The prices of cryptocurrencies and the interest in crypto-related jobs are highly correlated.
This is the takeaway from data provided to CNBC by AngelList Talent, a recruitment firm focusing on startups.
The data demonstrates that as cryptocurrency prices surged last year, the number of crypto-related job openings also swelled. But this year as cryptocurrency prices fell, the number of new crypto-related job openings has been steadily declining.
On the AngelList platform, the blockchain industry attracted the interest of 40% of the top job seekers last year before starting to fall this year in March. At the moment, only around 20% of the top job seekers have listed the blockchain sector as among the top three industries they would be most interested in joining.
Blood Everywhere
Jobs website Indeed also observed a similar trend with a decline in both job seeker interest and employer interest in cryptocurrency and blockchain related jobs being noted as cryptocurrency prices fell. According to Indeed job seeker interest in crypto-related positions was highest between October 2016 and October 2017:
If you look at data from the year prior, October 2016 to October 2017, job seeker interest for roles related to bitcoin, blockchain, and cryptocurrency rose by 481.61%, while employer interest for roles related to the same terms rose 325%.
This contrasted sharply with employer interest in crypto-related roles only increasing by 25.49% between October 2017 and October 2018. During the same period job seeker interest fell by 3.06%.
Blockchain Job Offerings and Seekers Decline with Crypto Market Capitalization https://t.co/9kL66UK7oP
— CCN (@CryptoCoinsNews) November 20, 2018
Besides the falling interest in crypto-related jobs by both job seekers and employers, some blockchain startups have also begun laying off employees. Earlier this month the, blockchain development firm started by Ethereum co-founder Joseph Lubin, ConsenSys, announced that it would undertake a restructuring exercise which would result in 13% of the workforce being declared redundant.
This was revealed in a letter sent by Lubin to employees in which he dubbed the firm that would emerge from the restructuring ‘ConsenSys 2.0’:
Excited as we are about ConsenSys 2.0, our first step in this direction has been a difficult one: we are streamlining several parts of the business including ConsenSys Solutions, spokes, and hub services, leading to a 13% reduction of mesh members.
Steemit Layoffs
The situation is worse at decentralized social media firm Steemit where plans are underway to lay off 70% of the workforce. The startup cited “the weakness of the cryptocurrency market, the fiat returns on our automated selling of STEEM diminishing, and the growing costs of running full Steem nodes” as the reason for the layoffs.
It’s not all doom and gloom, however, as the largest professional networking site in the world LinkedIn recently revealed that blockchain development had emerged as the biggest growing role this year.
Images from Shutterstock.
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