Digital Trust: Ethereum's 10th Anniversary and the New Era of Finance

As Ethereum celebrates its tenth anniversary, a detailed report outlines its investment case and emerging technology category as "trust software." This infrastructure enables trust to be encoded digitally, greatly enhancing the efficiency of the global financial system.

Research shows that Ethereum has become the dominant blockchain platform, supporting over 50% of non-Bitcoin digital assets, including 60% of stablecoins, 60% of decentralized finance capital, and 80% of tokenized "real-world assets".

Trust software upgrades the traditional human verification and guarantees to an algorithm-generated concept of digital trust. For a long time, human civilization has relied on various forms of trust infrastructure, from kinship to large institutions. While facilitating cooperation and economic growth, it comes at a high cost, with expenditures related to trust exceeding $90 trillion annually.

Ethereum endows data with the essential qualities of trust through an algorithmic process: validity and finality. It achieves trust at nearly zero marginal cost, significantly enhancing the speed, cost, security, and scale of financial transaction verification.

Investors are gradually realizing that ETH is not only the "second largest cryptocurrency", but also represents the rapid growth of stablecoins and other tokenized assets. With the emergence of relevant legislative proposals, this wave of innovation will continue to develop. Ethereum is increasingly being seen as a platform driving the future global economy.

Ethereum demonstrates outstanding performance in terms of security, assurance, and resilience:

1. Economic Security: Over $100 billion in staked capital and more than 1 million validators provide strong defenses.
2. Network effects: having the deepest liquidity, the most developers, and the richest application ecosystem.
3. Adaptability and Continuous Upgrades: Demonstrating resilience and improvement capabilities through complex upgrades, with no downtime.
4. Global neutrality and decentralization: Over 1 million validation nodes are spread across more than 80 countries/regions.
5. Institutional Verification and Adoption: Globally renowned institutions are beginning to utilize Ethereum for various financial activities.

Despite the maturity of the technology, the economic potential of Ethereum is still in its early stages. The total market capitalization of cryptocurrencies accounts for only 0.3% of global wealth, and tokenized securities remain a small part of the capital markets. However, increasingly clear regulations are accelerating its adoption.

The integration of artificial intelligence and blockchain has increased the demand for trustless infrastructure. Ethereum is the only infrastructure that is ready for economic environments that require algorithmic mutual trust.

For institutions, holding ETH means owning the infrastructure of the digital economy at a low price. ETH can be used to pay for network transactions, serve as a store of value, and generate cash flow through staking. It combines the characteristics of commodities, currencies, and capital assets, making it a unique and attractive asset.

The trust machine has been built and is continuously operating, self-improving, and creating more value. The key lies in whether one believes in the digitalization of trust. If you believe, then the reasons for investing in a part of the future global economic foundation are self-evident.