went down in the US.

It was the year of the sliding door. 

If the Democrats had won, the outlook for crypto would have been much less sunny. They went in on a platform of that also, confusingly, wasn’t entirely clear. 

Of course, Trump went in on a , saying he would be a pro-crypto president. And that’s what the crypto bros and the crypto sisters wanted to hear. And they seemed to vote that way. All of them.

Since the US elected a pro-crypto President, a lot of stuff has exploded across the crypto realm.  So let’s start our list with this pivotal shift in the crypto landscape. 

1. Pro-crypto President Trump gets elected

With Donald Trump's presidency, there was a notable shift towards pro-crypto policies. He vocally the idea of cryptocurrency being "made in the USA" and even discussed the potential of creating a , signalling a new era of governmental backing for digital assets.

2. SEC Chair Gary Gensler resigns

The of Gary Gensler from the SEC was met with celebration in the crypto community due to his on crypto regulations. This event potentially paved the way for a more crypto-friendly regulatory environment. Not a soul in crypto was sad about this. Allegedly. Bye Gazza. Don’t be coming back now.

3. Bitcoin Halving

The halving event in April 2024 reduced the reward for mining new blocks from 6.25 BTC to 3.125 BTC. In other words, some miners don’t feel the reward for mining Bitcoin is worth the effort and bow out of the race. This means that there is less new Bitcoin entering circulation. Usually, the year after the Bitcoin Halving sees the price of Bitcoin. But not always. 

In 2024, the price of Bitcoin did jump after the halving, making the average crypto bro and sis delighted with themselves. 

4. Bitcoin's All-Time High

The above three events were the right ingredients to bake into a moon cake. The price of Bitcoin broke through the on December 5, 2024. 

And there’s more good news to come. Bitcoin not only surpassed the symbolic US$100K barrier, fuelling market activity and investor enthusiasm, it went higher again. BTC price hit on December 17, 2024. 

While it has come back down to US$100K at the time of writing (Dec 19), the price surge has shown crypto enthusiasts that this isn’t a little hobby on the side for a lot of people anymore. Bitcoin has burst into the financial world and there is no going back. The reason why we speak about Bitcoin price as a gauge of all cryptos is that altcoin prices the Bitcoin price fairly closely.

5. XRP price surge

XRP experienced a significant price surge in December of 2024, on December 2, to become the world’s third-largest crypto. At the time of writing, Tether has flipped back on top again, however early investors in XRP who HODLed are still delighted with themselves as the price (at the time of writing) has hovered around US$2.34.

A lot of the XRP price movement has been around Gensler’s exit. He was thought of as the arch nemesis of XRP, indulging in legal battles (which he tended to lose). Again: Bye Gazza. Please retire somewhere far, faaaar away.

6. Increased institutional adoption

2024 saw the big fish move in on crypto. While companies like Microstrategy and Tesla have been for a while, big investment houses like Blackrock sliced off a large part of the Bitcoin pie for themselves. 

The SEC's of spot Bitcoin and Ether ETFs was a landmark moment for mainstream acceptance, making it easier for investment houses to flog crypto products to their customers. All the instututions had to do was own the digital asset first. So they bought up big. 

Along the same lines, further solidified the global trend of institutional crypto adoption. Yep, these sharks are circling “the people’s money”. And they are eating them up good.

7. Germany's unfortunate BTC Sale

Germany made headlines by selling a large portion of Bitcoin at a less-than-ideal time, potentially missing out on future gains as the market continued to rise. In fact, they potentially lost in profits had they made a different selling decision. That potential loss hits different now that Germany is facing . Face palm. Hard. 

8. El Salvador's Bitcoin investment pays off

President Nayib Bukele's decision to invest in Bitcoin for El Salvador, with the country reaping substantial profits as the cryptocurrency's value soared. 

Bukele has faced razor-sharp criticism over the years for making Bitcoin legal tender in the country. And as the bear market hit in 2022, he faced as his country’s hoard of BTC sank in value. 

But as the bull market kicked in this year, he’s a hero again. It’s a volatile ride in crypto, and every crypto sis or bro feels this hard. One minute you are a weird outlier, and next minute you have a lambo. Bukele, we feel you, man.

9. Crypto adoption outpaces internet growth

A new highlighted that crypto adoption was growing faster than the internet did in its early days, indicating a rapid mainstream integration of digital currencies. Crypto enthusiasts knew that this would happen, so we are being all smug, can’t stop won’t stop. 

10. Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) sentencing

Sam Bankman-Fried, crypto douchebag at large, once the CEO of FTX, was to 25 years in prison for his role in the collapse of his crypto exchange FTX. 

TLDR: This guy stole crypto from his customers to plug financial holes in another one of his companies that was thanks to his girlfriend’s absolutely terrible trades.

Hopefully this is a signal flare that the days of the crypto wild west are over, and crypto exchanges are in. 

Here’s to an amazing 2025, sailing the choppy crypto high seas! 

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