In the traditional investing world 'unicorn' is a term used past venture capitalists to describe a privately held startup valued at more than than $1 billion.

Typically these startups take strong fundamentals and oft a commencement-mover advantage that helps them apace rise in value to become prized investment opportunities for yield-seeking funds.

Some of the best-known unicorns include Elon Musk's SpaceX, a private rocket and spacecraft manufacturer with a valuation of $46 billion, and Coinbase, the largest U.Due south.-based cryptocurrency exchange with a current valuation of $eight billion.

While the world's attending has been focused on the Coronavirus pandemic, the outcome of the 2020 U.Southward. presidential election, and the recent r/Wallstreetbets social investing phenomenon, the crypto sector has quietly ascended to a total valuation of over $1.ii trillion.

Adding to this, currently there are more than 55 unicorn condition projects that take a market place cap over $ane billion.

Top xviii projects by market cap. Source: Messari

Recent Bitcoin (BTC) evangelism from the likes of Michael Saylor, Mark Cuban and Elon Musk are helping shine a spotlight on the nascent crypto industry, and with information technology comes the discerning eye of institutional investors who will quickly want to look beyond BTC to what other promising opportunities be in the space.

These projects are no longer simply focused on making cryptocurrency a global means of commutation. Some of the summit projects include smart contract platforms, decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols, privacy tokens, oracles providers and even sense of humor-oriented meme coins.

With that in mind, here are some of the top crypto unicorn projects to keep an center on as institutions brainstorm to brand their presence felt in the cryptocurrency markets.

Blue-chip projects

Bitcoin is the ultimate start-mover in the crypto space as it paved the way for the remainder to come into beingness and holds more than than 61% of the full market value with a current market cap of $843 billion.

As the longest-running concatenation possessing the strongest mining network of all proof-of-piece of work cryptocurrencies, BTC is likely to be the go-to choice for new money coming into the sector which volition take a cautious approach to commencement out with.

Percent of total market place cap. Source: CoinMarketCap

Like to how many of the current crypto faithful got involved in the space, Bitcoin will exist the "gateway coin" that introduces the concept and leads to further exploration.

Ethereum (ETH), with a electric current marketplace cap of $196 billion, is the obvious 2nd pick as it is the most-utilized smart contract platform and home to a majority of the top DeFi protocols that have surged in popularity in recent months.

Other legacy projects that take survived multiple bull-behave cycles and achieved unicorn condition include Litecoin (LTC), which has emerged as a reliable value transfer alternative to the higher fees and longer block times of BTC, and the privacy-focused Monero (XMR) and Zcash (ZEC), which paved the way in bringing anonymity to blockchain transactions.

These projects currently accept market caps of $10.5 billion, $2.75 billion and $1.07 billion respectively.

Decentralized finance takes center phase

Since early 2020, one of the principal driving forces in the growth of the cryptocurrency sector has been the emergence of decentralized finance.

Decentralized exchanges (DEX) similar Uniswap take steadily grown from being a simple exchange interface dApp to a sprawling trading platform that now averages a seven-day trading volume of $vi.72 billion, a figure that rivals volume of the top centralized exchanges.

Uniswap 7-day trading volume. Source: Uniswap

Uniswap's UNI governance token was initially airdropped to users of the interface who took a chance on the protocol while information technology was nonetheless in development, but at present the token tin be institute on all major centralized and decentralized exchanges.

The protocol likewise received venture upper-case letter backing to ensure further development. With a current marketplace cap of $5.ix billion and a token price of $nineteen.79, Uniswap is likely to exist on the watchlist for the smart money eyeing the space.

SushiSwap, the main competitor to Uniswap, has likewise accomplished unicorn status with a current valuation of $1.8 billion. The platform offers a customs-focused system that allows token holders to stake their SUSHI to participate in governance as well as earn passive income from trading fees generated by the protocol.

Full value locked in DeFi. Source: Defi Pulse

While DEXs helped facilitate the growth of DeFi, lending protocols have emerged as the elevation draw for total value locked (TVL) and higher token values.

Maker (MKR), AAVE and Compound (COMP) are the leading platforms when measured by the total value locked (TVL) in the protocol. Currently in that location is a combined $15.63 billion in value deposited in smart contracts that interact with the protocols and their market caps range from $two.ane billion to $v.98 billion.

In addition to the high yield opportunities offered by staking protocols, retail investors are also attracted to the governance features that requite token holders a say in the hereafter evolution of the protocol. These DeFi darlings are probable to pique the interest of long term capital.

Ethereum congestion drives smart contract innovation

Ethereum's authorisation in DeFi has proven to exist a double-edged sword every bit increasing network congestion resulted in an untenable surge in gas fees.

Average Ethereum gas price. Source: Etherscan

The recent record-high gas fees have opened the door for other smart contract platforms to fill the need for layer-two options, likewise every bit highlighting the demand for oracle providers that can communicate information securely beyond platforms.

Promising smart contract platforms that have emerged include Polkadot (DOT) and its sis chain Kusama (KSM), which introduce interoperability with Ethereum and other top blockchains equally the solution to the current siloed nature of split networks.

DOT's marketplace cap has risen to $xviii.8 billion as its prominence continues to grow and Kusama is new to the unicorn guild as its market cap merely surpassed the $ane billion mark for the starting time time on Feb. half dozen.

Interestingly, Cardano (ADA), one of the 2017 ICO-era projects, has also started gaining momentum in recent weeks following the improver of smart contracts to the protocol and hints of future DeFi related endeavors.

Currently, Cardano's market cap is $19.8 billion and the integration of DeFi could aid propel its value college as ADA has yet to tap into the liquidity offered on decentralized exchanges.

Theta captured the first-mover advantage when it comes to blockchain-based video streaming and the project has recently added smart contract functionality, the ability to create non-fungible tokens, and they launched the Thetaswap DEX on Feb. 4.

Oracles join the party

As more participants enter the crypto space and new blockchains sally to fit specific niches, communication between divide networks will become essential to the overall health and continued growth of the sector.

This is where oracle projects come up in to offer reliable, secure means to transfer data.

Top oracle projects. Source: CoinGecko

Chainlink (LINK) is the superlative oracle project in terms of protocol integrations and its valuation. LINK currently has a $10.37 billion market place cap and the project'south recent integration with Kraken exchange is expected to add further value to the project.

Meanwhile, upstarts like UMA and The Graph (GRT) take merely recently achieved unicorn condition every bit the 2021 balderdash market place heats up. Both projects take developed novel ways to track, record and transmit data and they have reached valuations of $ane.7 billion and $1.one billion.

GRT has been peculiarly active in the growth department, announcing multiple partnerships and upcoming integrations including bridges to DOT and Binance Money (BNB).

The 'unicorn' herd will expand

Bitcoin burst onto the financial scene more than twelve years ago and has steadily forged a path to prominence that governments and the global financial organization can no longer ignore.

Now that institutions are finally beginning to dip their toes into BTC and ETH, it's time to take an fifty-fifty closer look at what the emerging blockchain ecosystem has to offer.

The herd of unicorns is likely to expand and considering that the decentralized finance sector is all the same in a very early growth phase, there's enough of value to exist found in these unicorn projects.

The views and opinions expressed hither are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cointelegraph.com. Every investment and trading move involves risk, yous should conduct your ain enquiry when making a conclusion.