We have talked a lot about markets and macro topics lately – but mostly on a relatively short-term basis. In today’s video, we’ll take a closer look at how the economy is changing in front of our eyes, how we should position and why soon, the last good investing opportunities of our lifetimes might arise… Strap in!

Falling From a Sugar High

• The last few years have undoubtedly been crazy – with more than just one “black swan event”. The Covid crisis led to an almost complete standstill of the global economy. Instead of letting the economy and markets run their natural cyclical course, governments and central banks decided to “paper over” the cracks with unprecented amounts of money – not without consequences: First monetary (aka asset) and now “real” inflation have led to massive dislocations across the economy and asset markets.

• Now, in 2022 we witness the dreadful consequences of these unsustainable actions: Inflation is rampant, and the Fed’s reactionary force has led asset markets crashing – effectively squeezing both the lower and upper end of society.

• The only winning strategy of 2022 so far? Not fighting the Fed. While this meant holding assets in times of monetary easing, it’s the opposite during tightening periods: Holding US dollars, a strategy which mostly hasn’t worked out in past decades – and likely won’t in the long-term – has been the “trade of the year” so far.

• On the bright side, this “dollar squeeze” will lead to tremendous buying opportunities – maybe the last for a long time! Once the massive dollar uptrend reverses, we can expect asset prices to rise A LOT. In this article, we’ll lay out why now is the time to pay attention because soon, the time to make generational wealth might be running out…

Recessions Are Common Events – Is This One Different?

• While the theme of 2021 was the recovery from the pandemic, in 2022, the global economy has been facing major headwinds: From the global inflation and energy crisis to deepening geopolitical tensions and the implosion of the Chinese economy and real estate market, there is no shortage of issues. While the data will tell if we are already in a recession or will face one next year, fact is, that a global recession seems almost inevitable at this point.

• So, knowing that some serious economic pain probably still lies ahead, how can we prepare and set ourselves up for growth during these unpleasant times? First of all, it’s important to know that recessions are not rare events. In fact, they have happened on a regular basis throughout history and are a normal part of economic and financial growth. You can see in the graphic below that recessions pretty much always align with stock market crashes. 

• Consequentially, recessions are ripe with opportunity. In the graphic below, you can see how stocks performed during, before, and after a recession. In almost all cases, buying during a recession leads to outsized returns! The larger the recession, the greater the returns, but also the riskier and harder it is to time.

• What is the conclusion here? Big buying opportunities are likely still awaiting us, and we want to be ready to take advantage of them. How can we do that? First of all, by not gambling away our money during this bear market – capital preservation is key. Secondly, it’s important to have enough dry powder and free cash low (aka an income) to be ready to deploy in the markets when the time is up… Patience and emotionless execution will set apart winners from losers in this unprecedented crisis.

The Last Chance for Generational Wealth Could Be Upon Us

• Now that we have shown that recessions are frequent and generally serve as great buying opportunities let's address why this upcoming recession could be different (dangerous words I know) and be the last chance to make generational wealth for a long time.

• First of all, we have to look at a few charts. Everything starts in the year 1971 when Richard Nixon removed the US Dollar from the gold standard. As you can see, we have had unprecedented monetary and consumer price inflation ever since.

• The value of assets has skyrocketed in comparison to incomes, making real estate and most assets almost unattainable for the average person.

• Debt as a percentage of GDP has skyrocketed, making living off debt the new standard and increasing even larger difficulties for the average joe to attain assets.

• Looking at these charts, it becomes clear: Acquiring and holding assets has been the ONLY viable way to protect oneself from inflation and create generational wealth. While it would have been enough just to enter the market at some point in the past decades and hold for a long enough period, riding (and exiting) asset bubbles like the dotcom or crypto manias has been a fast way to outsized returns. 

• In order to understand why soon may be the last good time to acquire assets at fair valuations, we have to look at the longer-term macro outlook:

  • Currently, central banks are on a mission to fight inflation and strengthen their fiat currencies – a mid-term trend that has put risk assets under tremendous pressure year-to-date. This leads to the effect of money flowing out of assets and into strong currencies like the US Dollar. 

• Looking at historical charts, however, we know that such episodes of monetary tightening have been RARE and SHORT in the past decades. Looking at the record-high debt levels of both states and consumers, we know that this monetary tightening cannot go on forever. In fact, our whole economic model is based on creating more debt and stimulating growth by injecting more money into the system. Contracting economies are a NO-GO in the Western world because prosperity and societal peace depend on growth. The question is just: When will they start printing again?

• In order to achieve the desired effect, central banks had to inject a significantly larger quantity of money into the system after every crisis. At some point, this fiat-based monetary system will likely become to iondebted and reach a breaking point. We have already seen cracks in recent months: Many countries have started to move away from the US Dollar and into hard assets such as gold and commodities – China being a leader at this front. This trend will only accelerate in the years to come. 

• Also, in order to prevent the debt-based system from blowing up, it’s probable that the US will at some point have to resort to yield curve control – a mechanism that artificially prevents yields from rising and thus alleviates the debt burden on the economy. There is one sacrificial lamb with YCC, however: the currency. Just look at how the Japanese Yen has crashed year-to-date because the Bank of Japan artificially suppressed its bond yields. The US Dollar could face the same fate at some point against hard assets…

  

• Now comes the timing aspect: Once the next Fed pivot actually becomes reality, things could shift extremely FAST! People will pile into assets and out of fiat currencies at a record pace. Already today, we see rampant FOMO when central banks even signal the slightest possibility of reversing to easing at some point ... The markets have been conditioned to “buying the dip” and trying to front-run any potential pivot. The fact that this market anticipation could be premature and a fakeout makes this game so hard!

• However, history has shown that markets rarely bottom before an ACTUAL pivot by central banks and/or bottoming of the economy. Without monetary stimulus or economic growth, the natural direction for asset prices is down… Thus, we might still see the biggest buying opportunities still lying ahead of us.

• Once a “Fed pivot” actually happens, the trust in fiat currencies could continue to erode rapidly (as it has in the past decades) due to the fact that everyone knows that buying assets has been the only viable strategy. This could lead to prices of hard assets rising quickly, leaving cashholders on the sidelines. The big task will be to anticipate this shift! Therefore: All eyes on inflation and growth data in the coming months and how Fed speakers react to it in order to get a signal for our next big play!

• Why should you be concerned that soon the time for generational investing gains could be over? Because the elite of this world doesn’t want you to be free and rich! As the WEF stated as part of their “Great Reset” agenda: “You will own nothing and you will be happy.” This threat of reduced property rights and redistribution of wealth will hurt the everyday person’s ability to “make it”. Therefore, we have to make our next big plays before it’s too late…

• There is one more reason why this recession might offer the last good opportunity to buy crypto: Crypto has gone through several cycles and “mini-bubbles.” As with every nascent technology and asset class, this is completely normal, but with time, as the space matures, the principle of diminishing return sets in. While it might signal good things when it comes to adoption, as an investor, the biggest opportunity lies in the early stages of an asset class. Thus, the next cycle could be one of the last ones to really offer significant gains to investors.

Yes, it’s finally happening: Despite years of delays and memes like the one below becoming routine, Ethereum is approaching a critical milestone: The Merge! In this article, we’ll shed light on this crucial event and what Ethereum’s transition from Proof-of-Work (PoW) to Proof-of-Stake (PoS) means for ETH and the broader crypto space.

Only a Few Weeks Until the Merge?

• Yes, we have been talking about the Merge for quite a while on this channel – but expectations of an imminent launch have been pushed out time after time again. Is this time different? It certainly seems so since tomorrow the last testnet Merge is scheduled to occur before the real Merge comes next.

• If you need a reminder of what the Merge is, check out this great summary by Bankless. 

The Bull Case

• If you checked Crypto Twitter recently, you probably didn’t miss the bullish hopium spread by ETH supporters on a daily basis. In short, this meme does a good job summarizing the current sentiment:

• To further promote the bull case for ETH, let’s give the word to a few of Ethereum’s biggest advocates (or “ETH maxis” in other words 😉):

• Jokes aside, it’s undoubtedly true that many people still have no idea what the Merge is and what a dramatic impact it will likely have on ETH as an asset.

• While not anyone in the crypto community might agree, the fact that Ethereum will transition to a much more energy-efficient consensus mechanism will significantly impact Ethereum’s public perception as an “ESG-compliant” asset – which could prove to be an advantage over BTC when it comes to regulation and institutional investing.

• Besides the energy efficiency narrative, Ethereum believers often connect the Merge with a concept called the “Triple Halvening.” Sounds bullish, right? Read the thread below to get an in-depth explanation of what the “Triple Halvening” is and how it might affect the ETH price after the Merge.

The Bear Case

• While the Merge is a critical milestone for Ethereum and the broader crypto space, it will NOT offer a solution to all of Ethereum’s problems – notably the scaling issues plaguing the L1 blockchain. The Merge “only” marks the transition of Ethereum’s consensus mechanism from PoW to PoS.

• Besides the fact that the Merge could go wrong (compare it to a space shuttle having its engines replaced mid-air), there are other significant risk factors – mostly of economic and systemic nature. Bankless does a great job summarizing these risks, and the potential chaos around the ETH Merge in their latest newsletter. The tldr is:

  • During the Merge, the Ethereum blockchain will be “hard forked” into two chains: the PoW and the PoS chain. Initially, this can potentially lead to quite a bit of chaos in DeFi land since stablecoins and liquid staking tokens (stETH, rETH, etc.) will fall to 0 on the PoW chain (they can’t be redeemed anymore). This will lead to a potentially considerable amount of volatility, liquidity movement, and MEV (Minter Extractable Value). Read more in this article to find out more about the potential chaos surrounding the Merge.

• It’s important to remember that the Merge has a drastic impact on a key player in the Ethereum ecosystem: miners. Overnight their business model will drastically change…

How to Position Around the Merge

• Has the Merge been priced in by the recent pump, or is there more juice in the tank? Clearly, ETH has outperformed BTC in recent weeks…

• Who knows what the short term will bring, but what is clear is that traders are making big bets right now. If you want to gamble on a short-term pump (or dump after the Merge), be careful not to burn your hands… Avoid leverage and for a more hands-off approach, accumulate ETH during dips and hold it for the long term. If the Merge goes as planned, it should certainly have a BIG impact on Ethereum’s tokenomics and positively influence the ETH price in the long run.

• A possible short-term scenario could be: Run up until a few days/weeks before the Merge, then profit taking and derisking. If the Merge goes through smoothly, there could be more bullish price action (similar to BTC’s halvings which mostly show their bullish tokenomics effect after the fact).

• Many traders fear the Merge as a “sell the news” event. While this might certainly hold true, the FUD that ETH stakers will dump all their ETH right after the Merge is undoubtedly not factual. In fact, staked ETH will not be unlocked until at least 6-12 months after the Merge – and even then, a sudden drop is unlikely due to an unstaking queue.

• Have been and will there be other ways to “play the Merge” besides holding ETH? Indeed – in recent weeks, tokens related to the Ethereum ecosystem benefitted from the broader market bounce remarkably.

• However, if you want to trade altcoins right now, be aware that this small wave of bullishness could end as quickly as it began as we find ourselves in the possible later innings of a macro bear market rally. And no, the Merge will not be enough of a bullish catalyst to withstand a potentially broader market crash…

You might ask yourself, why talk about real estate when this channel has been all about crypto and the digital economy? The reason is simple: Crypto is not a niche asset class anymore that only tech nerds and speculators care about – in the last few years, it has turned into a legitimate asset class, respected and followed closely by investors and “macro experts.” And while crypto is a great “macro indicator” for risk on and off environments, it is also crucial that crypto investors understand the macro environment and how it moves the prices of our precious digital assets.

Thus, today we will look at an asset class of paramount importance to global financial stability: real estate. In fact, real estate is by far the most significant asset class, and every hiccup in housing has serious ripple effects throughout the economy and financial markets. Let’s jump in and look at what a historic and precarious position the real estate market is finding itself in currently and why it matters for crypto.

Real Estate: A Global Asset Bubble of Epic Proportions

• As seen in the graphic below, real estate is the largest asset class in the world (absolute numbers are hard to gauge, and there are different methodologies, but the relative market cap comparison says it all). 

• Spurred by monetary debasement and asset inflation, global real estate has turned into a massive asset bubble (see the world’s biggest real estate bubbles below).

Has the Housing Crash Started?

• Certainly, we all remember the headlines earlier this year when Evergrande and other large Chinese real estate developers were on the brink of collapse – spreading fear of global contagion in financial markets. While things have been somewhat contained, the Chinese real estate collapse has had BIG implications for the world economy. If China sneezes, the world gets a cold... 

• It’s important to be aware that China has been leading the world in many aspects in recent months and years: They have been the first to be hit by Covid, and the Chinese economy has been in a recession for months already while the West is still teetering on the edge of a recession. It’s only a question of time until both a recession and housing correction become a reality in the US and Europe.

• In fact, there are many signs that the real estate market in the US is slowing at an unprecedented speed.

• No matter if you call it a crash, correction or downturn, the real estate market is going through a sharp slowdown.

• Now that we know that real estate is entering a “corrective phase,” should we worry about an 08-style housing crash? The answer is likely no, mainly for one reason: While before 2008, many homeowners had bad credit scores with subprime mortgages AND relied on variable rates, today, average credit scores are much higher, and fixed yields have overtaken variable yields. This means that while we could experience a 10, 20, or even 30% correction in average home prices, it’s unlikely that we will see a full-on housing crash.

• One factor that speaks for a sharper housing correction is the fact that consumer sentiment is already at record lows while housing prices are still printing all-time highs. Once prices drop, bad consumer sentiment could exacerbate panic-selling. Many Americans have their wealth tied up in real estate and don’t want to see their home values drop (after their stock and crypto portfolios have already declined materially this year).

• Of course, in every crisis there lies opportunity, and a housing crash (or correction) will be a much longed-for opportunity for Millenials who have been priced out of the real estate market in recent years. Will they get the price discounts they desire, or will Blackstone and Co. scoop up (see Tweet below) all discounted properties and leave Millenials waiting for lower prices again?

What This Means for Crypto

• As we stated in the beginning, real estate is the largest and structurally most crucial asset class, with many Americans having most of their net worth being their house (and many taking out loans against it). Therefore, a housing crash or correction should significantly impact both investing and spending behavior. If people feel that their net worth is declining, they will spend less – thus hurting the economy and, subsequently, stocks. 

• In addition, homeowners will likely not be willing to make risky investment decisions, which could have big implications for the crypto market. A crypto bull market is only possible if we see new money enter the space, and a slowing housing market could be a significant headwind. Therefore, patience will be required for crypto bulls. At the same time, macro factors like a real estate correction could lead to excellent buying opportunities in crypto.

• On the bright side, crypto and stocks – while being hit hard in the first half of 2022 – could recover BEFORE we see a low in the housing market. Housing prices tend to lag equities and economic drivers by 12 months. This means we could witness the lows of crypto and equities while real estate continues its downturn.

• Interestingly, JPMorgan strategists have recently stated that crypto has usurped real estate as their “preferred alternative asset class” and that the recent liquidation-induced market crash offered a "good entry point" for longer-term investors.

If you made it through this weekend well and alive, congrats, you survived one of the most brutal crashes in crypto history! Yes, we know crypto can be volatile and that 20% down or updays are nothing out of the ordinary. However, after 11 red weekly candles out of the last 12, probably not many – even the biggest bears – would have expected the vicious price action we witnessed in the past days. 

When Bitcoin broke its 2017 highs of 20k decisively and crashed down to the mid-17ks, probably quite a few crypto holders had a sinking feeling in their stomachs. While BTC bounced back yesterday, we still find ourselves struggling with the infamous 20k level today… Will it hold or not? What has caused this massive crypto crash, and what does it mean for the outlook of this asset class? Let’s dive in.

What This Bear Market Has Taught Us So Far

• The more and more 2022 progresses, the more we had to learn a few (unfortunate) facts: 

  • Crypto has in no way been uncorrelated from stocks and other risk assets. In fact, crypto has had a record-high correlation with stocks during this market downturn (see chart below). Crypto has practically performed like leveraged tech stocks.

  • Bitcoin has failed to act as an inflation hedge, and with an over 70 % price decline, its “store of value” and “digital gold” narrative has taken a serious blow.

  • While crypto has been hit hard, it doesn’t have to take all the blame: Equities – especially tech stocks – had to take an equally large haircut, pointing to the fact that we are witnessing a powerful risk-off period that affects all risk asset. In 2022 so far, cash has been king!

A House of Cards – Built on Greed and Leverage

• Now, let’s address a key question that probably occupies the minds of many crypto holders: What has caused this vicious crash we had to endure? There are a few explanations:

  • We find ourselves in the middle of a historic macro storm that has sent all risk assets crashing down. With crypto being a nascent asset class that never had to go through a major global recession or financial crisis (except for the Covid flash crash which was short-lived and quickly resolved with massive money printing) it’s no surprise that crypto is deflating so much when the S&P 500 is down 20% and the NASDAQ over 30%... We will look again at the macro outlook later in this article.

  

  

  • The second big reason why we are witnessing such coordinated selling is the massive institutionalization of crypto. While everyone was cheering for institutional crypto adoption in 2020, the large influx of traditional investors now comes back to roost because with crypto being perceived as the riskiest asset class, BTC, ETH, and co are the first assets to be liquidated from institutional books. Stocks crash 10 %? Now funds have to sell other assets to cover margin calls and reduce portfolio risk. This self-perpetuating mechanism has led to the relentless selling in recent weeks. 

  • Now onto the big culprit for the massive price declines (not only but especially impactful in crypto): Leverage and bad risk management. Without the massive build-up of leverage through the bull market, we would likely have seen more gradual price declines. While this time, it’s not only leveraged traders on Bybit and other leveraged exchanges who caused the crash (they already got wiped out at higher levels), we witnessed massive liquidations from VCs and crypto funds. The blow-up of 3 Arrows Capital has impressively demonstrated what horrific consequences over conviction and a lack of risk management can have on the crypto market. And when it strikes such a large and systemically important player like 3AC, the ripple effects are felt throughout the whole crypto ecosystem…

In the Short-Term: Has Enough Damage Been Done?

• Assessing the damage is one thing but since we can’t change the past, let’s now look at what the future may hold. After all, it’s times like these that are ripe with risks and opportunities and the decisions you are taking now could likely shape your financial future!

• After the last days’ brutal price action one has to think that enough damage has been done and that we are in for some form of relief bounce – especially given the massively negative funding fees on exchanges (see below). After all, we witnessed some of the purest forms of capitulation and forced selling. At the same time, sentiment is hovering at record-low levels. Of course, we can’t take past price action and sentiment as a guarantee for what’s coming next but a bounce is certainly a “risk” everyone should have in their short-term playbook. 

• Another reason why we could see a bounce in the near future is that equities find themselves at record oversold levels after last week’s selloff. This doesn’t mean that we can’t see further red days if bad news comes out (of which we expect quite a bit in the weeks ahead) but that the natural direction for price in the short term might be up.

• What could lead to further downside in the short term? Well, either it’s a continued stock market crash and/or further forced selling and ripple effects caused by the blow-up of 3AC and possibly other actors we don’t know of yet. Forced selling from insolvent funds can take time with “bodies floating to the surface” weeks after the initial dominoes fell.

The Mid-Term Outlook Remains Difficult

• There is a small probability that the massive liquidations and blow-ups of the last days have forced prices so low that we won't see lower lows anytime soon. However, that doesn’t mean that the bear market grind will end shortly. The last weeks’ price drops and scandals in crypto land have shattered a LOT of confidence which will take a long time to rebuild it.

• While in the short-term (meaning from a few days to several weeks) we could expect some mean reversion of prices to the upside, the fact is that nothing has changed the bigger macro picture: Inflation is expected to remain at record high levels throughout the summer which means that central banks will remain engaged in monetary tightening. QT and massively tighter financial conditions will bring the economy down to its knees and with it risk assets (which can bottom earlier though). While a lot of fear has certainly been priced in in the short term, this doesn’t mean ALL adverse news can be anticipated by markets. 

• According to macro analyst Darius Dale (who has nailed this bear market so far with his predictions), the next big shoe to drop could be an earnings recession which will likely be priced in by markets in July and August (Q2 earnings season starts in 2-3 weeks).

• While bad earnings are very bad for stock markets, there are more storm clouds brewing that will affect all markets. With mortgage rates having risen incredibly fast in the past few months and the middle class being “squeezed” by record-high inflation, a real estate crisis is in the making. With real estate being even more important than stocks when it comes to the “wealth effect”, a deflation of the housing bubble could have severe consequences for the whole economy and risk appetite of investors. 

• Will crypto be able to bottom while the real economy and asset markets continue to tank? While there is a slim probability that institutional capital will be “washed out” and crypto can become an uncorrelated asset class of “diamond-handed hodlers” again, the chances for people plowing money into crypto during a global recession are extremely low.

• While we find ourselves in an unprecedented environment, comparing this year’s price action with the bust of the dot-com bubble in 2000, we see some interesting similarities. If this past fractal holds true we could be in the late stages of the bear market today (not at the lows though). Don’t let a potential short-term bounce make you believe the next bull market has started!

Long-Term: Nothing Has Changed

• After chewing through the grim past and mid-term future, let’s now focus on the more positive perspective. After all, the long-term outlook for crypto is still bright as ever with the past months clearly demonstrating the flaws of today’s financial system. Global central banks have created a “casino” that forces everyday people to gamble away their income and retirement savings. In the current environment, average people can only lose: Saving cash in your bank account? You got screwed by inflation. Being fully invested? You just took a 20+% hit to your net worth… The need for an alternative system has never been bigger!

• While crypto prices haven’t been spared from the Fed’s manipulative force (by first printing and now removing liquidity), crypto’s original vision clearly represents the best way out of this nightmare. In the past decade, the crypto community has come together to build a new financial system that offers a way to opt-out of the madness of traditional finance.

• Yes, crypto still has many flaws and both greed and the influence of legacy finance have made the space deviate from its original path. But the current crisis is nothing less than a wake-up call to get back to the roots and focus on the original vision that Satoshi Nakamoto had in mind when creating Bitcoin: To free people from the overreach and manipulation of governments and central banks and create a more equal, free financial system.

What Should You Do Now?

• What we wrote in our 2022 outlook has (unfortunately) proven right: This would be a year where capital preservation is more important than aiming for for big gains. While no one can trade perfectly around market cycles and time bottoms and tops, the drastically shifting market environment has forced every crypto investor and trader to rethink his or her strategy.

• In a structural bear market as we find ourselves in today, “selling rips” and buying big red candles is the way to go. This means every bounce should be regarded as an opportunity to assess one’s holdings and possibly derisk. While cash is king in such an environment, this doesn’t mean that you shouldn't take advantage of attractive prices offered by crashes as we witnessed on Saturday. If you still believe in the long-term prospects of crypto, then such massive price drops should be viewed as a unique buying opportunity to either add to your long-term “hodl” stack and lower your cost basis or to take advantage of short-term swing trading opportunities.

• While we don’t know how the next months will unfold and when and how this bear market will end, all we can do is to stick to the data and stay vigilant and agile in our decisions. 

• And another reminder: Don’t underestimate the power of memes during a bear market… During grim times, not taking everything too seriously (except for your health and loved ones) can be a powerful weapon!

The bear market has a way of taking crypto newbies and veterans through the wringer. During the bear market of 2018, there were many investors that fell victim to the negative volatility and allowed themselves to be chewed up and spit out into the abyss of rekt gains. No matter how much money you make during the bull market, the emotions of seeing your portfolio take a dive always seems to matter much more. The technical definition for this feeling would be Loss Aversion.

During the tough times, it’s very easy to succumb to the Bear Market Blues and give in to your emotions. This usually never works out in one’s favor.Those that have participated in any market cycle through the bull and bear phases understand that the emotions of market participants can be quite predictable. In fact, these emotions are so predictable that there is a famous “cheat sheet” that circulates around the financial industry titled, Wall St. Cheat Sheet: Psychology Of A Market Cycle.

When the stakes are this high, not controlling your emotions can cost you more than you can afford to lose. Luckily, there are ways to avoid becoming another bear market statistic. Let’s discuss a few important things to keep in mind.

Getting Over The Initial Shock

• At the height of the bull market, everyone's a genius. The gains are enormous and the proverbial cheese and wine flows in abundance. Investors start to experience market euphoria, and the good times start to look like they will continue uninterrupted and indefinitely. 

• Sooner or later the music suddenly stops and everything dissolves into dust. The downturn can happen so fast that few people have time to react – almost no one is ever able to proact if they haven’t already been following some profit taking best practices. 

• The first mental phase that most people experience is a cascade of denial (aka “that didn’t happen”). You continuously tell yourself that you aren’t experiencing a bear market, and it’s just an obvious glitch in the system. 

• As things start to get worse, that denial slowly starts to transform into a state of shock.

• How well you respond to the initial shock of a dramatic downturn will make all of the difference in your financial outcome. At this moment it is important to take a step back and assess the change that has occurred. Doing this will give you time to plan and strategize. 

Take A Breath - Don't React Too Quickly - Reflect & Learn

• It is very common for newbies to rush to abandon ship at the first sounding of the bear alarm. In their minds, it is better to quickly liquidate all of their crypto assets while they can still get a little capital before everything goes to zero – because we all know that this experiment we call cryptocurrency will eventually implode and completely evaporate, right? 

• While nothing is impossible, complete market destruction is highly unlikely. It is safe to say that the industry has received enough institutional, retail, and government (in some countries) support to keep it around for the foreseeable future.

• This means that capitulating to a downtrend and leaving crypto for good while panic selling, is one of the best ways to ensure that you suffer a permanent loss.

• While you should never act too quickly, you should also avoid the Sunk Cost Fallacy.

• You are not obligated to remain invested in projects that have no clear upside just because you initially believed in the vision. There are many cases where founders and teams abandon their own projects before the community does. 

• As circumstances change, so should your strategy. Sometimes data trumps our convictions. The goal is to properly identify when it is truly the data influencing your decision and not premature panic.

Planning For The Future

• A great way to overcome your emotions is to focus on planning for the long term. This is because constructing a thoughtful and concise strategy requires that you put your emotions aside and focus on the pertinent facts and data.

• The best plans are conceived during the bear market. You actually have a chance to gather all of your thoughts in a slowed environment. Not to mention this is also a prime opportunity to thoroughly research the space and find the true builders. 

• The most simple way to outlast a bear market is to develop a long term thesis and stick to it (we will discuss this in further detail).

Maintain Your Mental Health

• This cannot be emphasized enough. Please take time to tend to your mental health. Your health takes precedence over all other aspects of your life.

• Mental stress and anguish are huge some of the biggest drivers of health complications. Here are some disturbing stats about stress according to the American Institute Of Stress:

• One of the most common causes of stress is Financial Problems. It goes without being said that a bear market is a huge catalyst of financial problems.

• Stress numbers are also rising due to all of the factors that have affected the market.

• One helpful activity would be to change our outlook on how we view bear cycles. Instead of perceiving this as a time of doom and gloom, we should look at it as an opportunity for self improvement.

• It is also important to understand that this is a temporary period. It is unknown when this particular bear cycle will end. However, one thing we can say with 100% certainty is that it will eventually come to an end. Your mission is to hold the line until the bulls return.

• Take some time to decompress, spend time with loved ones, enjoy the outside, and when all else fails, zoom out. There are plenty of things to be grateful for outside of crypto.

Dust Yourself Off And Stick To The Mission

• The truth of the matter is that you are not alone in taking a loss in the bear market. Actually, this is the case for most investors. 

• Adversity is to be expected. As the cliché saying goes, “it’s not about how many times you get knocked down. It’s about how many times you get back up and move forward.”

• It is important to realize that when it comes to past prices and great entries when things were cheap, bear markets are the closest things we have to a time machine. Bull markets make you feel good, but bear markets make you rich.

Conclusion

• Fear, anger, panic, and doubt are all emotions that are meant to be mastered. The tough times are designed to shake you at your core and test your convictions. Those who manage to pass the test are usually met with great rewards.

• So, be encouraged and take comfort in the fact that you are experiencing and participating in one of the most pivotal technological innovations since the inception of the internet. This industry will not only reshape our approach to technology and finance, it will also reshape history.

• Here are some key takeaways to remember:

  • Make a plan, stick to it, & trust the process.

  • This is a prime opportunity for self improvement.

  • Remember, no matter what emotions you feel in the moment, every experience in every cycle is an opportunity to improve your analysis.

• May the odds be in the favor of those that have the strength to endure.

In today’s episode, we’ll dive deep into the realm of fortune-telling and tackle the question that is on everyone’s mind: When will this grueling bear market end that is bringing so much financial destruction and negativity among the crypto community? Of course, no one knows with certainty, hence the reference to fortune-telling. However, since our channel tries to formulate theses and frameworks on the basis of facts and deep research, we’ll do our best to dig up the most relevant data out there. Let’s jump in! 

Where We Are Today

• There is no question that we find ourselves in the middle of a bear market. While we and many other analysts didn’t expect the imminent start of such a vicious bear market towards the end of 2021, in retrospect it was the right call to aggressively take profits and “get some bacon for winter”. After all, winter is exactly what we got – faster and colder than expected. Bull market euphoria quickly turned into bear market pain…

• As we pointed out in other episodes, while prices reached new all-time highs last autumn, from an on-chain distribution perspective, this current bear market arguably already started last April/May! What we witnessed in the following months, is the recycling of existing capital within crypto: From one L1 ecosystem to another, then the Metaverse narrative heated up, and finally capital cycled back to NFTs once all the juice seemed squeezed out from altcoins in early 2022.

• This money cycling behavior is typical for the transition from a bull to a bear market and we also witnessed it in a major way during the ICO craze of 2018.

• Looking at prices, we can see that they have come down significantly across the board. While last year’s “hot” L1s like Cardano, Fantom and Solana have all corrected between 80 and 90 %, many small caps got absolutely eviscerated with some being down over 99%. The only coins holding up better – as we would expect them to do during a bear market – are Bitcoin and Ethereum, down 57 % and 63 % respectively. 

• It’s clear: You don’t wanna hold risky altcoins during a bear market and even if a coin is down 80 %, there is a high probability that it will crash another 50-90 %. 

• Of course, we also have to mention that this bear market already took a big toll on DeFi and “non bear market proof” Ponzi schemes like the Terra ecosystem which has sadly collapsed and hurt many people badly.

• You can see that the TVL in DeFi has halved from over $200 to just $100 billion in a few weeks… Is DeFi dead? We will tackle this question in a separate article. 

The Recent Decoupling From Stocks

• Now that we have assessed the damage already done to crypto prices and the overall ecosystem, let’s get to the important question: How long will this pain last? Because after all, retrospect is interesting but we can only act in the present moment. As our friend Darius put it: It’s all about the Next Play!

• In order to leave this grueling bear market behind us, there are two ways: Either crypto and legacy financial markets bottom at the same time and resume their multi-decade uptrend. Or, crypto decouples from equities.

• While we all hope for the latter to happen, the last few days have shown signs of a decoupling we certainly didn’t hope for. Despite crypto generally performing better than stocks during the downturn of recent months, the last few days have shown an unfortunate trend change: Crypto has been showing significant relative weakness.

• At this point, we can only hope that this decoupling of recent days is only a blip and that crypto can catch up with stocks that are generally bouncing as of late.

• However, in the long term, every seasoned crypto investor is hoping for crypto to regain its status as an uncorrelated asset class that’s not manipulated by legacy actors (or do we just want “number to go up” regardless of what stocks do?...) In order to form a thesis if, when and how crypto might decouple from stocks in the long run, we have to talk about the elephant in the room:

The Fed – the New Boogeyman

• There is no question: You could look at adoption and on-chain metrics all-day long but if you hadn’t anticipated the massive impact the Fed’s policy U-turn would have on financial markets (and yes that includes crypto) then you were likely blindsided by the last months of bearish price action. In retrospect things seem pretty obvious: Once the Fed signaled that they would turn the “money printer” off last November, things were starting to look dire for risk assets.

• Of course, all of this was caused by the highest inflation the Western world has seen in many decades – which in turn was caused by massive money printing as well as supply shocks. It’s only because of high and persisting inflation numbers that central banks had to stop their easy money policy and start fighting the new enemy number one.

• On the flip side, the million-dollar question now is: When will the Fed U-turn again? Getting this answer right likely equates to the biggest play you can make as an investor in the coming years…

• In the short term, there are no signs that a Fed U-turn is in sight: Inflation is still near its highs and the economy is not slowing enough to signal the Fed to stop tightening (yet). So the question remains: What is already priced in and how much pain do we have to expect? 

• While the “risk” of a bear market rally is always there, especially after non-stop selling and fear as we have witnessed in recent weeks, it’s important to not miss the bigger picture – which in the mid-term doesn’t signal that the pain is over.

• In fact, the effects of Quantitative Tightening by the Fed which starts on June 1, haven’t even kicked in yet…

• So, what would signal to us that a Fed reversal and with it the bottom of this bear market is near? There are two different scenarios: 

  • Either inflation comes down so quickly back towards 2 % that the Fed can naturally stop tightening. This is VERY unlikely and most forecasts suggest that inflation – while peaking – will remain well above 3-4% into 2023. So, no signal from inflation for the Fed to stop anytime soon.

  • The more probable scenario is that while the Fed keeps tightening in the weeks and months to come, financial conditions will continue to deteriorate, raising the risk of a severe recession or something “blowing up”. In fact, we have already seen credit spreads (a sign of the inherent risk within the financial system & economy) widen substantially in recent weeks. If something in the credit market or economy “breaks” (just like it did in 2020), then the Fed would likely have to stop what they are doing. So, it all comes down to monitoring financial conditions and the communication by the Fed this summer…

  • As Darius Dale puts it: “It is likely we are only in the middle innings of the bear market in high beta risk assets. With the Fed unlikely to receive any signals from either the labor market or inflation statistics to stop tightening monetary policy for at least another quarter (perhaps 2-3), it is likely financial conditions must tighten considerably to force a dovish pivot.”

Fed Tightening Is Not “the Last Shoe to Drop”

• An important point to remember is that the Fed is not the only boogeyman spooking asset markets right now. In fact, the Fed only induced this crisis. However, after liquidity dwindles, serious problems can arise for the economy and company earnings. In simplified terms: 

  • The Fed removes money from the system -> financial conditions tighten -> people can afford less spending –> the economy slows down –> company earnings shrink -> asset markets tank

• While we have witnessed quite some pain in recent months, we haven’t priced in these recessionary earnings dynamics yet… Macro analyst Darius Dale explains it well in this Tweet:

• The current bounce in markets is clearly signaling that the Fed-induced negative “liquidity cycle” is nearing its final stages. However, brace for more damage in financial markets once data shows our economy is on the brink of recession. Q2 earnings season could get… interesting.

Some Thoughts on “Timing the Bottom”

• Timing cycles is extremely hard. Especially once strong trending phases like we have seen during the first months of this year are over and markets enter a more prolonged sideways range, it’s hard to get a clear picture of the markets. Key points here are surviving and staying patient. Bear markets don’t entail prices crashing non-stop. They can also go sideways, grind up and down for an extended period.

• What makes this market downturn different from many others, the March 2020 crash, for example, is that we have no clear event signaling the start and end of the price crash. While we got the pandemic and then massive easing by central banks in 2020, we now find ourselves in a more structural bear market, with liquidity and growth hindering price growth. While inflation remains elevated, there is no clear “switch” that will signal a V-bottom reversal. Instead, we will probably go through a prolonged phase of prices grinding lower and higher with some vicious crashes and hope rallies sprinkled in.

Comparing This Bear Market to the Last One

• This bear market has shown once again that “history doesn’t repeat but it rhymes”. In fact, we have followed the typical 4-year cycles once again. 

• Is the Bitcoin 4-year halving cycle still a thing or are macro factors overriding this once almost religiously significant price catalyst? From today’s standpoint it’s hard tell because of the complexity and interplay of factors. Supply and demand are driven by different forces (e.g. miner emissions vs. Fed liquidity). However, it’s a fact: So far, the 4-year cycles have still held up… According to the 4-year cycles, we could expect the bottom of this bear market to occur sometime late this year. This magically coincides with the “macro turnaround“ as estimated by Darius Dale.

• There are two big differences between this bear market to previous ones: 

  • 1. There was no “blow-off top” signaling the top of the bull market (speaking for the increased efficiency and maturation of the crypto market).

  • 2 The percentage returns of the last bull market were significantly lower than during the last cycles, deviating strongly from most expert estimates and data science models.

• The conclusion? The market always finds a way to surprise the maximum number of people… There is no free lunch in investing!

• To end this article, let’s look at some interesting comparisons between the current and the last cycle:

The bear market can be an extremely scary place to be in. This is a time where it seems like the world – or at least the market – is crumbling and everything is going to hell in a handbasket. This bear market has been especially traumatic because there seems to be no sanctuary in any industry. However, nothing is ever quite as it seems. For those that have experienced the bear marketlypse before understand that this is the time where you take advantage of the market stagnation. 

There are plenty of things we can be doing right now to set us up for ultimate success as soon as the market turns back bullish. Most people don’t know that conquering the bear market all boils down to how you hustle.

Stay Engaged

• During a bear market, the first thing people like to do is run for the hills and disguise it as “taking a break”. If this is your approach, you’re making one of the biggest mistakes of your life.

• Staying engaged is key. This is literally the difference between you grabbing a front row seat to financial freedom and potentially prolonging your ascension to the halls of crypto Valhalla.

• The bear market is where you get a chance to slow down and really take time to learn the space. 

• You should be using this downtime to find the projects that are still relentlessly building, and figuring out what could be the next trends to power the bull market in the future. You can only achieve this while sticking around and not leaving at the first sign of trouble.

Share Information

• In crypto, sharing is caring. This is especially true in a bear market. 

• Your mission is to drown out all of the FUD and seek out the communities that are still focused on supporting strong projects while seeking out 

• Networking is one of the most valuable skills you can possess in crypto. This space is pretty much impossible to tackle alone. You need friends and aquaintances…..and not just any friends and acquaintances, you need smart people that are well versed in the crypto space.

• Aside from portfolio benefits, learning and growing together leads to some of the best lifelong friendships. You want to surround yourself with people that have the same grit, passion, and determination as you do during the tough times.

• Even Cathie Wood understands the importance of sharing information.

Master New Skills

• Now is the time to double and triple down on mastering whatever skill you’ve been wanting to develop. If you’ve been wanting to become a better researcher, this is the perfect opportunity to roll up your sleeves and dive deep into white papers, team information, Discords, etc.

• If you’ve been wanting to become a better writer, this is a great time to start practicing writing thought pieces on a thesis you may have regarding the space.

• While prices may be dropping, your skill level will be rising, which is valuable in itself. Not only will this be valuable to you, it will also serve as a value to others.

• Web3 is lacking in the talent pool, and this is the perfect chance for you to work on providing something meaningful to the space.

Get A Headstart

• A huge benefit of a bear market cycle is that it can almost serve as a time machine for those that are smart enough to treat it as such.

• Throughout the bull market you constantly complained about what you would’ve, could’ve, and should’ve done if you only had gotten into the market when prices were low. Well here’s your opportunity.

• While most people are giving up on crypto (just like they did in the last bear cycle), this is your opportunity to take advantage of a few of these juicy entry prices that will be popping up. 

• It is important to still exercise caution and not get too carried away…but sticking it out during the bear market is almost the same as being early. They both produce the same results in the long run. 

Preserve Capital, But Don’t Forget To DCA 

• Now is definitely the time to carefully guard your funds. However, you still want to take advantage of some of the discounts on solid projects that will be popping up left and right.

• The best way to participate responsibly is through Dollar Cost Averaging aka DCA. We’ve talked about DCA’ing countless times on this channel, but this is truly the most foolproof strategy that will allow you to benefit from any market swings whether you’re Dollar Cost Averaging in or out of a project (aka taking profits).

• The great thing about DCA is that it’s not just a bear market strategy. It works in any market condition.

*Let me add a caveat to this. While DCA’ing is great for the long term, it only works on projects that are solid. If you’re buying into a shitcoin, no amount of DCA’ing will save your investment. You will just continue buying into a sinking ship. Also, during the bear market, this is a strategy to help you fill your bags for the next bullish run. Another important thing is to make sure that you have a consistent flow of external capital (a steady paycheck) before taking part in this strategy.* 

Continue To Build

• This one is for all of my founders out there. Being a founder/builder myself, I understand all of the struggles, worry, and turmoil that comes along with staying motivated while managing a team during the bear market.

• However, now is the time to put your best foot forward, step up as a leader, and show and prove that your project deserves all of the glory that comes along with the bull market hype.

• Building during the bear is the best way to put your team and yourself ahead of the game and ensure success. It can also be a serene experience because it gives you time to perfect your product without having to worry about facing the harsh criticism of the crowd while you work out whatever kinks you encounter.

Conclusion

• As you all can see, there are plenty of ways that you can “hustle” during the bear market that don’t require taking unnecessary risks. The most important asset at your disposal right now is your time.

• If you use that asset wisely, it will eventually result in financial gain. Along with strategically utilizing your time, the most important thing to remember is that surviving is thriving.

• This is not the time to get discouraged because you aren’t going to become rich tomorrow. Do what you need to do to maintain your health and standard of living while waiting for the bears to go into hibernation. 

To anyone that is both a crypto and mainstream gaming enthusiast, it is no secret that mainstream gamers absolutely despise crypto gaming. They see the introduction of NFTs into gaming as another cash grab from greedy founders parading as Web3 futurists. Players are not entirely to blame for not being able to see the bigger picture. The crypto gaming industry could do a lot better in marketing their message to the public, targeting the mainstream industry, delivering finished games in a timely manner that are on par with games that are popular in the mainstream market, and weeding out bad actors that are looking to capitalize on this growing industry. 

We believe that gamers have had such a bad experience with pay to play models that anything that sounds like a potential cash grab is an immediate turnoff, which is completely understandable. However, as mainstream gamers slowly see the power of crypto gaming and how they stand to benefit, it will shift the entire paradigm of gaming as we know it….and it will be for the better.

Issues With Mainstream Gaming

• The current gaming industry that we’ve grown to love has been plagued with problems for quite some time now. As previously stated, the mainstream gaming companies have become greedy, and have failed to prioritize the experience and well-being of the players over profits.

• Aside from greed (which I will delve deeper into later), there are a number of problems that are prevalent within the industry:

  • Centralization

  • Diversity

  • Sexism

  • Piracy

  • Revenue Sharing

• Crypto gaming solves all of these issues. It also solves the biggest problem….microtransactions. Imagine you spend $60 - $70 on a game, you get ready to play, and then you discover that you need to spend another $30 to purchase the DLC (downloadable content) that will give you full access to the complete game. All of my mainstream gamers are far too familiar with these scenarios.

• That’s only the start. Let’s talk about the cost of in-game items (ex: skins, weapons, vehicles, maps, etc). It is not uncommon to spend a few hundred dollars on game assets. Now, it is to be noted that in some games there are ways to grind your way to earning exclusive items. However, to dissuade players from avoiding the cost, they make the grind to earn these special in-game items long and tedious (some grinds take 20+ hours to earn a single item). To add insult to injury, these items cannot be resold in a marketplace for a profit. So, it is essentially a sunk cost.

• Mainstream games also exploit players through the use of loot boxes. 

• A loot box is a bundle of random in-game items packaged into a box aka loot box that a player can purchase with real money or in-game currency. The players don’t know what’s in the box but the chance of unlocking a special item seems to be worth the risk. Occasionally, games may also offer “deals” that give off the illusion that a player is purchasing at a discount.

• Loot boxes have been the subject of much controversy within the gaming industry. In 2020, the UK even suggested that loot boxes should be regulated under gambling laws.

• To paint a clearer picture, in 2020 it was estimated that the global online microtransaction market is estimated to be approximately $33.4 billion. Games like League Of Legends ($1.75B in annual revenue) and Fortnite ($5.1B in annual revenue) earn a bulk of their revenue through microtransactions.

• I know what you all are probably thinking. How are companies allowed to get away with this? Well, it boils down to brand loyalty and complacency. It’s almost like being afraid to leave that toxic boyfriend/girlfriend because they’re all you’ve known for the past x amount of years.

• The reign of exploitative practices from AAA gaming studios is coming to an end soon, and it’s coming in the form of Web3. 

The Opportunity That Awaits Crypto Gaming

• Right now, the video game industry is bigger than the music and movie industry combined. Rockstar Games recently made history with its legendary game, GTA V, becoming the highest grossing entertainment product of all time. With 100 million copies sold and $6B grossed on a development budget of $265M, GTA V has completely turned the industry on its head.

• While GTA V is the highest grossing game, Pokémon is the highest grossing franchise ($17B grossed since 1996).

• Knowing what we know about GTA V and Pokémon –that they’re console native games – one could not be blamed for assuming that console games hold most of the gaming market share. However, this is incorrect. In 2019, smartphone games held 36% of the global market share.

• In just two years, smartphone games captured another 9% of the market share, bringing the total market share held to 45% as of 2021.

• The point of highlighting these numbers is to show the opportunity that lies at the feet of the Web3 community. Most crypto games are being built with the intention of them being enjoyed on mobile platforms aka smartphone games.

• Web3 gaming developers have the ability to lead the next gaming revolution, but the execution must be flawless.

A Player Driven Industry AKA The Rise Of POGs

• The next evolution of gaming is vastly approaching. In an industry that is dominated so heavily by the mainstream sector, the task of Web3 gaining any respectable market share can seem almost insurmountable.

• The value proposition has to be attractive enough to entice players to abandon the traditional ways of gaming to become active participants of the new frontier. This is where POGs come into play.

• So, what exactly are POGs? POGs is an acronym for Player Owned Games (this is not an official term, but I believe that it should be). Since NFT gaming and crypto gaming has been met with much contention and apprehension from the gaming community, I figured that it would make sense to give the sector a facelift by using a title that better describes the purpose and overall goal of crypto gaming.

• At its core, POGs will give players the ability to own and control the assets and content within crypto games. Players will also have governance rights that will allow them to control the decisions made amongst the team, which means that the destiny of certain franchises will be placed into the hands of the community.

• Though many people are currently failing to see the bigger picture and how revolutionary this will be moving forward, soon a lightbulb will flash and we will experience another huge gaming boom.

• There are a number of positive outcomes that will result as a consequence of the support and adoption of POGs such as:

  • Forcing AAA studios to adhere to the best interest of the players.

    • Players voting with their support as well as their dollars take on a new meaning when they are in direct control of the assets and the content.

    • If AAA studios are determined to bring in the same exploitative practices seen in the traditional market, players will simply stop supporting the game and the ecosystem. This will eventually result in the studio falling apart.

    • In a way, POGs give players the ability to slay giants. So, it would only make sense for the big studios to keep the community happy.

  • Giving independent developers the power to compete on a grand scale.

    • In the past, many independent studios have been unable to compete with the game development of AAA studios due to the lack of capital. A lack of resources means that smaller studios are unable to hire the best talent – because we know that the best talent gravitates to where the money is.

    • However, we’ve seen smaller teams raise insane amounts (to the tune of 8 and sometimes 9 figures) of capital through NFT launches – take Yuga Labs, Star Atlas, and Illuvium to name a few. 

    • Smaller studios now have the ability to acquire the resources needed to produce games that are on par with any AAA studio.

  • Forcing companies to listen to players.

    • Governance rights and DAOs give players the loudest voice in the room. No longer will complaints continue to go unaddressed.

    •  This is ultimately for the good of all parties involved. An empowered community will lead to a better product overall.

  • Studio incentives will finally align with player incentives.

    • For the longest, gaming studios have had no real incentives to listen to the players that support their products.

    • POGs will create a win-win situation for both companies and players. The better the product, the stronger the support. This makes sense for a few reasons:

      • In Web3 models, studios only benefit from increased activity within the game itself.

      • Additionally, studios can provide opportunities for smaller players and/or creators to assist in the construction of the game while benefiting economically.

Conclusion

• There are many reasons to be excited about the new wave of gaming that is on the horizon. The upside potential is massive.

• However, in order for crypto gaming to truly live up to its full potential, the games must be able to compete with the mainstream games that we love today. This means that the game loops must be solid, and the gameplay must be fun. 

• Most importantly, there must be incentive alignment between all parties included. As the industry progresses, I expect that we will start to see a pivotal shift in the land of gaming. All I can say is that if you’re lucky enough to be involved this early in the process, be sure to stick around.

We often discuss the rise of crypto gaming and the components of that make up the sector. One aspect that needs to be revisited are the crypto gaming guilds. Back in November, we covered the best guilds in the sector. Guilds have continued to be an excellent way for prospective investors and players to gain exposure to the overall sector while learning at the same time.  

Crypto gaming guilds became popular after the launch of Axie Infinity. Since then, there has been an emergence of various guilds within the sector that allows participants to experience crypto gaming with half of the risk. Not only are guild participants bullish on crypto gaming guilds, the true power of gaming guilds have also been recognized by the best and brightest within the space.

What are play & earn gaming guilds?

• Play-and-earn crypto gaming guilds are organizations composed of investors, gamers, and managers that purchase in-game assets for games such as land, characters, or items, then lend them out for hundreds or thousands of players to play with.  

• The use of these assets earn yields within those gaming assets ecosystems - earning for the players & the guild simultaneously.

• This empowers individuals and communities to participate in NFT & crypto games without upfront capital.  Pushing players to get a head start in Play & Earn crypto economies, as well as making NFT assets more accessible for all, creating a win-win for the space.

Guilds made a Huge splash in 2021/2022

• Crypto gaming guilds have made huge waves this year in not only the membership numbers, but the revenue department as well. Guilds like Neo Tokyo, YGG, and Merit Circle have continued to deliver value to the community members since these guilds were launched.

• In January, S1 Citizens reached a floor price of 43 ETH with Outer Citizens reaching a 10 ETH floor.

• It is also worth mentioning that Neo Tokyo Citizens also earn passive income through the delivery of $BYTES.

• Aside from Neo Tokyo, YGG and Merit Circle brought in huge revenue numbers (primarily from Axie infinity)

“Since the program’s beginning, YGG scholars have collectively generated over US$13.6 million in SLP” - Medium

• YGG and Merit Circle have also achieved some pretty hefty capital raises.

• It’s not hard to see how transformative crypto gaming guilds have been when it comes to creating a new lane for players and investors to benefit from participating.

• We even saw Crypto Twitter’s beloved Pentoshi join the ranks of Merit Circle as head of partnerships.

Why guilds may be the best R/R play in Crypto Gaming.

• Crypto gaming guilds their communities, and their tokens may serve as the best point of entry for anyone interested in participating in the crypto gaming sector. There are various factors/attributes of gaming guilds that make them the best option for investors and players. These are a few of the reasons that gaming guilds have the perfect R/R (Risk Reward) ratio in crypto gaming:

  • Simpler Research

    • The popular saying goes, “two heads are better than one.” Multiply this by 100x or 1000x and think of possibilities that can occur when everyone has the common goal of finding the best projects in the space.

    • Granted there is always the risk of there being too many cooks in the kitchen, but that depends on the size of the kitchen. The crypto gaming sector is an enormous space that continues to grow by leaps and bounds. This makes it almost impossible to keep up with all of the happenings in the space without having access to a network of other enthusiasts and experts.

    • Guilds can also serve as a protective measure as well. Oftentimes you will find members that are current or former developers that are capable of reading and deciphering smart contracts – meaning that you could potentially be saved from falling for scam projects.

    • Guild research also comes in handy when it comes to finding new gaming projects earlier than anyone else – which is probably the most valuable aspect of participating in a guild.

    • Gaming Guilds and their models are very simple to research on their own, while game trends, economic viability, & playability are harder to assess.

    • Gaming Guilds have a much larger “moat” than P2E games themselves as Guilds participate in many games, so if any one game fails, they still have revenue from others.  If a game itself fails, the holders are left holding a bag that may bleed to 0.

  • Simple Revenue Generation Model to drive value back to investors

    • Many guilds lend or allow owners to lend their NFTs to players (scholars) that lack the start-up funds to participate in P2E games through what is known as a scholarship program.

    • The scholars then split profits earned from playing the game with the owners and the guild. This essentially allows scholars to earn free of charge – other than a little sweat equity – and 

    • Guilds also allow previous scholars to earn by becoming mentors to newer scholars, and teaching them methods and strategies that will assist them on their path to success.

    • The Guild’s split of the scholarship earnings are in many cases driven back to their token holders. In addition, many guilds are purchasing passive assets in the metaverse that have potential to add value to investors.

  • The power to make decisions

    • Crypto gaming guilds essentially double as DAOs. Ownership of a guild’s native token can grant holders governance rights that will allow them to vote on different decisions.

    • Depending on the size of the guild and the amount of games the guild participates in, there may be subDAOs – mini DAOs that are dedicated to a certain game or ecosystem – within these DAOs.

    • SubDAOs are good because they allow experts in a particular ecosystem to congregate and discuss different strategies and/or become mentors.

  • Potential Higher Ceiling as some games may act as P2E index

    • Certain guilds allow players to stake the guild’s native token to different vaults (DFK, Axie, Raid Party, etc) to earn a portion of the rewards.

    • Some vaults allow you to gain exposure to a mixture aka an index of different P2E games. This also creates a layer of insulation that protects investors from losses that they could otherwise incur from direct exposure to one P2E game.

Conclusion

• Gaming Guilds and organizations like YGG, Merit Circle, Avocado Guild & Perion and their respective tokens grant investors exposures to the P2E space without having to understand the current Gaming “Meta”.

• Gaming Guild tokens may act as an index granting exposure to all of the games that the guild owns assets and is participating in - due to their revenue being tied to the games they are exposed to.

• Crypto gaming guilds communities serve as a HUB for players and investors of all levels of experience. Not only will participants be afforded the opportunity to receive scholarships, they will also have the privilege of supporting projects earlier than the masses. That is what makes gaming guilds so powerful.

• Another excellent benefit of gaming guilds are the networking opportunities. For example, Neo Tokyo is filled with developers, founders, and different subject matter experts. Everyday connections are being made that lead to the formation of crypto teams that go on to build great products. This is the power of crypto gaming guilds. 

In crypto, there’s a common theme of unrealistic optimism and a little delusion. If you’re an active member of the Crypto Twitter community, you’ve often seen – and often see – the acronym WAGMI occupying your feed on a regular basis. For those that are unfamiliar, WAGMI is the acronym for “We’re All Gonna Make It”. It is used as a rallying cry to boost the morale of the community and encourage others to stay engaged in the market by ensuring others that because they’re so “early” to the industry, the chances of them reaching success is pretty much guaranteed. While the intentions are noble (and optimism is certainly a welcomed emotion), the message of everyone making it is not the truth. 

The fact is that a number of people will reach a level of success that is satisfactory for them, and sadly a lot of people will fail. As unfortunate as that reality is, there is a ray of hope. You can greatly increase your chances of success if you dedicate yourself to growing and developing your skills as an investor. This brings us to the topic of the hour. In this article, we’re going to break down a few skills/traits that will give you a leg up in this industry. 

The best part about these skills is that they cost nothing to develop, just a little time and energy.

Researching & Understanding

• As simple as it may sound, one of the first skills to master when you’re on the road to becoming a competent investor is researching and understanding the projects that you are investing into.

  • Furthermore the best investors develop the ability to understand what fundamentals cause growth in a project or market sector - then invest as the growth narrative is starting to play out.

• Be a relentless learner.  The more you know about any one thing, the more you know about everything.  The universe is full of repeating patterns.  The more you understand one set of patterns, the better you understand them all.

• Most people fall victim to listening to others or simply using market sentiment to gauge whether or not they should buy or sell a position. While there is a possibility to gain some good alpha and tips from those that are knowledgeable within the industry, increasing your level of understanding will always be one of the most valuable investments you can make.

• Oftentimes, we attribute making bad investments to a lack of research and understanding. However, we rarely talk about how many missed opportunities occur simply because potential investors fail to see the bigger picture.

• The best case of this is everyone missing out on investing in Bitcoin back in 2010 or taking advantage of the opportunity to grab some Ethereum in 2015. 

• Researching a project until you completely understand it not only does wonders for your portfolio, you also become smarter in general. For example, let’s say there’s a new DeFi protocol that seems interesting. However, you know nothing about DeFi.

• Well, the first step would be to research and understand the importance of DeFi and how it works. In order to understand this, you must have some working knowledge of traditional Finance. If you’re unfamiliar with traditional Finance, guess what you have to do? You must learn about it. While you’re learning, be sure to pat yourself on the back. Not only are you learning about a new project, you’re learning about new industries altogether. 

Observation & Engagement

• Once you’ve mastered the art/skill of researching and understanding the industry, you need to learn how to actively observe from a close distance while engaging with the community.

• It is a common misconception that observing from the sidelines is the equivalent of missing out. People in the crypto and NFT community have a bad habit of turning into a “buy right now before it’s too late” echo chamber. 

• Contrary to popular belief, observing a project and its community before taking a position is one of the most important things you can do. 

• While you’re observing and surveying the landscape, you should use that time to engage with members of the community (both bullish and bearish) to get a full scope of the opportunity or lack of.

• It is important to always move at your own pace, but it’s even more important to not move too fast. At worst, if you drag your feet on an opportunity, you might miss out but you’ll still have possession of your investment funds. Plus, another opportunity is always around the corner.

• However, move too fast, not only do you make the wrong decision, you can also kiss your initial investment goodbye. 

• Observing the market is also the key to spotting trends earlier than other investors. As we know, spotting trends early could determine the difference between a 10x and a 100x opportunity.

Practice & Mastery

• Without practice, you’ll never master any activity – this is especially true when it comes to investing.

• A lot of people make the mistake of thinking that crypto will make them a millionaire overnight due to some of the wild stories that they’ve either read or heard about some random person putting their life’s savings into some meme coin.

• Trust me, for every newly minted crypto millionaire, there are a thousand others paying their dues in the form of losses. There’s a saying in crypto that your first big loss should be looked at as tuition.

• The only way to truly master crypto investing is to practice.

• When most people think about practice, the first thought is paper trading – i.e. trading using practice accounts instead of real money. While this is definitely a great way to learn to trade, we’re talking about investing.

• Here are a few exercises you can start doing today:

  • Practice reading white papers to familiarize yourself with what a good white paper entails (read the white papers of some successful projects, as well as failed projects).

  • Practice researching teams.

  • Start keeping up with crypto news and events.

• Ultimately, the best way to practice is to simply be present and participate. The longer you stay in the market, the smarter you become.

Conclusion & Closing Thoughts

• Becoming a crypto aficionado is a never ending journey. Along the way, you will experience some losses as well as some wins. Hopefully, the skills discussed above will help you achieve more wins than losses. 

• Remember the person that cares the most about your success is you (and maybe your parents).

• Everything in the universe is connected – you can learn to be a successful crypto investor by learning any other subject, so keep an open mind, and study EVERYTHING that interests you.

• Prepare for losses.  The biggest winners in any market take losses, so prepare yourself for them, and stay in the game.  If you aren’t winning, you are learning, avoid losses so large that you get knocked out of the game.

• So, for those of us that choose to put the time, effort, and consistency into developing and mastering our strategies, We’re All Gonna Make It!

Introduction

Throughout the thousands of NFT and crypto gaming projects that have been launched in the span of less than a year, there have been plenty of winners and even more losers. However, a few projects put on an absolute master class in bringing something innovative to the sector. The impact these projects had echoed throughout the industry. Today we figured we’d switch up the pace a bit and have a little fun. After looking at a few of the top projects in the space, we’ve decided to list five that we feel helped pioneer a few trends that are popular within the sector.

Keep in mind that the projects mentioned below are based on our own opinions. We know and understand that some of you all may respectfully disagree. If that’s the case, feel free to leave a comment with a few of you all’s picks. Without further ado, let’s dive in!

Neo Tokyo

• We have to start the list off with one of the projects that revolutionized the way NFT communities are launched. Changed the launch approach to a riddle based approach.

• Neo Tokyo is the brainchild of none other than our very own EllioTrades and Alex Becker. 

• Prior to NT, community members were accustomed to fighting through gas wars to mint and grinding through mundane tasks to gain a whitelist spot.

• Neo Tokyo took the minting process and flipped it on its head by having hopeful Citizens solve complex riddles and actually use their brains to earn a spot into the coveted community. 

• You can say that it was one of the first projects to reward the community based on merit as opposed to money. Not to mention, this was also a free-to-mint project.

• The theme of merit continued through Neo Tokyo's mint process as minters of the first NFT token (IDs) were required to play games through an entire season to “earn” all of their pieces and fully upload as a Citizen of Neo Tokyo.

  • 4 Pieces Earned through the challenges

    • Identity

    • Vault Box

    • Items

    • Land

  • The sum of the rarity of their pieces earned dictated their status in the community & the yield earned by their Citizen.

  • Citizens can buy, sell, & trade the pieces of their NFTs to increase yield, rarity, or status.

• Soon after, other projects took notice and started using the same method to launch their NFTs and grant access to their whitelists. 

• Did I also mention that NT is one of the biggest – if not the biggest – crypto gaming alpha groups in the industry?  Also, at one point, the floor price reached a height of 60 ETH.

VeeFriends

• We’ve seen celebrities endorse and attempt to launch countless NFT projects, and most ended up being either rug pulls or an epic fail. 

• However, for one very popular influencer, this has not been the case. Gary Vaynerchuk aka Gary Vee is one of the first celebs/influencers that was able to successfully launch an NFT collection.

• VeeFriends currently sits at a floor price of 15 ETH.

• Just a few days ago, it ranked amongst the top 5 NFT projects in floor prices.

• There have also recently been NFT sales for as high as 21.7 ETH.

• A portion of the project’s success can be attributed to Gary treating VeeFriends with the attention and care that the space is not used to seeing from a celebrity founder. It was recently announced that there will be a second series of VeeFriends released. We discussed in our last article the benefit of project expansions.

CloneX

• CloneX is an avatar project that was launched by RTFKT – the same company that produces the popular NFT sneakers and wearables.

• RTFKT was no stranger to success within the NFT sector. However, they reached another level of success when it was announced that they were acquired by Nike. 

• This was (and still is) one of the first cases that we’ve seen of a native NFT startup being acquired by a major brand. Once the news of the acquisition hit the airwaves, the prices of the CloneX NFTs skyrocketed as expected.

• A few legendary CloneX sales occurred as well. One NFT sold for 200 ETH.

• Since the acquisition, we’ve seen teasers of what’s to come.

• This will not be the last acquisition of a crypto native company by a mega brand, but we can never forget who did it first.

Cyberkongz

• We must show love to one of the OG projects that paved the way for NFTs implementing sustainable token economies ($Banana) and creating the appeal of alpha groups. 

• Not only have the Kongz given some of our most beloved projects the blueprint to launching a token with real utility, they’ve also been indirectly tied to the success of these same projects.

• At the moment, a Genesis Kong will cost anywhere between 80 ETH - 90 ETH. The price is a testament to the amount of value that one can obtain from gaining access to $BANANA as well as the Wall St Kongz alpha group.

• It is worth noting that 80 ETH - 90 ETH for a Genesis Kong is actually a bit of a bargain. Let’s not forget that approx five months ago, the floor price was 159 ETH. Granted this was around the height of the NFT bull cycle, but we could easily see this level of activity again.

Loot

• Loot (for adventurers) was the first of its kind that started an entire new wave. Loot was a free-to-mint project that was stealthily launched.

• Introduced the first completely open source “items” to be used by the community in the metaverse.

• This spun up a narrative around decentralized NFTs & assets that’s use are determined by the community, including a number of derivatives, & had influence on the design of projects like Neo Tokyo.

• We can also thank Loot for being a key catalyst of the insane NFT bull run that we experienced throughout 2021.

• The thing that makes Loot so revolutionary is that there was no plan, Discord, roadmap, or marketing in place when it was launched. All you had were these weird NFTs that consisted of a list of words on a black background. 

• Did I mention that these weird NFTs achieved some respectable floor prices?

• It was speculated that these words were a description of in-game items of a game that was to be built in the future.

• Since then we’ve seen a few Loot derivatives – Treasure Dao being one – as well as the release of Loot inspired crypto game, The Crypt Game. 

Conclusion

• Well, there you have it. Those are our Top 5 crypto gaming and NFT projects that helped revolutionize the industry that we’ve all grown to love. 

• If you notice, these projects have one thing in common. All of the projects listed above have done exceedingly well for those who had the foresight and a little bit of luck to get their hands on one of the NFTs. 

• The moral of the story is that you’ll rarely go wrong supporting the builders that are bringing true innovation to the space. When you’re fortunate enough to spot innovation, follow it.

In this crypto gaming journey, there are multiple strategies that can lead you to both your short term and long term goals. For some, a short term approach is their preferred method of investing. We’re more of a long term investment type of team. However, we still find some short term strategies to be quite viable and appropriate depending on the circumstances. Truthfully, some of these projects deserve to be treated as short term plays anyway. 

You don’t want to be caught holding the bag when the news drops that a project was a rug pull all along. When we say short term investing, we’re usually talking about a period of approximately 6 months - 12 months. Long term investing is between 1 year - 5 years. So, judging by these timelines, we’re going to discuss some of the strategies we would consider if we were to take a short term approach to the market. The strategies discussed in this deep dive is our approach to determining when it may be a wise time to enter the market, or to take some profits.

Buy The Development, Sell The Release

• “Buy the rumor, sell the news,” is a popular phrase that is often repeated in the world of investing/ trading. This has been an OG short term trading strategy for quite a while now.

• This same strategy applies to crypto gaming. During the initial announcement and development phase, it’s common for a project to gain a lot of hype and momentum in anticipation of what’s to come.

• One of the best and most recent examples that fits this strategy perfectly is Raid Party. The project was able to gain approx 5,000 ETH from a Dutch Auction that led to massive FOMO.  The average mint price was 5 ETH.

• The top 10 bids were massive.

• Those that bought into the auction were up for a short while.

• However, no more than two days after the auction, the floor dropped to around 2 ETH from a price of approx 6 ETH. After the reveal, the price dropped even lower – around 1.7 ETH.

• This is a case where selling right before the release would have saved someone a world of heartache.

Follow The Hype Cycles

• Hype cycles are defined as the five phases that represent the maturity, adoption, and social application of specific technologies. The five phases are:

• However, when people talk about hype cycles within the crypto industry, they are referring to the different phases in which a project gains the most hype. Though traditional tech and crypto industries both have their differentiating factors, the chart below applies to both.

• Following hype cycles is definitely a short term strategy that you must partake in at your own risk. Judging from the chart above, the best time to exercise any exits is around the time when mass media hype begins – on the way to the peak.

• It would be disingenuous to not point out that predicting hype cycles can be very risky. Not only are they tough to follow, people also fall into the trap of not being able to press the Sell button when it’s time.

• This often leads to undisciplined investors becoming the victims of rug pulls – which unfortunately have become quite common in the NFT and crypto gaming space.

• Following hype cycles can also be super risky because the timeline can be extremely short. Therefore, you must be in tune with everything that is happening with the project as well as the overall sentiment within the community.

• However, when used correctly, hype cycles can be a great tool for separating hype from truly innovative projects. This ultimately works in your favor, because once you become a master at identifying hype cycles, you can make your investment decisions accordingly.

• A perfect example of the Gartner hype cycle playing out in NFTs is the mass media coverage of BAYC & celebrity buyers entering NFTs, denoting the top of the recent NFT cycle. A great example is Justin Bieber buying a BAYC NFT at the top price 

• This guy read the writing on the wall perfectly.

Watch Out For Project Expansions

• Project expansions usually deliver bullish outcomes. Most of these expansions happen in the form of another NFT release.

• We’ve seen this with projects like:

  • Bored Ape Yacht Club: BAYC has released a number of expansions that has helped increase the overall value of the project. One of the most notable releases is the Mutant Serum that was airdropped to all BAYC holders.

  • Cool Cats: At the end of January, they released Cool Pets, which created new excitement within the community.

  • Doodles: They recently released Space Doodles. Instead of releasing a new collection, they added new features to the original collection.

• It is to be noted that this strategy works best with projects that have already had a successful launch and have been able to maintain a thriving community. If you notice, all of the projects mentioned above are regarded as “blue chips” within the NFT space. The play here is brand loyalty and reputation.

• If project expansions have worked for regular NFT PFP projects, there is no doubt that this will be a home run for certain crypto games.

• We have seen proof of this in the past in conventional gaming with established games that have active player bases.  Each time there is an expansion or content release, the game will experience an influx of users, both returning & new users.  Path of Exile, a popular ARPG, is a great example.

• The in game economies reflect the sentiments of hype as well.  This is important to crypto because these same principles are present in NFT projects & will likely make their way into our favorite crypto games.

Conclusion

• Short term investment strategies are ideal for those that are looking for ways to increase their long term investment stacks. However, it needs to be stated that only those with a certain risk appetite and experience level should engage in riskier strategies. A long term outlook is usually the safest approach to the market.

• Whether looking for a short term strategy to build your stack, or a profit taking strategy for the NFT, crypto, & crypto gaming projects you love, these are a few tips that will hopefully serve as a solid roadmap. Sell when hype is high, while always keeping large content releases in mind.  As always a little bit more research goes a long way in the journey of a successful investor.

• One thing we enjoy doing is looking at different crypto gaming ecosystems in an attempt to find the teams that are bringing true innovation into the sector. 

• Today is the day where we discuss one of the most robust crypto gaming ecosystems that we have come across. The ecosystem that I’m referring to is Treasure.

• This project has been absolutely killing it. So, it’s only right that we dive deep into this project to discover the magic behind Treasure.

What Is Treasure?

• Treasure is a metaverse ecosystem that’s built on top of the Layer 2 solution, Arbitrum. Through Treasure, communities have the ability to bootstrap and govern (conducted through Treasure DAO) decentralized metaverses – so in a sense, you can look at it as a metaverse launchpad of sorts.

• Treasure provides a marketplace where all of the projects – referred to as Cartridges – use $MAGIC (Treasure’s native token) as the currency for all transactions that occur within the marketplace. MAGIC is the glue that links all of the cartridges economies and narratives together.

• One of the most unique things about Treasure is that all of the Cartridges are fair-launch and free to mint projects. MAGIC was also a fair launch token. 

•  MAGIC is generated and earned in Treasure’s own metaverse, Bridgeworld (more details on this later). The players that earn MAGIC in Bridgeworld are known as Legions and the assets that they use to earn tokens are called Treasures.

• The Treasures then produce resources that allow Legions to continue mining MAGIC, which in turn allows other Cartridges to continue growing.

• Some of the Cartridges currently connected to Treasure are:

  • Bridgeworld

  • Smolverse

  • Life

• Some upcoming Cartridges are:

  • Ether Orcs

  • Battle Fly

  • Toadstoolz

  • Peek-A-Boo

• Treasure also has more upcoming projects that you can discover if you do a bit of digging. One example is Realm DAO. 

Treasure DAO

• Treasure is governed by a community DAO – Treasure Dao. All decisions are controlled by MAGIC holders that have staked their tokens.

• The DAO gives members the ability to vote on different proposals such as:

  • Marketplace revenue sharing agreements

  • Projects to onboard

• All members of the DAO are able to vote on decisions through Snapshot Voting.

• The overall consensus of the DAO is that the value of the metaverse assets is determined by the effort that goes into obtaining them. It is also believed that other metaverses should be fairly launched and allow decentralized decision-making to maintain consistent value and participation. 

• This is why other metaverses aka Cartridges on Treasure are also fair launch and free to mint projects.

$MAGIC

• MAGIC is the resource needed to power on treasures (NFTs). Powering on treasures is what allows them to produce yield. This is a very clever way to add utility to MAGIC.

• All MAGIC is earned through players participating in Bridgeworld. MAGIC has a distinctive approach to staking.

• Players must stake all three assets (Legions, MAGIC, Treasures) to earn new items. The best way to summarize how it works is through this simple equation:

  • Cost of farming = Price of initial assets + Time it takes to perform the actions

• This method of staking ensures that players actively put in the work to earn the most rare assets. The team believes that this will ultimately lead to a thriving and sustainable ecosystem. Whether or not this is the ultimate solution remains to be seen, but we do like the approach and the thesis behind it.

• The total supply of MAGIC will be 350M tokens. MAGIC will be distributed between:

  • Mining

  • Team

  • Ecosystem Fund

  • Treasure Farm

  • Staking/Liquidity

• However, the MAGIC emissions schedule has been modeled after the Bitcoin halving schedule – for those who are unfamiliar, every four years, Bitcoin emissions are cut in half, which in turn adds to the immediate scarcity. 

• According to the distribution chart above, 25% of the MAGIC supply – 86,928,502 tokens – will be dedicated to mining. Also the mining supply will be emitted over a 10-year period.

Bridgeworld

• Bridgeworld is a game of strategic commerce, trade and domination which sits at the center of the Treasure metaverse.

• Legions, Treasures and other NFTs native to Bridgeworld, represent player characters and items that are used to explore, create and ultimately extract $MAGIC from the world.

• Bridgeworld incorporates many of the DeFi concepts that are becoming standard across “Play-to-Earn” (P2E) games, but also introduces unique elements.

Core “Gameplay”

• Players utilize legions to quest for treasures, summon other legions, & consume treasures while crafting.  Accumulated treasures are used to craft items & can also be locked to “Mine” rewards.

Questing

The Ivory Tower

• All Legions set out from the Ivory Tower in search of treasures, earning questing points & levels along the way.

• Quest are divided into three difficulties:

  • Easy (8 Hours to complete)

  • Medium (12 Hours to complete)

  • Hard (16 Hours to complete)

• As players quest they earn:

  • Essence of Starlight

    • Used to upgrade Legion’s constellations.

  • Prism Shards

    • Exchange at Mysterious Merchant (coming soon) for complete Prisms.

  • Treasures (20% Drop)

    • (1) Stake in the MAGIC mine or (2) Used to craft consumables

  • Universal Lock (.01% Drop)

Crafting

The Forge

• Treasures contain magical properties that Legions can extract and use to craft valuable consumables.  Legions grow more experienced as they continue to craft and hone their trade.

• Crafting Costs 5 $Magic per craft

  • Craftable Items:

• Recipes to Craft Items:
  

• Leveling Up Crafting on Your Legions

Summoning

Legions - Characters of Bridgeworld

• Genesis (Capped Supply)

  • Summon other legions (unlimited)

  • Quest

  • Craft

• Auxiliary

  • Summon Other legions (one summon)

  • Quest

  • Craft

• Summoning Costs & Requirements

Pilgrimage 

• All existing Legions must go on a pilgrimage for 24 hours.  Upon completion, legions are assigned their class, and can participate in activities in Bridgeworld.

• Summoned legions do not need to do a pilgrimage, can immediately begin activities, & are automatically assigned a class.

Classes 

• There are five different classes in Bidgeworld:

  • Siege 

  • Fighter

  • Assassin 

  • Ranged

  • Spellcaster

• Class utility to be announced in a future season.

Constellations 

• Legions can burn magic to tattoo multiple Bridgeworld constellations onto their skin using ancient technology located at the Starlight Temple – tattoos represent different elements.

• There are six different tattoos:

  • Fire 

  • Earth 

  • Wind

  • Water

  • Light

  • Darkness

• The benefits of these tattoos are unknown.  

Mining

The Atlas Mine

• The natural successor to the Genesis Mine and primary source of MAGIC within Bridgeworld. Users can stake MAGIC within the mine to activate Bridgeworld’s productivity and gain access to the rarest and most powerful resource of all, MAGIC. 

• The Atlas Mine has no cap on MAGIC staking (unlike the Harvesters).

Harvesters

• Harvesters work like mines - allowing users to stake NFTs & MAGIC to earn more Magic.

• Social coordination is required to build harvesters to begin generating emissions.

• MAGIC yields can exceed the Atlas Mine due to an incremental boost derived from the number of Harvester Parts and the number and rarity of Legions staked within the Harvester, but the total MAGIC distributed is capped.

How to mine

• Users must time lock MAGIC in the mine to gain access to emissions. 

• NFTs including Legions (Genesis and Auxiliary), Treasures and Consumables can be deposited alongside MAGIC to enhance a user’s mining power which is used to determine the relative share of emissions.

• Bridgeworld in combination with Treasure DAO is bringing some very compelling innovations to NFTs and gamefi.

• Mass Social Coordination to farm $MAGIC using Harvesters.

• Cross Treasure DAO Ecosystem Use Cases for Treasure NFTs.  This creates a very interesting ecosystem design that drives massive value to Legions who can farm treasures.

• The ecosystem is young, but seems to be building credibility with free mints, & innovating in ways that other projects are not.

Ways to participate

• For those who are interested in participating in the Treasure ecosystem, there are a few different options available:

  • Invest in the $Magic token.

  • Purchase Auxiliary Legion NFTs

  • Purchase Genesis Legion NFTs

Conclusion

• As you can see, Treasure is one of the most vast and complex ecosystems in the sector.

• It was stated earlier that Treasure can be viewed as a metaverse launchpad. However, that statement might be underselling the vision and potential of this project. 

• Only time will tell if this is truly a sustainable model. However, we will be watching to see what treasures this ecosystem produces.

The wealthiest and most successful investors identify and ride the waves of change in markets before everyone else. A huge part of making it in crypto gaming will require you to have the foresight to see where the sector is headed and what the next innovations will be. Recently, the team has been having some pretty lengthy discussions on the outlook of gaming and where things could ultimately be headed. We’ve been spending a lot of time diving into the sector and looking at everything – well almost everything – it has to offer in order to form a thesis of where we can see things going. Our sentiments are derived from common pain points and obvious opportunities of disruption that we’ve been seeing and taking note of. 

Today we’d like to share our thoughts on a few innovations that we can see arriving soon that will improve crypto gaming and ultimately catapult it into the mainstream. Here comes the part where I give you all my famous disclaimer before continuing:

It is to be noted that any projects discussed in this article is not a smoke signal to buy or take any positions without first doing your own due diligence. Everything mentioned are projects that we believe highlight the picture we are painting. If you automatically invest into any project SOLELY based on someone’s opinion who you deem to be an expert, there’s a great chance that things will not end well for you. 

AAA Level Gameplay

• Currently, the gameplay for crypto games have been decent, but far from great. This is an area of the sector that is in prime position for a complete overhaul.

• The industry is filled with auto battlers and a few promises of AAA RPGs. The latest trend has been 2D dungeon crawlers. Needless to say, there is a lot to be desired.

• A lot of the crypto native games today can be described as:

  • Basic

  • Lacking polish & fun 

  • Many times incomplete.

  • An oversaturation of simple, turn based games

• So, where will the next wave of innovative gameplay come from? Ideally, what would it look like?

• Our thesis is that there will be a splintering of mainstream gaming companies that will result in a lot of the developers diving into the crypto gaming industry. One of the major gripes is that current crypto gaming developers either have a habit of exaggerating their experience or lack any real experience at all. 

• There have been countless examples of teams listing huge brands on their websites (Ex: Riot Games, Rovio, etc) to make it seem as if the developers were building the games of said companies. However, upon further research it is discovered that the “developers” were basically admins at those powerhouse brands. 

• This has been a major reason for the lackluster gameplay that has been plaguing the industry.

• We believe that many AAA studio teams will be drawn to the opportunity to build, and dramatically increase the competition in the crypto game space. This means that developers with real track records will assist in creating much better experiences.

• This will force the industry to evolve. 

• Actually, this isn’t just a pie in the sky dream. We’re already seeing this come into fruition. There are currently a number of upcoming projects with teams that have experience shipping real games from major brands. A few examples are:

  • Shrapnel: 

    • The team has previous experience working for HBO.

    • The CEO, Mark Long, is the former Head of Microsoft’s Xcloud. He has been in the gaming industry for 26 years.

    • Mark has also shipped over 32 titles on multiple platforms ranging from Sega Genesis to Oculus Rift.

    • The Head Of Studio, Don Norbury, has worked on games like Bioshock Infinite, Sunset Overdrive, and Crackdown 3.

  • Moonfrost:

    • Founder, Ric Moore, is one of the developers of Stardew Valley.

    • He also led a successful acquisition of his company, Bossa, after growing it to over 100 employees.

    • Ric is also the Game Director on Dragons Watch and a BAFTA award winner.

    • The cofounder, Gina Nelson, is also an industry veteran. She has worked in the gaming industry for over a decade as an Artist & Art Director.

    • She has shipped over 14 titles. She was also the lead artist for the very popular mobile game, Temple Run.

    • Gina has also partnered with popular projects like Gears of War, Star Wars, Hasbro, Disney, and Lionsgate to name a few.

  • Everseed:

    • Everseed is being produced by the Amihan Entertainment team.

    • Amihan is made up of a team of previous Riot Games veterans.

    • The Game Director and Co-Founder, Naomi McArthur, was previously the Senior Game Designer at Riot.

    • The CTO, Paul Loy, was the Technology Lead at Riot.

• It’s important for us to highlight that the people developing these games are not just mediocre employees at these studios. They are core contributors with serious game development experience.

• We’ve also seen gaming executives abandoning their roles to join the Web3 community. Last month the YouTube’s Head Of Gaming – Ryan Wyatt – announced that he was leaving YouTube to take on the role of CEO of Polygon Studios.

• As the industry progresses, the barrier to entry will only increase – it’s already beginning – and leveling up the gameplay will be a requirement in order to get ahead. Plus, lower tiered blue chips (if we can call them that) have already staked their claims.  

Sustainable & Profitable Gaming Economies

• In our last Deep Dive, we discussed the importance of the economic models of crypto games. Game economies create positive feedback loops of incentives that attract new players and keep players engaged & excited to continue to play more. This is the make or break mechanism of every game in the sector. 

• We saw this play out with many of the P2E games that hit the market this year.  Millions of players flocked to games for the economic incentives alone.

• We’ve seen one of the biggest projects in the crypto gaming space mess this up. It took a while for players and investors to notice that the Axie economy was broken, but once they did, it became (and still is) a huge issue. Even today, Axie is still struggling to recover.

• As you all can see, Axie’s in game currency – SLP – reached a height of $0.39 at its peak and now sits at a low of $0.019.

• A similar situation occurred with Thetan Arena as well.

• THC – Thetan’s in game currency – reached a height of $0.98 and now sits at a low of $0.031

• Both examples point to a huge portion of their player base entering a stable economy & leaving as the economy crumbles and economic incentives are less favorable. Situations such as these erode the community & the player base.

• We see the same thing in real world economies, people will go where they feel safest, enjoy themselves & earn the most. Metaverse & crypto gaming economies mimic this pattern.

• These examples are not meant to be FUD (these games can still recover).  They are used to illustrate the severity of the expansion and contraction games experience without finely tuned economies.

• Every game economy is going to go through expansion & contraction phases, just like any normal economy.  But, the severity of these phases has a significant effect on the player base and investors alike.

• As the sector moves forward, we can expect to see some innovative economic models emerge. Let’s be clear, this isn’t something that should happen. This MUST happen.

• If crypto gaming economies can’t be perfected, we may as well kiss the entire sector goodbye. Is that a dramatic hot take? It sure is.

• I also have no problem making such a strong declaration because I know that founders are actively working on developing economic models that make sense.

• Heroes Of Mavia is a good example of an upcoming project that is working on delivering a revolutionary crypto gaming economy.

• In order to ensure that their economy doesn’t eventually crash and burn, the team is using a simulator to test the economy’s stability. Next. Level. Thinking.

• Aside from Heroes Of Mavia, we have also seen mainstream examples of thoughtful gaming economies. One of the most popular examples of this is World Of Warcraft.

• WoW has been at the top of the MMORPG pack for over a decade now with no signs of slowing down. This is largely due to the success of their micro-economy.

• Founders could learn a lot from studying the economic layout of WoW.

• The key takeaway is that sustainable economies will be important in the market for the next gaming/metaverse wave to grow and maintain a player base, while protecting investors the games player base.

Conclusion

• I’m sure you all probably expected an exhaustive list, but the truth of the matter is that it doesn’t take a bunch of bells and whistles to drive innovation in the crypto gaming industry at the moment. Now, there are other developments that will occur as we move forward.

• However, these are the two most glaring areas that are ready and begging for innovation. Projects that manage to nail these two areas will already be winning 95% of the crypto gaming battle.

• More importantly, finding projects early that meet the mark will be equivalent to finding the express lane to Valhalla.

We’ve been on our soapbox about crypto gaming since Q3 of last year. Since then, there have been a lot of gaming projects to hit the market. With the influx of projects, it can be very hard to gauge which teams are making the right moves. When it comes to launching a game there are many variables that need to be taken into serious consideration. Join us as we give you all a brief rundown on the 7 key factors that need to be taken into consideration before, during, and after the launch of a crypto game so you can build or judge projects with confidence.

1. The Team

• This is where it all starts. If the community is the lifeblood of a project, the team is the heart that is responsible for pumping the blood and keeping the project alive. It is imperative for investors to understand that when they invest in projects, they are investing in the team rather than the product.

• Outside of experience and expertise, a team must also display passion and excitement. The teams that receive the most support are the ones that are constantly building, providing updates, asking for customer feedback, engaging with the community, and sincerely taking suggestions into consideration.

• For prospective players and investors researching any team, the most important questions to consider are: 

  • Does the team get sh#$ done? 

  • Do they do it well? 

  • Are they unwavering in their conviction to bring their vision to life?

• After those questions are addressed some positive – and possibly negative – traits need to be identified.

  • Positives

    • Conviction

    • Skill sets

    • Experience

  • Negatives

    • Overly Audacious Goals

    • Conflating Experience (Saying they have Riot team members that had no impact on game design)

2. Clear & Easily Understandable Vision

• It is extremely important for investors and players to easily understand the concept that is being presented. 

• No matter how much potential a game may have/has, it will be very hard to gain the support and build the hype needed to gain the right traction for rollout if no one understands the vision.

• This is where the KIS (Keep It Simple) method is a team’s best friend. When a game promises too much, it can be perceived as delusions of grandeur. I know what you all are thinking – what is “too much”? 

• “Too much” can be defined as an excessive combination of game features that either don’t flow well together, make the game feel overwhelming, don’t add to the narrative/storyline, and/or don’t serve a purpose in a character’s progression.

• When read or explained, the vision should be comprehensible enough for a prospective investor or player to get a fairly good understanding of what the game is about on the first attempt.

3. A Rock Solid Gameplay Loop

• Now that we have a great team and a clear vision, the next thing to focus on is the gameplay loop. For those that need a reminder, the gameplay loop is the primary set of mechanics or actions that someone will perform repeatedly while playing (also referred to as the Core Gameplay Loop or CGL within the industry).

• Once people get past the initial glitz and glam, the only thing that will keep players engaged is an addictive gameplay loop. This is why no matter how dated they are, people will always revisit games like Super Mario Bros., Zelda, Pokémon, and other classics. The gameplay loops are simple and repetitive – yet intriguing enough to keep players coming back for more.

• It’s also to be noted that it isn’t necessarily about reinventing the wheel as opposed to making slight adjustments that makes the game unique enough to stand out. Even when you look at popular modern day franchise hits like Call Of Duty, Halo, Fortnite, PUBG, etc, the Core Gameplay Loops are still very simple.

• We group loops into 3 categories:

  • Fully proven loop (CoC, Mavia, Etc)

  • Adapted loop (proven loop with additional unique elements)

  • Unproven loop (completely new, never used loop)

4. A Thriving Community

• This is probably the most important aspect of any project in crypto across all sectors. Remember what was stated earlier – the team is the heart and the community is the lifeblood.

• The heart cannot function if there is no blood flowing through it, and it will die if the blood is toxic.

• If the community is unhappy, unenthusiastic, or unengaged the chances of the project being successful is slim to none. A concerted effort has to be made to keep the community happy.

• A vibrant community is critical to the value creation and a sustainable economy.

5. Compelling, Consistent Marketing

• The great thing about marketing is that a team can be creative and experimental in their approach. 

• However, as creative as marketing campaigns can get, it can be all for naught if some basic principles aren’t followed. 

• A  few basic principles are:

  • Identifying the target audience: Who is the ideal customer?

  • Identifying the hook or “sizzle”: What makes the game unique?

  • Leveraging Social Media: What type of following has the project built? What platforms are they targeting?

  • Coming up with an initial plan: The marketing plan should not be an afterthought or placed on the backburner.

  • Understanding the competition: There is no shame in observing the competition and taking note of what’s working for them.

  • SEO: All great projects must give proper attention to their SEO strategy.

• Right now, the sector is still growing. So projects have been able to get away with lackluster marketing strategies – as we are in a bit of a mania where investors are turning over every stone in an attempt to find the next big thing.

• However, as the growth continues, the mania will start to die down, and it will be tougher to grab the attention of players and investors. So, any project that is putting real effort into their marketing strategy is one to pay attention to.

6. Visuals That Bang!

• Every team should repeat these words daily, “Gamers Want To See Gameplay!” Cinematic trailers are cool, but that isn’t enough to get the job done.

• Ideally, a project shouldn’t have more than two cinematic trailers at max (speaking from opinion). The rest should be either actual gameplay footage, or a merge of cinematic and gameplay footage.

• Gamers have been deceived by cinematic trailers far too many times. Since then, the community has wisened up. Too many cinematic trailers before sharing any gameplay footage is a good recipe for creating suspicion.

• Keep in mind, trailers are bonuses, not necessarily 100% required. They instill confidence in the ability of the team to deliver. 

• Art & Visuals are like icing - done well they bind the project together so it clicks giving it the “it” factor.

7. A Rewarding & Sustainable Economy

• The economy in crypto gaming is essential, even more important than in normal games because the value is tied to real money and real investment.

• Nothing can sink a thriving project quite like a bad economy. We’ve seen this exact thing occur with Axie Infinity:

• Tascha actually predicted this back in July of 2021.

• Her predictions were soon realized around October.

• Can Axie recover? Hopefully they can. There are some suggestions on exactly how this can be accomplished.

• Enough about Axie though. The intention of this section is not to put a spotlight on problems with the Axie economy. It’s just the most relevant and popular model that we are able to reference and use as a teachable moment.

• What makes a great crypto gaming economy?

  • NFTs that complement gameplay

  • Balanced & Fair Rewarding System

  • In-game currency that inflates at the perfect rate (if using in-game currency)

  • Tokenomics that make sense (governance token & in-game currency)

• As imperative as this is to get correct, we should also keep in mind that this sector is still very new. Therefore, teams are still learning how to build the perfect economy.

• With that being said, it is not the community’s role to bear the pain of suffering through bad economic models. A team needs to be agile and flexible enough to improve any flawed models before they cause significant impacts to players and investors.

Conclusion

• Obviously, there are more aspects to a successful crypto gaming launch. However, we wanted to cover a few of the most important today. Crypto gaming will have a monumental year in 2022. However, the only way this sector will continue to progress is by constantly reviewing, refining, and demonstrating some best practices.

• The last point that needs to be expressed is the importance of teams giving realistic timelines. Building a great game takes time (anywhere from a year to a few years depending on the complexity). There’s a bit of a trend where teams are promising to have a fully developed AAA game within 6 months. These super fast timelines are always a bust.

• The goal should always be to underpromise and overdeliver. It is ok to quell expectations of a quick turnaround in exchange for quality. Actually, it’s preferred.

It seems like everyday shiny, new crypto gaming projects pop up with promises of blowing competitors out of the water. What if I told you that most of them have no chance? That’s right. Unfortunately, most of these projects that are moonlighting as the next coming won’t make it. However, if you’ve been in crypto for any amount of time, that should be an obvious – and maybe overstated – truth. With that being said, there are a few games that seem to be building with longevity in mind. 

Whether or not they’ll last is still too early to determine. Nevertheless, they’re taking the necessary steps to inspire confidence within the hearts of their supporters. Recently, a game has hit the scene that has really piqued the team’s interest. The game that I’m referring to is Heroes Of Mavia. If you want to know what excites us about the potential of this game, imagine Clash Of Clans on the blockchain. 

Now, you see where I’m going with this. So without further ado, let’s dive right into it.

In this article, it is more important than ever that I stress that this is not financial advice. Never ever throw your money into any investment without doing your own due diligence FIRST. We honor and respect our community members’ support. However, this is about sharing interesting projects…..nothing more, nothing less. 

What Is Heroes Of Mavia?

• Heroes Of Mavia is the self-proclaimed “first AAA Blockchain Base Builder.” This is a PVP strategy game where armies and bases serve as the assets players use to engage in battling other players for cryptocurrency. 

• In Heroes Of Mavia, players have the ability to:

  • Build and command their own base on the island of Mavia.

  • Use over twelve different types of vehicle, infantry, and air units to attack other players’ bases and loot resources – Gold, Oil, and Ruby (one of the in-game currencies).

  • Rent, purchase, and/or partner with landowners to build bases and earn rewards.

  • Livestream and replay battles.

  • Generate passive income and manage base battles.

• The ultimate objective of the game is for players to use resources they’ve gained from attacking other bases to build their armies and grow their bases.

• The difficulty level of the game increases as players develop their base and army. Also, defeating stronger players rewards higher yields.

• The gameplay loop is simple, yet compelling enough to keep users engaged.

  • Build Base > Attack & Defend > Earn Ruby > Upgrade NFTs

Tokenomics

• Heroes Of Mavia uses a dual token model as well:

• Players can earn RUBY in multiple ways:

  • Attacking another base.

  • Successfully defending their base (which doesn’t require a player to be online).

  • Completing daily challenges.

  • Removing obstacles from their base.

  • Winning wagered matches.

• Once players acquire RUBY, it can be used to:

  • Purchase resources.

  • Upgrade heroes, statues, and bases.

  • Speed up various processes (training, construction, etc).

  • Purchase skins and decorations that add value to their NFTs.

• The more RUBY players earn, the more they are also required to spend to continue upgrading their assets.

• Here is a breakdown of the token dispersion:

Heroes Of Mavia NFTs

• There are three different types of NFTs in HOM:

  • Bases

    

    • Players can own more than one base.

    • Bases can be rented out, resold, or placed into a partnership for a split of the earned RUBY.

    • Each base contains an HQ. This is where players will upgrade their NFTs. It is important to note that bases can only be upgraded with RUBY.

    • All upgrades are permanently attached to the base.

  • Statues

    

    • Statues boost process speed and efficiency of each base.

    • Only one variable can be boosted per statue. However, a player can own multiple statues.

  • Heroes

    

    • Heroes are unique and can only be purchased with MAVIA tokens.

    • Attributes are upgraded using RUBY.

    • Skins can be purchased and enabled or disabled.

• All NFTs are purchased through HOM’s custom built marketplace – The Mavia Marketplace. Players have the ability to:

  • View past NFT sales.

  • Find base partners.

  • Rent out bases for MAVIA tokens.

  • Buy and sell HOM NFTs.

Team

• The team behind HOM is Skrice Studios (founded in Q2 of 2021). The core team is made up of approx 10 people that are based in Hanoi, Vietnam. 

• The overall team is a global team of approx. 60+ members.

• Though the studio has only been in existence for less than a year, the core team has decades of experience within the gaming industry. 

  • The Executive Director – Yvan (Aiven) Feusi – has over 15 years of experience as a 3D artist.

  • The COO – Nam Trương Hải – has over 18 years of experience in the gaming industry.

  • The CTO – Nhan Cao – has approx 7 years of software development experience.

• One thing that has thoroughly impressed me is that the team broadcasts the game development in their Discord (that currently has 61,897 members). That’s right! Supporters have the ability to watch the team build the game in real time.

• Heroes Of Mavia has also partnered with some of the biggest companies and guilds in the crypto space.

Tharebear Alpha

• Tharebear has once again joined me to deliver you all some great “off the record” alpha on HOM.

• An important thing to take note of are the risks surrounding the project:

  • Current market conditions are uncertain.

  • The project is still in development.

• However, there is a huge positive that offsets some of the risk:

  • HOM has a committed team that consistently ships features & puts players/investors first.

• If anyone is interested in taking a look at HOM, here are a few other important details:

  • Land Whitelist & Public Mint (3k tokens) - Mid February Mint (Details Here)

  • Initial Mavia Token Offering - Date TBD (rumored Q2), Participation Details to come

  • Future Land Drops - Future land drops will come with content releases

  • Mavia Token Secondary Market** - The benefit to owning land early is unique NFTs using Mavia’s unique “soft staking” mechanism. Those who hold their land can earn exclusive NFTs to improve their bases, based on how long they are “soft staked”.

  • If land is unable to be secured during the drop, there is no need to worry. More land will be coming in the future.

  • Plus the hype is likely to subside between the initial launch and the game release. In theory, this can create an opportunity for speculators to gain exposure to tokens or land.

Conclusion

• Well folks, there you have it. Hopefully, it isn’t hard to see why HOM is highly anticipated amongst the team.

• I cannot definitively say that this game has a fail proof chance of conquering the industry. However, Heroes of Mavia seem to have all of the core ingredients of a successful game/company:

  • Proven and Active Team

  • Stellar Partnerships

  • Supportive and excited community

  • Good Tokenomics

  • Solid Proposed Gameplay loop

• With all of the pros listed, I will not be surprised to see Heroes Of Mavia shake up the crypto gaming industry and create a new standard. Looks like we may truly have a blockbuster on our hands.

• Currently the team is in the process of distributing land to whitelisted supporters. This is a game that I’ll definitely be paying very close attention to.

We have been witnessing gaming take the crypto world by storm. The latest game that has become the darling of the dance is DeFi Kingdoms. DFK is the most popular example of a happy marriage between the sectors of DeFi and Crypto Gaming.

Without going too far into detail, DeFi Kingdoms is a 2D game that allows players to earn NFTs and fungible tokens through completing different quests. What’s impressive is that since its launch, DFK has been absolutely killing it – it is currently sitting at a market cap of approx $1.2B with a fully diluted market cap of $10B.

To add to the shock, DeFi Kingdoms is built on top of the Harmony One protocol. Not many could have predicted the momentum that we’re currently seeing from DFK on this rather niche L1. But enough about DFK, let’s talk about what we’re really here for. With the rising – and so far sustained – success of DFK, everyone is looking around for the next GameFi project with the same potential.

Today, I’d like to present to you all a game that I think could potentially rise to the occasion. Allow me to introduce to you, Crypto Raiders.

What Is Crypto Raiders?

• Crypto Raiders is a pixel dungeon crawler game, RPG, & ecosystem with gamified DeFi elements utilizing tokens & NFTs. The inspiration for the game was drawn from Zed.Run and World Of Warcraft. Crypto Raiders is built on the Polygon Network. 

• Players have the ability to:

  • Raid dungeons to increase character power (EXP/Equipment)

  • Increase character power with EXP & Equipment

  • Embark on quests to earn crafting materials

  • Own Mobs in dungeons to steal players currency/items

  • Participate Defi elements to earn currencies to support them in game - Keys

  • Mint New Raiders on Generation Event Days using Aurum

What Makes This Game So Interesting?                      

• What’s interesting about Crypto Raiders is that it has a permadeath feature – meaning that if your character dies in the game, it’s permanent. If this sounds a bit extreme, don’t worry. 

• Beginner dungeons have a 0% chance at death, and the first few intermediate dungeons will only have a 1% - 5% chance of death. Also, players will know the chance of death percentage before entering a dungeon.

• The best way to increase your chance of survival is to upgrade your character’s gear. The better the gear, the better the survival rate.

• Also, the team has a unique solution to prevent the permadeath mechanic from sabotaging the growth of the game.

• Dungeons are released on a weekly basis. There are evergreen dungeons that players can raid continuously, and limited time dungeons that players can only raid for a limited amount of time.

• This month (Jan 19th), the team is releasing a new mode called Endless Dungeons.

• The two tokens that power the game are RAIDER and AURUM:

  • $RAIDER

    • RAIDER powers the entire Crypto Raiders economy.

    • Players can stake their RAIDER tokens to earn AURUM.

    • Staking rewards are received on a daily basis based on in-game activity.

    • Staked tokens are locked for three to twelve months for various reward rates.

    • RAIDER can either be purchased on the market or earned by staking $AURUM-MATIC and $RAIDER-MATIC Sushi LP Tokens.

    • RAIDER is gaining more utility in the future (governance voting, special access).

    • The supply of the RAIDER token will be fixed at 100,000,000.

  • $AURUM

    • AURUM is the in-game token that is used for the marketplace, recruiting/breeding characters, running dungeons, and other future activities.

    • Players earn AURUM by completing quests and dungeon raids.

    • The awarded amount of AURUM will be based on the level of difficulty of the quest or dungeon.

    • Holders that don’t wish to participate in looting dungeons will need to obtain AURUM through either staking or purchasing from other players.

    • The initial supply of AURUM is 1,000,000,000. However, the team reserves the right to mint and burn tokens as needed.

• The key to building a successful game is creating an addicting gameplay loop. A gameplay loop is the term used to describe the cycle of actions that a player repeats when playing a game. 

• The gameplay loop is what keeps players engaged. Crypto Raiders has two interesting gameplay loops:

  • Crawl Dungeons > Level Up & Earn Items > Increase Character Stats > Crawl Harder Dungeon

  • Quest > Earn Materials & Experience > Craft 

Crypto Raiders Assets

•  Let’s talk about the NFT assets that are in the game. There are currently three NFT classes.

• Characters

• All character stats are created through weapons, gear, and potions acquired during dungeon raids.

• Mobs

• There are 12,500 Mobs and 14 different types.

• Mounts

• Mounts will be used to help speed up quests and farming speeds.

• Mounts were airdropped to RAIDER stakers. Other mounts can be purchased on the open market.

Conclusion

• Though Crypto Raiders is fairly new, it’s growing at a rapid pace. If we take a look at some of the stats, we can see that there is plenty of activity occurring everyday (keep in mind that this screenshot was taken at 9:34 AM EST this morning).

• Now that we’ve covered the details surrounding Crypto Raiders and the potential it has, I’d like to conclude this Deep Dive a little differently.

• I’d like to take a moment to give a massive shoutout to the newest EllioTrades team member and current Lead Of Research in Neo Tokyo, Tharebear, for providing me with the initial TLDR on Crypto Raiders.

• A few risks and opportunities that Tharebear sees with Crypto Raiders are:

  • Risks

    • Current overall market conditions are uncertain.

    • The project is up over 398% already.

  • Opportunities

    • This project has been showing user growth in a down market.

    • Committed team that consistently ships features.

    • Liquidity Pool APYs + Bonus Raider Yield 

• Also one of the ways that he – and I as well – will be taking advantage of the Crypto Raiders opportunity is by purchasing mounts. This is because:

  • They have lower supply than Raiders.

  • Character holders will want them to speed up their Questing/Yield.

• Please give Tharebear a warm welcome, and show him some love for the alpha by giving his Twitter account a follow.

Nothing makes people more happy than receiving free money. Especially, when that free money can range from thousands to even millions (in rare cases) of dollars per individual. How is all of this possible? These windfalls of free money in crypto occur through events known as airdrops. If you’ve watched the EllioTrades channel recently, you will have likely seen a video of Elliot and CoopahTroopa discussing airdrops. 

Though airdrops are not a new crypto phenomenon (they were very popular back in 2018), it is worth covering the resurgence of their popularity. So, today we’re taking a further look into what airdrops are, and how you can position yourself to receive the benefits. 

What Are Airdrops?

• Airdrops are a marketing strategy used by projects to:

  • Bring awareness to their platform/product

  • Entice users to engage with their platform/product

• This is accomplished by projects giving away free tokens/coins to potential users that meet certain criteria.

• Airdrops can also be used to reward loyal community members and early adopters.

• Usually, a project will announce that they are launching an airdrop, and provide instructions on how to claim or meet the eligibility requirements to receive tokens. Your amount of usage often determines how many tokens you will receive.

• Airdrops are essential because it allows a project to gain immediate attention, and a little bit of traction if people start buying or staking tokens.

Notable Airdrops

• There have been some very big airdrops released in recent years. Two legendary airdrops that have taken place were the Uniswap (Sept 1st, 2020) and 1inch (Dec 24th, 2020) aidrops.

• Both of these airdrops delivered tremendous value to those who were fortunate enough to receive (and not sell) them.

• In the case of 1inch, one user received over $20M in airdropped tokens.

• It was also reported back in February of last year that the Uniswap airdrop of 2020 had reached a peak value of $12k per recipient.

• So what sparked the new airdrop frenzy recently? It all started early November – November 8th, 2021 to be exact – when ENS decided to airdrop governance tokens to all ENS domain holders that owned a domain on or before October 31st, 2021.

• Then, a few weeks ago, OpenSea users were taken by surprise when a project called OpenDao decided to randomly airdrop $SOS tokens to all OpenSea users.

• As predicted, this created a good bit of “airdrop hype”, and soon after a project called GasDao followed suit.

• The airdrop train has not stopped rolling. As recently as yesterday, LooksRare airdropped tokens to everyone that has traded NFTs on OpenSea between Jun 16th, 2021 and Dec 16th, 2021.

How To Receive Airdrops

• The best way to receive these airdrops is to be active and participate in new projects (since you almost never know exactly which project is gonna do an airdrop).

• For example, we’ve been talking about ZkSync on our channel for some time now. It has been widely speculated – and all but confirmed – that they will be airdropping tokens to early adopters.

• Now would be the perfect time to start preparing. If you need a few pointers on some potential ways to make yourself eligible, checkout this thread.

• Cosmos has already dropped hints that some of their ecosystem projects will be releasing airdrops soon. These projects are:

  • Evmos

  • Umee

  • Gravity Bridge

  • LikeCoin

  • Game

  • Stargaze

  • BitSong

• You should also follow and monitor different crypto airdrop sites like:

  • Airdrop.io

  • Airdrop Alert

• Last but certainly not least, stay active within the crypto community. Some of these airdrops have been happening with little to know warning. If you aren’t active or at least following the Crypto Twitter community, you will miss out.

Conclusion 

• Airdrops can be a great way to build up your stack at little to no cost. However, please understand that not all airdrops are the same. Bad actors will advertise a fake airdrop in hopes of luring you to a fake landing page and having you connect your wallet to claim free tokens. To avoid being scammed always do your due diligence and perform a quick check on Twitter if technically savvy and trustworthy people have “approved” the safety of an airdrop.

• I have a rule of thumb that I’m never first in line to claim any airdrop. I take time to read the comments, and watch others claim theirs first. One great thing about Crypto Twitter, is that though it may be drama-filled at times, the community does make a concerted effort to look out for each other.

• If you’re worried about missing out, don’t be — there will always be new opportunities. So relax, stay engaged, and most importantly, stay safe!

It’s looking like we’re starting the new year off with new life being breathed into some of the L1 protocols that have been flying under the radar for the last few months. One of the L1s that is being shown some love is Fantom. Back in November, I covered Fantom in depth (feel free to read the article here). Today, I’d like to cover some of the projects that are native to Fantom’s ecosystem. 

Please keep in mind that this is not a call to action for anyone to invest in any of the projects discussed today. It is my goal to make you all aware of what’s out there. If anything discussed today peaks your interesting, always be sure to follow up with more research before making any financial decisions.

Tomb Finance

• The first project we’ll talk about is Tomb Finance. Tomb is probably the most popular project in the Fantom ecosystem.

• Tomb Finance is a DeFi protocol that aims to help Fantom solve its future liquidity issues by providing a medium of exchange – TOMB – that is pegged to FTM (more on that later).

• The protocol has three tokens:

  • TOMB - Tomb is a toke that is designed to maintain a peg to 1 FTM. Because the peg to FTM is maintained through an algorithm, it is not guaranteed that TOMB will always be valued at 1 FTM. This is because the token is uncollateralized.

  • TSHARE - Tomb Shares are used to gauge shareholder trust in TOMB to maintain the $FTM peg, and measure the value of the Tomb Protocol. As the epoch (measure of time) expands, the protocol mints and distributes TOMB to all holders that have staked their TSHARE tokens in the masonry. TSHARE also gives holders voting rights towards future use cases and protocol improvements. Here are some details on how TSHARE tokens are distributed.

  

  • TBOND - Tomb Bonds are used to help insure the TOMB peg to FTM during an epoch concentration period. TBOND tokens are issued if the price of $TOMB falls below 1 FTM. TOMB holders can buy TBOND tokens at the TOMB token’s current price. To bring the price level of $TOMB back to 1 FTM, TOMB tokens are burned when they are exchanged for TBOND tokens. Holders can redeem TBOND for TOMB tokens whenever the TOMB peg is back above 1 FTM. This sell pressure helps push the TOMB price back to 1 FTM. As long as the Treasury maintains a positive TOMB balance, TBOND tokens can be redeemed. Also, there are no expiration dates for TBOND tokens.

• Tomb Finance is working towards making TOMB the main medium of exchange used on Fantom Opera. In order to achieve this, the team plans to continue to develop functionality and use cases for TOMB.

• Not only will this help solidify the TOMB token as the medium of exchange, it will also help maintain the peg to FTM. 

• Let’s talk about the TOMB Finance platform. The site has five different categories that are used for different purposes: Cemetery, Masonry, PIT, SBS, and Liquidity.

• Cemetery allows TOMB holders to earn TSHARE by staking TOMB - FTM (106.56% APR) or more TSHARE (212.38% APR).

• Masonry allows users to stake TSHARE for TOMB (1019.65% APR). 

• PIT allows users to purchase or redeem TBONDs

• SBS allows users to swap TBOND to TSHARE.

• Liquidity makes it possible for users to generate LP tokens with TOMB and FTM.

• Tomb Finance released a Cemetery Cycle video to teach users how to cycle their TOMB rewards

• Route 2 Fi also shared a staking strategy for those who may be new to the platform.

• As you can see, Tomb Finance is a complex DeFi hub with many moving pieces. It’s a thoughtful product that has the potential to be one of the greats contingent that Fantom’s TVL continues to grow.

SpiritSwap

• That brings us to SpiritSwap. SpiritSwap is a DEX that is built on Fantom Opera. Think of it as the Uniswap of Fantom.

• SpiritSwap has the same AMM capabilities as Uniswap. SpiritSwap also has a full suite of products which include:

  • Portfolio: Users have access to multiple features that include:

    • Liquidity

      • Users can see unstaked LP tokens.

    • inSPIRIT Stats

      • Shows rewards and the total number of SPIRIT a holder has locked as inSPIRIT.

    • winSPIRIT Rewards

      • Shows wrapped inSPIRIT tokens: ginSPIRIT (Grim Finance) and linSPIRIT (Liquid Driver)

    • Farming Rewards

      • Rewards and SPIRIT tokens from farming can be claimed here.

    • Wallet Breakdown

      • All assets can be viewed in the portfolio.

  • Exchange: Users have the ability to:

    • Swap tokens

    • Provide liquidity to different token pools

    • Use the Zap feature that allows users to stake to an LP with one token (Instead of using a token pair)

    • Migrate LP tokens between different pools.

  • Bridge: Gives users the ability to bridge cross chain Ethereum, Fantom, Polygon, Arbitrum, and Avalanche by using a bridge powered by AnySwap. New users also receive 0.4 FTM to offset any gas costs associated with the first transaction.

  • Farms: Users have the ability to participate in different farms and earn trading fees for the swaps within the pool. Liquidity providers participate in farms by using two tokens. The fee to trade is 0.3% and the farm participants receive 0.25%. 

  • Boosted Farms: These are farms where users can stake their inSPIRIT to farms for a boosted APR (up to 2.5x boost).

  • inSPIRIT: SpiritSwap’s governance token

  

  • winSPIRIT: This is wrapped inSPIRIT.

• Bonds: Users can purchase SPIRIT at a discount by depositing LP tokens. The tokens are then sent to a bond contract on Olympus Pro, where they are vested over 7days.

• Lend/Borrow: Lenders can lend assets to put as collateral in exchange for an APR, and borrow against the collateral for an APR.

• The SPIRIT token is the native SpiritSwap token that is earned by farmers on the platform. This is how tokens are distributed.

• SpiritSwap is currently sitting at a market cap of $57.5M with a TVL of $273M.

Spookyswap

• Spookyswap is another AMM DEX built on Fantom Opera that allows users to:

  • Swap

  • Stake Boo (Spookyswap’s native token)

  • Provide Liquidity

  • Farm

  • Bridge Tokens

  • Purchase NFTs

• The difference between SpiritSwap and SpookySwap is that users are able to perform Limit Orders using Spooky. Users are also able to purchase NFTs called Magicats.

• The BOO token is used for:

  • Governance: Token holders are able to vote on proposals that are listed on Snapshot. The voting value of BOO can differ depending on whether or not it is staked as a liquidity pair.

    • 1 BOO staked as a liquidity pair = 5 voting points

    • 1 BOO that is in your wallet or staked as a single token = 3 voting points

  • Buyback and Partner Pool Staking: Users have the ability to stake BOO tokens in the buyback xBOO pool and earn more BOO. Users can also earn other tokens.

  • Collateral: BOO tokens can be used as collateral on other protocols.

• The distribution method of the BOO token is very reasonable.

• The developers receive 10.3% of the allocation. Out of the 10.3%, 5% were allocated with a 365 day lockup period. The other 5.3% will be allocated throughout the 3-year admission period. 2% were allocated to the IDO. The community will receive 7% from airdrops. Most importantly, 72% of tokens will be allocated through LPFarm Rewards.

• This is good because it will encourage token holders to participate in farming instead of immediately dumping. 

• SpookySwap has been performing very well in the last 7 days.

• You can also see how SpookySwap measures up with some of the other great DEXs on Fantom.

ZooCoin

• ZooCoin is an ecosystem of dApps (decentralized apps) that are built on Fantom Opera.

• The different dApps that make up ZooCoin’s ecosystem are:

  • ZooDex: Zoo’s DEX that has a token verification system and embedded charts. 

  • ZooTrade: Zoo’s investing and trading dApp that is also integrated.

  • ZooTracker: Zoo’s wallet that gives the user portfolio analytics and an asset dashboard.

  • ZooPet: Zoo’s NFT marketplace.

• The native token of ZooCoin is ZOO:

• There are other projects coming in the future.

• In 2021, SpookySwap was one of the top projects in the Fantom ecosystem with a market cap under $100M.

Conclusion

• These are a few of the projects in the Fantom ecosystem worth keeping an eye on. Keep in mind that the ecosystem is constantly growing. 

• My prediction is that 2022 will be a breakout year for the Fantom protocol. This means that a lot of focus will be placed on the projects that fall under the Fantom umbrella.

• I’m not advising anyone to jump into any of these projects tomorrow, but this ecosystem will definitely be one to keep track of throughout the year.

Crypto is all about community. You could say that it is the glue that holds the entire space together. What makes these communities so special is that they are changing the idea of how organizations have traditionally been viewed. Community – for better or worse, but often better – takes precedence over corporate interests.

There are communities that are built around projects, and there are communities that are built by influencers. Both have led to the emergence of one of the biggest anticipated trends of 2022. The trend that I’m referring to is the introduction of social tokens into crypto.

For the uninitiated, social tokens are fungible tokens that brands, influencers, and communities can use to monetize themselves. They give supporters, members, followers, and fans the ability to purchase services or gain access to different communities. Social tokens can also be used to reward members and contributors of communities through airdrops.

To understand the benefit and potential of social tokens, it is important that we cover the landscape of social media and influencers.

The Landscape Of Social Media

• In 2022, the backbone of anything requiring digital interaction is social media. It has been reported that there are 3.78B social media users worldwide. That is a 920M user increase from 2017.

• It is estimated that there are 233M social media users in the US. 

• This number actually grew from 2020. The growth wasn’t significant, but it was growth nonetheless.

• However, social media platforms like Tik Tok and Twitter did see significant growth among GenZ and Millennial users.

• Though most of the growth can be attributed to the crisis we’ve been plagued with for the last two years, it is to be noted that a good majority of the crypto community resides on Tik Tok and Twitter (especially Twitter).

• It is important for us to review the landscape of social media when it comes to crypto – especially when discussing social tokens – because the two sectors are pretty much intertwined.

• Along with the growth of social media, we’ve also seen the rise of crypto influencers. Influencers in the crypto space are not a new phenomenon, but their impact has grown significantly throughout 2021.

The Rise Of Influencers

• Influencers are typically public figures with large followings. In the mainstream markets, we’ve always seen the use of influencers to market products. Influencer marketing can be traced back to the 1950’s and 60’s. Though not as prevalent – primarily because of the lack of digital communication – it did exist. 

• Before the rise of social media, companies would take the traditional route of reaching their audience through huge ad campaigns. Those days are long gone. Companies have chosen to target their audience through the use of influencers, and with good reason. If we look at the influence that YouTube creators have over their followers, it’s easy to see why traditional marketing is taking a backseat.

• It doesn’t just stop there.

• In crypto, there are two types of influencers (content creators also fall into the influencer category):

  • Value Add Influencers: These are influencers that truly have their followers’ best interests at heart. They also use their influence to contribute to the overall growth of the crypto industry. They are quick to identify projects or other influencers that could be harmful to the crypto community. They also focus on educating their tribe rather than manipulating them.

  • Value Drain Influencers: These can also be considered parasites and/or vampires. These are people that build a following and community for the sole purpose of draining liquidity from their followers through manipulation. This can be in the form of shilling rug pull projects for pay or promoting products that can be harmful to newbies for a fee… or even creating their own token and rug pulling the community.

• Now, I’m not saying that Value Add Influencers are immune to making bad calls. This is crypto, and even the most promising projects can turn out to be duds or rug pulls that even the most veteran crypto enthusiast can fall victim to. The difference is the intent. A Value Add Influencer will always be forthcoming about any risks associated with the projects they support. They also do not shy away from admitting mistakes.

• Morning Consult conducted a survey of 2.2k investors, and 29% said that they use social media to learn about cryptocurrency. Depending on how you look at it, this can be equally intriguing and terrifying. While it certainly has its risk (discussed later) the trust and use of influencers will not die down anytime soon.

• As the use of social tokens continues to grow, you will certainly see more influencers take advantage of the opportunity to independently monetize their communities without having to worry about corporate interference (YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, etc).

• However, only the most trustworthy deserve to reap the benefits of the utilization of social tokens.

Social Tokens In 2022

• I hope that the picture that I’m attempting to paint is starting to become more clear.

• Content platforms, like YouTube and Facebook, have the ability to control how creators distribute their content, while social tokens allow creators and influencers to go direct-to-consumer.  

• One project that is making it possible for influencers, creators, and artists to offer social tokens to their communities is Rally. Rally allows creators to:

  • Create their own branded tokens with no experience.

  • Integrate them into their platforms.

• The best thing about Rally is that you can perform these actions without paying any fees.

• Another project that is leading the charge in fan engagement is Chiliz. Chiliz has partnered with different sports teams and organizations to give fans the capability of:

  • Buying and trading branded tokens of their favorite teams through the Chiliz.net exchange.

  • Use the Chiliz token as an alternative payment for products. Services, and experiences.

  • Vote in team surveys and polls.

• There are other projects that exist as well. I will refrain from listing them all – as to not unintentionally shill. The two projects above are only meant to be taken as examples and not actual endorsements.

• So far, social tokens sound great, but what are the pros and cons? Let’s discuss those now.

The Potential Risks

• Just like any other coins or tokens, social tokens can be wildly volatile. While positive volatility is one of the main selling points to newbies, negative volatility can be a killer.

• These tokens can also be susceptible to whale manipulation.

• In conjunction with whale manipulation, liquidity can be rugged by bad actors. Tokens also aren’t immune to being hacked.

• Most of the risks listed aren't unique to this new frontier. However, it is important to always highlight any potential pitfalls. 

The Potential Benefits

• The creator economy is projected to be worth over $100B. YouTube expects to pull in at least $30B in revenue by the end of this year (coincidentally, that is today).

• YouTube does share a percentage of this revenue – around 55% of ad revenue – with creators. However, YouTube still has the ability to demonetize creators. Spotify also avoids paying royalties by driving traffic to the original content.

• The ability for creators, influencers, teams, etc to offer their own social tokens offers a certain immutability that creators desire. It also gives them a way of earning and keeping 100% of their revenue – aside from paying taxes.

• In theory, the ability to offer social tokens could incentivize creators to provide real value to the community and help combat paid shilling of horrible projects and/or products.

• Social tokens can also help the growth of the entire crypto space. As teams and influencers integrate social tokens into their offering, more mainstream fans will be exposed to the industry. Think of it as an unconventional onboarding process.

• This could also lead to the creation of new decentralized social media platforms.

Conclusion

• You’ve seen the statistics surrounding social media, the breakdown of social influencers, and the potential benefits and risks of social tokens. In the end, what does it all mean?

• It means that the collective behemoth called social media is continuing to grow – especially with the introduction of the metaverse. Right now, creators, teams, influencers, and organizations have the ability to create value for their tribes while receiving value in return.