Alexis Ohanian, the co-founder of Reddit, has said that digital asset investors should not be discouraged by the prolonged crypto bear market – as he thinks it has helped in significantly reducing the number of speculative traders and investors.

Ohanian, a history graduate from the University of Virginia and Coinbase investor, told Yahoo Finance:

This is the Crypto Winter, no doubt. But a friend of mine, Brian Armstrong — who’s the CEO of Coinbase — said, ‘This is the spring of crypto innovation.'

“Some Of The Smartest People” Now Working On Crypto Projects 

Ohanian explained that this means cryptocurrency prices are currently “depressed”, however most of the speculators may have finally exited the digital asset ecosystem. This, according to Ohanian is “great” because the people that are left are now are involved in “building” real-world solutions. He remarked:

They’re actually building the infrastructure that it’s going to take to really make this happen.

Ohanian also revealed:

Some of the smartest people I know in tech are still working on solving these problems. They’re building companies that are built on blockchain.

Expressing views similar to other prominent business leaders and entrepreneurs, Ohanian believes:

The hype [around cryptocurrencies and blockchain] is gone. The fervor is gone. But I think that’s a good thing for all of us who have been in this [from the technology’s early stages of development].

Investing In Coinbase Back In 2011

Ohanian also pointed out that he was a “seed investor in Coinbase back in 2011, back when it was a pipe dream of devoted engineers.” He mentioned that JPMorgan, the largest bank in the US, and other established established financial institutions are starting to enter the crypto space. According to Ohanian, the introduction of the JPMorgan coin suggests that “there is real innovation that is happening now that all the wild speculation is gone. And that’s a good thing.”

Acknowledging that the extended bear market may be tough to endure for many crypto industry participants, Ohanian recommended taking a long view when investing in digital assets. He said: .

The [prolonged bear market] is painful. But if you were investing … in [crypto] in the first place, you really should have been thinking long-term. That’s just generally good advice for any kind of investing, but especially something so nascent as crypto.

Comparing Crypto Adoption To The Growth Of The Internet

In October 2018, Ohanian, a best-selling author, had compared the current state of crypto technology to that of the growth and adoption of the internet. The Reddit co-founder had noted at that time that the present state of blockchain-based platforms is similar to how the internet was during the early 1990s. However, Ohanian had also said last year that crypto technology was improving and that the initial coin offering (ICO) craze of 2017 had gone away. He remarked (in late 2018):

Now is a good time because it's scattered all the hucksters and scenesters.