To launch this year’s World Economic Forum gathering in Davos, Switzerland, Klaus Schwab warned: “People are revolting against the economic ‘elites’ they believe have betrayed them, and our efforts to keep global warming limited to 1.5°C are falling dangerously short.” These were striking words to hear from the founder and executive chairman of the World Economic Forum.

2020 marks the 50th anniversary of the Davos gathering, and this year brought what felt like a clear shift in tone. Rather than self-congratulation, the more tempered atmosphere of the event indicated how much everyone present felt the urgency of managing the Earth and our resources better and more sustainably, making policies and economies more inclusive, while addressing the mounting sense of anger and mistrust fomenting in many parts of the world. In other words: the need to repair and rebuild trust and construct better systems on which to conduct our activities and steward our planet was a salient theme throughout the proceedings.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, blockchain was more central at this year’s summit than ever before — and as an integrative thread across core themes rather than in isolation. Fittingly, number of major blockchain-related announcements emerged over the course of the week. Most notably was Christopher Giancarlo, former chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), announcing an organization to explore the framework and potential of a digital US dollar. He stated that current USD users are “underserved by an analogue currency in a digital world.”

Read all of Joe’s update on stablecoins and central bank digital currencies at Davos 2020 on the ConsenSys Blog.