The Token2049 conference is underway, Pantera CEO said he is optimistic about DeFi, Web3 and NFT

Pantera CEO Dan Morehead highlighted the potential growth and value of decentralized finance (DeFi), Web3, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and metaverse applications in his opening keynote address at Token2049 in Singapore.

Thousands of attendees gathered at the Marina Bay Sands Convention Center in Singapore on Wednesday to kick off a two-day conference featuring prominent speakers from the cryptocurrency and blockchain ecosystem.

Pantera is a blockchain-focused investment fund with $4.5 billion in assets under management. Pantera said it continues to see value in emerging encryption use cases.

Morehead likened it to the early 2000s, when emerging tech companies such as Amazon, Apple and Google began attracting significant investment after years of Microsoft dominating the stock market.

Morehead emphasized that while Bitcoin and Ethereum have dominated investors’ cryptocurrency portfolios over the past decade, he believes that new projects and use cases can promise greater returns on investment:

“We’re almost at the point where half of the entire market isn’t in the two major blockchains. I’m still very bullish on Bitcoin and Ethereum, but I just think those projects will do better and someone should have they."

According to Morehead, DeFi, Web3, NFT and Metaverse projects are the most promising. The Pantera CEO also pondered on the state of DeFi. DeFi has had a rough few months following the collapse of Terra and the contagion of the now-defunct lending firm.

Morehead said DeFi’s current market capitalization of $20 billion, compared to the traditional financial system’s $3 trillion market capitalization, means the industry has plenty of room to grow.

The CEO is also bullish on Web3 because of its focus on putting users in control of their own data and platforms owned or governed by communities rather than centralized entities.

“The internet as it exists is about extracting value from you. Big tech companies have some sketchy governance issues too. I’m looking forward to a world where people create and add value and all these networks actually own their own data.”

Morehead went so far as to describe Web3 as the most inevitable deal he’s ever seen, highlighting the potential for decentralized versions of existing projects to hand value back to creators and users.

The Pantera CEO concluded his presentation by emphasizing that the current cryptocurrency market cycle is different from previous years given the strong fundamentals, noting that around 200 million people use blockchain-based platforms and increased to 1 billion people.