This article discusses the upcoming crazy bull market, focusing on the development of the ecosystem, providing opportunities for technical innovation, currency token printing, and fascinating stories.
Original Title: "Reexamining the Degen's Playbook for the Bull Market"
Author: IGNAS
Translation: Kate, Mars Finance
What happens when you expect?
How does the market treat your airdrop?
So far, it's been good for me. The top three airdrops so far: JITO, STRK, and ETHFI. Fortunately, the fun is not over yet.
In this blog post, I will introduce our current situation and re-examine my Degen bull market playbook, as well as the new and previously shared airdrop protocols that are still worth promoting.
I believe the second stage of the bull market has begun:
In the first stage, we:
- Cleaned up the mess from the last bull market (won multiple lawsuits and eliminated leverage).
- BTC ETF approved
- SOL ecosystem thriving
- Received several significant airdrops.
In the second stage, we will see:
- Further victories over regulatory agencies
- Speculation on interest rate cuts
- Speculation on approval of ETH ETF
- Increasing inflow of Bitcoin ETF
- More innovation on BTC through Runes protocol, L2, and BTC native dApps
- Accumulation of new leverage using Restaking/LRT/Ethena style protocols
- Larger airdrops: Eigenlayer, LayerZero, L2 airdrops, LRT protocol, etc.
I am not the only one who thinks the second stage has arrived. For Yano, the second stage is the realization that we are in a bull market, but many friends still haven't realized it.
https://twitter.com/JasonYanowitz/status/1762878513731002570
"This is the calm before the storm."
The price of Bitcoin is currently in the accumulation zone, and when new catalysts appear, the price of Bitcoin will rise.
It only takes a spark—any catalyst will do—to keep the momentum going. The halving narrative might be enough. Perhaps it's an interest rate cut, a prominent institutional player entering the space, or maybe something unexpected.
The market wants to liquidate, and we will find reasons to continue to rise.
At least, that's what I (and most degens) expect.
What happens when you expect
I remember watching a discussion on the potential impact of Bitcoin ETFs on the cryptocurrency. Sorry, I can't find it now. Towards the end, there was a comparison showing the Bitcoin users before and after the ETF.
The "before" picture showed Bitcoin enthusiasts delving into the technical aspects of Bitcoin, such as Rodamor (creator of ordinal theory) here.
In contrast, the "after" picture showed Bitcoin holders retiring with their children.
The main point of the speaker was that due to continued fiat inflows, the value of Bitcoin will continue to rise, bringing wealth to Bitcoin holders.
The "after" image reminded me of the movie "What to Expect When You're Expecting" (I haven't seen it).
The name of the movie is apt for another reason: we all expect the market to continue to rise, airdrops to continue, and to peak in early 2025.
Right?
But this journey won't be smooth sailing.
The bull market is more sluggish and unpredictable than you imagine. Who would have thought SBF would steal users' money to gamble on coins?
So, we all hope the market will continue to mint millionaires, airdrops will continue to come, but I'm prepared for the unexpected.
However, each bull market will repeat similar patterns.
Most importantly, each bull market, we find innovative ways to make money by issuing tokens supported by sexy new hot stories. These narratives are often made possible by new technological advancements in the field, such as re-staking or RWA.
Opportunities abound in the bull market, but you need to find the Schelling point about the market share of cryptocurrencies. Here are the lessons I learned from the past two bull markets:
Navigating the Crazy Bull Market to Come
As the narrative of the story comes and goes, my goal is to focus on the booming ecosystem, which provides 1) technological innovation, 2) opportunities for currency token printing, and 3) fascinating stories.
I detailed how to identify booming ecosystems in my previous article:
Three Pillars of Booming Crypto Ecosystems
As each bull market passes, creating tokens becomes easier and easier.
Previously, Dogecoin required PoW hardware to mint tokens, but now even uninformed influencers can create tokens in just 5 minutes.
As we continue this trend, I expect we will reach a point where the oversupply of tokens will exceed the available attention and currency flow to maintain their prices. This is when the party ends.
Fortunately, the entire market is not there!
But there are signs of increased leverage risk in the market, such as Ethena's sUSDe and LRT ETH derivative assets being accepted as collateral by major DeFi protocols.
But I believe the market is healthy. We can increase leverage.
In fact, I believe there is a lack of new high-quality tokens in the market.
Few are interested in buying tokens from previous cycles. They are not exciting, and most are overvalued. Additionally, teams that succeeded in the early cycles lack the motivation to further promote their tokens. For example, Compound's $COMP…
The team has stopped interacting on social media, and their proposed Compound Chain plan has disappeared along with a deleted tweet.
Therefore, I expect the market to continue to value new tokens higher than tokens from the previous cycle.
The newer, the better.
JITO and ETHFI have a higher FDV than LIDO. Ethena's ENA is 2.5 times more expensive than MKR.
This is good news for airdrops: higher valuations will lead to more generous airdrops.
So, considering all this, in December 2023, I shared my DeFi Degen's bull market playbook: Part One, which includes over 60 protocols in 10 ecosystems.
It has been four months since the initial post. I expect the performance of these 10 ecosystems to exceed the market.
Therefore, it's time to update the ecosystems/protocols that are still worth cultivating. Additionally, I will include new protocols that were not mentioned in my previous articles.
Reexamining the Degen's Playbook for the Bull Market
Please note, this is not Part 2 Playbook. The market is entering the second stage, but not much has changed from 4 months ago. Some things have changed:
- BTC rules, ETH is rotten: Fortunately, Ethereum has re-staking, otherwise I would consider selling most of my ETH
- Meme coin fever has become even weirder
- Protocol teams have endless token schemes, possibly prolonging this bullish cycle through delayed token generation (and dumping) events inadvertently
https://twitter.com/DefiIgnas/status/1775910200962088994
So, my degen strategy remains the same: deposit assets, click buttons, and then claim airdrops.
Note: I don't like meme coin trading. Since I stopped buying cryptocurrencies with fiat in 2020, I have increased by 100 times. Now, I am chasing a 10x target, focusing on the safer way of thriving ecosystems through multiple airdrops. If you are looking for 100x opportunities, I shared some strategies to increase opportunities in a previous article.
How to Find 100x Gems: 5 Strategies
First, I will share new airdrop strategies, and then I will review the ecosystems that are still worth paying attention to (with new airdrop protocols).
New Airdrops
• Elixir: The order book liquidity network raised $8 million, valued at $800 million, from Crypto Hayes, Sui, Amber, etc. Elixir allows providing liquidity to order exchanges and earning rewards, including Vertex, Bluefin, etc.
Potion, which can be obtained by depositing ETH and minting elxETH, to receive mysterious chests. Your ETH will be locked until the mainnet launches in August.
• Phaver: The best front end for Lens. With the explosive growth of Farcaster usage and airdrops, this trend is coming to Lens. Phaver's mining is severely lacking. You can earn Phaver points by posting, connecting NFTs, and more. Phaver raised $7 million from Polygon, Nomad Capital, and others.
• Zircuit: Another L2 with various buzzwords: "modular zk rollup supporting AI," and an annoying invite-only marketing campaign called Blast. It's bad, but…
It is backed by Pantera and Dragonfly and integrates major LRT protocols, so you can participate in LRT + Zircuit airdrops simultaneously. Deposit your LRT ETH to earn double points. You can withdraw at any time.
• Mode network: Another Blast/Zircuit/Manta copy L2, but it's an Optimistic rollup. Once again, I bought it because it supports EtherFi weETH and Renzo ezETH, so it's double mining.
Tokens will be released this month, but with a TVL of $175 million, it's not excessive.
• Ethena: No introduction needed, but if you're sitting on stablecoins, there may be no better airdrop than this.
I will share new airdrop protocols, as well as the previously shared airdrop playbook of DeFi Degen, which are still worth joining in this bullish market.
1. Eigenlayer+ Liquidity Staking Tokens + Actively Validated Services
The Eigenlayer mainnet is expected to launch in April, possibly accompanied by tokens. Additionally, I expect the LRT protocol to also launch their tokens at the same time.
The growth of EigenLayer's TVL is amazing. Since my Degen playbook in December last year, TVL has grown from $262 million to $12 billion—a 4480% increase! It is second only to Lido, surpassing AAVE.
Liquidity re-staking has accumulated $8.4 billion in just 13 protocols, meaning most EIGEN airdrop hunters prefer mining through the LRT protocol.
More importantly, everyone has forgotten about EigenLayer's AVS airdrop. There are 14 more in the pipeline. Just this week, a new AVS "Gasp" cross-chain swap company announced a $5 million seed funding, valuing at $80 million. Venture capital funding for AVS is a good sign.
If you want to learn about the AVS protocol, please check out my previous post.
Navigating Restaking: Your Guide to Eigenlayer's Actively Validated Services
I expect the number of LRT protocols to continue to grow, but the market has already stabilized. Only 7 have a TVL of over $100 million.
So, if you're sitting on native ETH, LRT is the best place.
What to do?
• EtherFi: Even after the token release, ETHFI's TVL has increased, and the second season will end on June 30. Consider the strategies:
(Simple) Deposit eETH into EtherFi's "Liquidity" strategy to earn 20% APY, 2x EtherFi, and 1x Eigenlayer points
(Advanced) On Fluid, earn up to 10x leverage on Eigen and 20x EtherFi points.
• Renzo: The fastest-growing LRT, with a TVL of up to $23 billion. Binance Labs announced investment, and Thor Hartvigsen's calculations indicate that Renzo is the "best place to park ETH at the moment." The token release date has not been announced.
Choose any DeFi strategy that suits you across multiple L2s and protocols.
• Swell: Confirmed to launch tokens in mid to late April, rswETH withdrawals are coming soon, and Swell will launch its own L2 with native staking rewards. If you want to enter and exit quickly, Swell might be a good choice.
Mint rswETH and earn more pearls
Consider waiting for Swell L2 pre-deposits to open soon
• Puffer: The third-largest LRT, but TVL is declining. This is because Puffer currently does not support native ETH staking (unlike Renzo and EtherFi). Therefore, new stETH depositors cannot earn Eigen points on Puffer. However, it is backed by Binance Labs, so some exposure is effective.
Join the Crunchy Carrot Quest and deposit into Curve/Convex pools here to earn 2x points.
• Kelp: Did something that might annoy the Eigenlayer team: launched liquid EIGEN points as the KEP token. Check KEP price here.
Kelp has launched the "Road to a Billion" TVL reward, where every ETH can earn up to 100 additional EIGEN (about $17 per ETH, $0.17 per KEP).
Important note: Eigenlayer and LRT tokens will be released soon, so to leverage your points, consider using the Pendle YT token. The value of YT drops to 0 at maturity, but due to Pendle, my EtherFI airdrop is the largest ever.
You can view Thor Hartvigsen's Pendle LRT calculations here and Stephen DeFi Dojo's real-time calculations.
2. Stacks
Still one of my favorite dramas because:
- Bitcoin L2 narrative
- Nakamoto's upgrade to launch 5-second transactions in April (trading on Stacks will become interesting)
- The ecosystem is still small, with few miners, making it easy to position oneself early. In dollar terms, TVL has grown from $35 million to $176 million in 4 months, but this is due to the rise in STX price. In STX terms, TVL has doubled.
Good. Still early.
If you're very lazy but want rewards, Stacks has two best opportunities:
• Stacking DAO: Liquidity staking of STX's stSTX. Live points with my referral if possible 🙇♂️
Rewards: Deposit stSTX/STX LP for 2x airdrop to Bitlow: Stacks DEX. Stacking DAO offers additional points on top of Bitlow airdrop.
• Lisa: Another liquidity Stacking just launched. Apply for the waitlist here. Alex Labs' staking and mining.
Other farms to consider:
• Arkadiko: Stake STX to mint USDA stablecoin. Will launch Bitcoin native loans. Exchange and hold some USDA.
• Hermetica: Earn funds on BTC using derivative strategies. Use stack sBTC. Currently on testnet, but I'll wait for mainnet trial.
• Zest: Bitcoin lending. Currently in internal testing, but access can be requested here.
• Velar: AMM. Just completed ICOs for Gate and Bybit. Airdrop points system launched.
3. Starknet
I know many of you are disappointed for not receiving the airdrop, so you've permanently left this ecosystem.
But I still like Starknet for its unique Cairo development language (prevents easy forks and fewer protocols → easier to focus on where to mine), STARK and SNARK scaling technology, and the utility of the STRK token for staking and gas.
Additionally, the second STRK airdrop is coming soon, and Starknet's TVL ($314 million) is still low compared to STRK's FDV ($19 billion), so I can smell an airdrop coming.
However, I'm disappointed with the zkLend airdrop: I only received a few hundred dollars of loans/borrowing for 5-digit assets. Almost no one knew the airdrop had started, click here to see.
I hope these three protocols will bring more returns to users:
• Nostra: First. TVL dApp (total Starknet $314 million, of which $200 million).
• Ekubo: First, DEX. Besides running a points system, most major asset LP rewards are 50%, so you can earn airdrop points + profits.
Note: Ekubo LP withdrawal fees are ridiculously high (up to 1%), so choose a wide range of LP assets.
• Avnu: Starknet's Jupiter. I often make small trades to earn more points.
4. Solana
Most major Solana dApps are launching tokens (especially KMNO, PRCL, TNSR, and DRFT?), but mining is not over. There's a new trend of immediately launching tokens and points activities in the second season to prevent TVL loss. This is effective because only half of the first batch was airdropped.
Here are the ones I'm currently watching:
• Kamino: First season ended, second season ongoing. Expected to list in April!
My favorite is 5x SOL multiplied by degen treasury (but low liquidation risk).
• Sanctum: New LST, or LST aggregator. JTO's airdrop was good, Sanctum might be better. Raised $6.1 million from Dragonfly, Sequoia, Solana Labs, etc. Still early for a TVL of $100 million. I deposited money into INF (a basket of LST with a 9.3% interest rate).
• Marginfi: Jokingly launched tokens, but I'm tired of their endless points activities. Additionally, they also launched the native stablecoin YBX. Honestly, Aave and Curve launched stablecoins to attract TVL but failed to gain traction, so I don't have high expectations for their stablecoin. Still, a little farming is needed.
• Backpack: Has an exchange and wallet. Requires KYC for trading to prevent witching and may offer higher airdrops. Raised $17 million led by Placeholder VC & Wormhole.
• Tensor: I still hold and stake Tensorian NFT, but the price has dropped. Surprisingly, despite MagicEden eating into Tensor's market share, sales of Solana NFTs are still growing.
Nevertheless, the Tensor team is still launching new features (price locking), and the token release may trigger a FOMO revival.
• Grass: Passively earning points with an old phone. If your funds are limited, Grass is a cost-effective choice.
It fits the Solana x AI narrative. They will launch their own L2. You need to install a Google extension to mine points. Just raised $3.5 million from Polychain Capital, Bitscale, etc.
• Parcl: Long/short real estate market. I'm just mining points in USDC liquidity.
• Flash.trade: Perpetual contracts for cryptocurrency, commodities, and forex trading. They have NFTs that change based on your trading history, and you'll receive part of the protocol fees, and they're likely to airdrop.
• Drift: Margin trading, borrowing.
5. SUI
Why SUI?
I joined SUI relatively late, and my position is not large. But this experience is much better than I imagined. TVL continues to grow, making SEI, INJ, or Aptos pale in comparison. But the main dApps still don't have tokens.
I like that it's built with the Move programming language because it can prevent simple copy-paste Ethereum forks.
Consider these operations on SUI
SUI has three LSTs available (possibly the simplest gameplay)
• Stake some SUI for haSUI on Headal.
Note: Exchange SUI to haSUI on the Cetus protocol for better rates.
• Stake some SUI for an SUI LST here.
Note: Provides liquidity mining with up to 100% annual interest rate.
• Borrow haSUI and/or afSUI and lend stablecoins or SUI on the Navi protocol (with tokens but APY up to 30%) and Scallop (second phase airdrop points launch).
• Borrow $SUI to lend stablecoins $BUCK on Bucket - Maker of Sui.
6. Bitcoin Ecosystem
Bitcoin ordinal is the second bullish thing in the crypto space. Right behind Stacking.
I bought Bitcoin NFTs very early, and they not only appreciated but also yielded returns in multiple airdrops, most notably RSIC and Runestone. In fact, I received too many airdrops that I don't even know what they're for.
Now, the Runes protocol is launching on the Bitcoin halving block, which will bring more trading opportunities for Bitcoin.
With more and more protocols, I recommend checking this thread and learning before the fun begins.
https://twitter.com/DoggfatherCrew/status/1775546878836294102
Additionally, here's a great educational thread from peddy.
https://twitter.com/peddy2612/status/1775948393904308314
If you're new to ordinals, I've written a beginner's explanation and some protocols for you to try:
Ordinals & BTC DeFi: Start Here.
7. SEI
I've exited most of the SEI ecosystem. So far, there's a lack of growth and few dApps. SEI will launch EVM through SEI V2, but I expect it to be overshadowed by low-effort Ethereum forks.
However, one area I'm optimistic about is the Silo liquidity staking on SEI. Simply stake some SEI and wait for the airdrop.
Stake on Silo.
8. Injective
I recently completely exited the Injective ecosystem.
The ecosystem is filled with low-quality dApps (even their front ends are riddled with typos), lacks a passionate community, and worse, the airdrops received by INJ stakers and dApp users are only worth a few hundred dollars. For months, I've been mining and depositing close to six figures.
Injective seems to lack innovation internally. My suspicion is that after the final token unlock, investors will intend to cash out. Perhaps an exit pump is imminent.
Overall, my market expectation is that after accumulation, cryptocurrencies will rise, and airdrops will continue to come.
Then there will be some structural changes in the market (it always happens), and the script for Degen will also change. So, when it happens, please subscribe to Part 2.
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