Recently, Lighter has been frequently mentioned by some industry insiders and airdrop hunters KOLs. Its mainnet test trading volume has also been hyped by certain Chinese airdrop hunters communities. Overall, I am not optimistic about Lighter: About Narrative and Logic Lighter’s core narrative is that it has identified some pain points in the Prep DEX space and attempts to solve them through technological innovation to succeed. For example, Lighter believes that using zk technology can achieve scalable, low-latency, secure, and trustless matching and liquidation mechanisms. I believe that in the Prep DEX space, relying purely on product and technical innovation no longer leads to unicorns. The core competitiveness lies in the founder’s strong market-making (mm) ability and resource integration (the money to pump the market). For example, Hyperliquid’s core strength is its powerful market-making and the wealth effects created by market pumping. GMX quickly faded once it lost the ability to drive market activity. Similar zk technology-based derivatives projects like @derivio_xyz and @grvt_io all have their own technical features, but having good technology does not guarantee market success. Notably, multiple bloggers have pointed out that Lighter’s technical abilities are very unprofessional; their documentation looks like something made by a makeshift team. Also, the API signature is completely opaque—you must give your wallet private key to sign, which poses a huge risk. About the Team founder of @Lighter_xyz , Vladimir Novakovski (Russian origin), is also the founder and CEO of an AI social platform called Lunchclub, which has received investment from a16z and Lightspeed. Silicon Valley insiders have said that Vladimir Novakovski is essentially using funds from Lunchclub to start Lighter. The continued backing from these investors is partly because Lighter is a new project that can issue tokens, helping previous investors exit. Currently, Lighter is actively seeking support and endorsements from large institutions. About Project Progress Lighter started operating in early 2023. Initially, it was deployed on Arbitrum and positioned as a competitor to GMX. It ran for about two years, but its Twitter and community channels were almost inactive with no updates for nearly two years. In 2024, Lighter partnered with zkSync and launched a customized ZK Rollup called zkLighter, running as an L3 on zkSync. Until last November, after Hyperliquid’s successful launch, Lighter realized the booming opportunity in Prep DEX. This year, under the label of “the next Hyperliquid,” Lighter restarted its operation, launching a testnet and trading competitions. About the Founder Vladimir Novakovski is a well-known Silicon Valley entrepreneur. He is a Harvard mogul with awards in I0I/IPhO, worked in quantitative trading for over ten years, served nine years as a Portfolio Manager, and later worked mainly in engineering roles at companies like Quora and Addepar. While the founder has market-making and engineering experience, his recent focus has been on engineering, with no publicly verifiable market-making achievements in crypto. Moreover, some Silicon Valley insiders and acquaintances say Vladimir often indulges in Miami yacht parties and is frequently involved with drugs. He has also reportedly breached commission agreements with multiple partners, so the future token distribution dynamics of this project are worth watching. Disclosure: I have several accounts trading on Lighter, mainly with expectations of airdrop rewards. I hope that when Lighter issues tokens, the situation proves me wrong.