The global financial system is the ‘net new buyers’ this cycle — Chainlink founder
In a recent interview, Chainlink founder Sergey Nazarov stated that the current cryptocurrency market cycle is unique due to the sheer amount of new types of investors entering the market, which may fast-track the adoption of real-world asset tokenization quicker than the industry initially anticipated.
Speaking to Bloomberg on Feb. 28, Nazarov emphasized that the recent participants in the crypto market extend beyond retail customers who respond to mainstream media coverage of crypto price fluctuations. He explained that the new buyers come from all sectors of the global financial system:
In October 2023, Cointelegraph reported that the United States government is one of the largest Bitcoin 
BTCUSD holders, with over 200,000 BTC. At the time of publication, this is worth approximately $12.4 billion.
Nazarov further explained the recently approved Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) products are just the beginning of facilitating easier access for funds to enter the market.
“The Bitcoin ETF is just an initial offering that allows the global financial system to have basic investment rails and payment rails toward Bitcoin within structures that they find comfortable for them,” he stated.
Meanwhile, Nazarov forecasts that real-world asset tokenization will be the next major trend in the crypto market.
“The next stage is asset tokenization where banks see all these inflows into ETFs and then they make assets to compete with the ETFs or to get some of that capital,” he declared.
Since the approval of Bitcoin ETFs on Jan. 10, there has been a surge in the influx of funds into the crypto market.
On Feb. 26, Cointelegraph reported that crypto investment products saw inflows totaling $598 million from institutional Bitcoin investment products over the previous seven days.
Pav Hundal, lead Analyst for Australian crypto exchange Swyftx, told Cointelegraph that the recent strength in memecoin prices was driven by the communities supporting the projects.
He also emphasized he will be keeping a close eye on an upcoming upgrade to Shiba Inu’s (SHIB) network.
“We expected Shib and Doge to run quickly due to the sheer size and conviction of their communities. But we’re also closely watching the impact of forthcoming upgrades to Shib’s mainnet, which is going to start burning tokens on transactions,” he stated.