In late 2024, AI-crypto projects like Virtuals and ai16z (later renamed to Eliza OS) became a popular narrative before fading badly. But the hype may eventually become a new, and strange, reality.

According to CoinMarketCap, the AI sector of crypto has seen a stark decline in market capitalization this year.

AI-related cryptocurrencies, mainly based on Ethereum, its layer 2 chains and Solana, hit a record-high $69B market cap in early 2025. That market cap is now around $16B as the sector fizzled along with the rest of crypto. But it will come back - it’s something to keep an eye on, because both crypto and AI aren’t going anywhere.

The AI-Crypto Use Case

Ribbit Capital, which put VC money into Coinbase, Solana and Privy, among others, made public a report recently describing a Cambrian explosion in cryptocurrencies that will be adopted by AI. These tokens will create buying demand from AI agents, Ribbit proclaims, purchased for artificial intelligence to complete a various tasks.

This could be highly impactful for crypto markets as AI becomes more efficient and precise over time. The first cycle for crypto AI agents is obviously over. But the category will experience a resurgence. One driver is the low cost for launching tokens.

It used to be hard to launch new cryptocurrencies. But that complexity is gone - millions of tokens have been launched on the Solana-based launchpad Pump.fun. At least ten thousand are still being launched there everyday. Imagine the future - it’s going to be more token-heavy than most people could possibly dream.

Let the Agent do the Work

On Solana, it costs about $10 to launch a token, with onchain transaction fees under $0.02. Yes, this has meant the creation of really low-quality shitmemecoins. But cheap tokenization will lead the way for AI agents to do work more valuable than the cost of these cheap transaction fees. Pay an AI agent, to go do some work, even trading in the crypto markets, more precise and efficient than any human ever could.

AI agents in the future will readily take cryptocurrencies from humans as payment to do things like financial analysis and trading. Ribbit Capital’s report noted over 330M financial app downloads in the U.S. for 2024, 11M of which were in personal financial management.

The demand for inexpensive financial services exists - and AI agents powered by and being paid small amounts of crypto could cheaply fill that need. Coinbase has already launched an AI-powered advisor in its wallet app. The logical evolution of this is AI agents taking crypto tokens for advice - financial or otherwise.

The Tokenization Unlock

As AI agents take on tasks like financial advice, tokenized activity will increase as markets begin a slow march onchain. There’s currently a rush for assets to be placed on blockchains - RWA.xyz pegs that value currently around $18B. Tokenization can unlock brand-new markets, and it's probably going to be unleashed on previously closed-off value.

There are lots of closed markets that could be unlocked and tradable. Fairly illiquid advertising markets, such as Google’s $264 billion or Meta’s $164 billion of 2024 reported ad revenue, might make a lot of sense. Liquid ad markets for marketing spenders to unleash AI agents to get the best pricing could unlock every specific ad’s true worth.

But would controlling behemoths like Google or Meta want to open up thefloodgates of an onchain ad market? Definitely not. But this is coming even if incumbents dislike it. And ads are just one market example. Think about all the markets tokenization might unleash. Prediction markets are a great instance of this. They are monetizing and democratizing forecasting onchain. Prior to prediction markets, only closed-off sportsbooks were doing anything like this, taking bets on politics and the outcomes of games. Now that those gates are open, they aren’t going to close again.

Things Could Get Strange

The AI agent burst in late 2024 petered out. But a new cycle will happen was artificial intelligence and the tokenization of brand-new markets improves. But crypto and a heavy dose of AI, might also create some market havoc. Get the popcorn ready with traditional markets and crypto more intertwined than ever before due to favorable U.S. policy.

This was certainly the case during the October 10, 2025 flash crash that saw a massive $19.5B in liquidations supposedly due to a traditional finance macro event - tariffs. Or when a bot on Lighter sent a thinly-traded HYPE market to an inflated $98 price per token on October 27, 2025. Could AI-powered and highly tokenized crypto markets get even weirder that this?

Ribbit Capital’s token paper, while bullish, also acknowledges this, noting that, “the future will be stranger and more surprising”.

Can’t wait.

June saw the massive IPO of Circle Internet Financial, provider of stablecoin USDC. Circle currently floats the second-highest number of stablecoins in circulation at $61 billion, with Tether at $157 billion in first place, according to CoinGecko. Stablecoins are now top of mind for many.

Why? Well, money of course. As of June 2025, the total stablecoin market capitalization reached approximately $250 billion, a significant increase from $208 billion in Q1 2025. Tether’s USDT holds a market cap of over $150 billion while USDC has grown to $60 billion. Ethena’s USDe, a newer entrant that has made significant progress since its 2024 launch, has a market cap of around $5.5 billion, making it the third-largest stablecoin in some metrics

So are we at peak stablecoin? Where do stable blockchain assets go from here?

A Booming Business Will Produce Copycats

With Circle’s attention in the public markets - its stock price moved from $31 at IPO to hundreds of dollars in short order during June - a stablecoin rush is on. But the stablecoin concept is not brand-new. Amazingly, stablecoins have been around for almost a decade already.

Stablecoins solved a huge problem back when banks would not service crypto companies. This made bank-based dollars in the ecosystem scarce. Tether was the first to jump on this in 2014 with its blockchain-based dollar, USDT, followed by Circle’s USDC in 2018. Blockchain bucks are aplenty in crypto-land now.

Issuers like Tether and Circle make a ton of money in the stablecoin business as a result of high interest rates. These companies use their float issuing stablecoins for cash to purchase Treasury Bills. This provides these companies cash flow in the form of net interest income, or NIM. It’s hugely profitable. Tether reported nearly $14 billion in profits in 2024, largely from interest on its $100 billion in U.S. Treasury bills.

Copycats are sure to follow this trend. Expect to see the issuance of many brand-new stablecoins as a result. But many emerging stablecoins may have trouble finding product-market fit with so many entrants already entrenched. It doesn’t make a lot of sense to issue yet another stablecoin unless it’s a bank or a government with a large moat.

Not New Stablecoins, But New Stablecoins Apps

Entrepreneurs should be thinking about using the existing stablecoins already in the ecosystem instead of creating new ones. The real opportunity is building programmable money apps that utilize stablecoins, replacing the need for consumer apps to rely so much on banks. This can mainstream users to the “onchain” world - dollars running on a blockchain rather than inside of a bank account.

Stablecoins enable “programmable money” applications, automating payments based on real-world conditions. In high-inflation economies like Argentina, for example businesses use USDC to preserve value. They can convert local currency to digital dollars instantly, reducing reliance on foreign bank accounts.

The stablecoin operators already in existence like Tether, Circle and possibly the DeFi-focused Ethena will be the providers for these apps. These stablecoin-based apps could be for shopping, gaming, prediction markets - applications where, with stable assets, there’s no need for traditional banking - it's replaced by blockchain. Payments provider Stripe is at the forefront of this, authorizing USDC payments in 2024, with transactions from over 70 countries in the first 24 hours.

Stablecoins Are the Method to the Masses

Stripe’s acquisition of stablecoin ramp Bridge in 2024 and wallet provider Privy in 2025 enhances onchain payment infrastructure for developers and entrepreneurs. This can reduce fees compared to traditional card transactions in apps by replacing them with onchain stablecoin payments.

Stablecoins are the best way to onboard more new users to blockchain. New apps that support stablecoins will almost be like stealth crypto exchanges: Users will onboard into stables and offramp back into dollars often without knowing it. Everything will just look like a dollar. This is the next stage of crypto’s adoption.

Apps that are powered by stablecoins, upending existing web2 apps using legacy banking and compliance, is the next step for blockchain adoption. And as stablecoins move mainstream, keep an eye on Ethereum. Most developers are familiar with Ethereum as the original smart contract programmable money chain, and the network has a massive $100B+ stablecoin market cap already.

So watch out - the next big payment or gaming app that becomes wildly popular might just be one that’s totally onchain. Stablecoins haven’t peaked. That’s because there is almost no mainstream user saturation for stablecoins yet - that sector is just warming up

Over the course of 2025 so far, I’ve been really focused on the utility of layer 1 blockchains. And there’s a really good reason for this. We now, in the world of cryptofication, are entering a time when more and more layer 1 blockchains will emerge. Just look at the top ten cryptocurrencies on CoinGecko.

Of the top ten cryptocurrencies by market cap in 2025, 70% are layer 1 blockchains. Some of them don’t scale for technical reasons, namely Bitcoin and Ethereum, necessitating the use of other chains, called layer 2 solutions, to built more purpose-built utility. You know, things that people want to actually use blockchains for, like web3 apps.

I’ve long been skeptical of layer 2 blockchains, and some have had success, such as Base. Yet the more I talk to web3 entrenprenuers in the space lately, the more I realize an explosion of layer 1 blockchains are coming.

For some reading this, this may sound counterintutive. The argument would be there are already tons of layer 1 blockchains that have emerged in the wake of scaling problems. But many of these layer 1s aren’t getting any traction, despite constant marketing efforts convincing developers to build on them.

And this is where the developer conumdrum comes in. Blockchains are now getting easier to deploy, so why build on an existing ecosystem? Why not fork or use tooling to build one exactly purpose-built for the specific needs of a web3 app?

I think this is really where we are at in the industry today, and it makes sense. There’s an argument to be had about network security. But with staking, networks can pool highly liquid crypto capital (and thus consensus) in a way to keep a network honest. In this way, new layer 1s can be spun up a lot faster than ever before.

One of the best examples of this today is the DEX Hyperliquid. I’ve been talking a lot about Hyperliquid with people recently, and that’s because there are approaching the layer 1 blockchain thing in the very correct way it should be done. They’ve built a centralized exchange experience with an orderbook on chain. They are still having some growing pains in how they do their business but it’s working. The chain has Solana-like speed, which is smart to copy, on basically an exchangechain that now has had $2 trillion in volume.

That being said, another dynamic in play here is surely regulation. In the past, many entrepreneurs would have shied away from launching their own chains with cryptocurrencies because of total regulatory uncertainty.

But since the current U.S. administration has pretty much dropped S.E.C. investigations on blockchains - XRP as one example - it seems really favorable to launch new chains.

Lastly, composability across chains is really starting to make headway. I’ve never been a huge fan of bridges, and in previous years we’ve seen them hacked - Axie Infinity comes to mind here.

However, new systems like THORchain, which is a DEX that is adding multiple exchangeable assets across layer 1s, are emerging at lightnining speed. And of course there are centalized exchanges as well, which allow people to move across chains, with more liquidity than ever before.

We’re going to see a mind-blowing amount of chains emerge. Stablecoins, retail, gaming - it’s simply too easy for web3 developers to build and deploy their own layer 1s.

These chains will be purpose-built for what exactly what’s needed rather than some general-purpose “we build it, developrs come” strategy. Many of those chains, which are too numerous to list here, are struggling with traction becase they still have no blockbuster apps for a community to form around.

So the layer 1s are coming, and they aren’t going to stop coming.

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In early 2025, the entire blockchain world was super bullish on the prospects of Solana, a top-ten cryptocurrency by market cap.

Solana was disrupting things so quickly in crypto that folks in the Ethereum world were madcappishly freaking out. They were calling for changes in foundational leadership, to eat its own dogfood, to find institutional product-market fit. Perma ether bulls Paradigm, a crypto VC fund backing a lot of Ethereum-based technology, even called out the need for the chain to focus, accelerate, accelerate!

One could argue Solana has found a product-market fit. The chain’s speed and megacheap layer-1 fees made for a perfect fit for the pump.fun memecoin craze. Say what you will about crypto speculation, but it brings in the people! Mass adoption incoming!

Now that the memecoin craze has fallen flat, that product-market fit is looking as volatile as owning a shitcoin itself. Since peaking at almost 400,000 active users at the end of January, pump.fun’s daily active and new users has fallen off a cliff.

Recently, I thought it appropriate to make a joke that upon the news of the U.S. government’s strategic crypto reserve, or some government might actually think about adding memecoins to a stockpile. I still think that might happen, because community strength is such a crypto superpower. But for the time being, the memecoin market is seriously pooping the bed.

And as the memecoins go, so does Solana - at least for now. The price of SOL has retreated to a level not seen since May 2022. CoinDesk is making an assumption the average SOL holder is underwater. Exacerbating Solana’s problems are a massive amount of token unlocks that started happening in February 2025.

It’s not clear why the network decided early 2025 would be a good time to unlock 15 million SOL that investors other stakeholders possess. Perhaps far-off dates in the future portend a permabullish cycle to the moon-minded. Unfortunately, this release of tokens is happening a poor market time.

Maybe that’s a lesson other blockchains could learn from. On that note, there have been a lot of things that Solana has done that other early chains looking to grow should adopt.

1. Airdrop. In December 2023, during the bear market, staking platform Jito did a massive airdrop. It gave 100,000,000 JTO tokens to users who held SOL. At the time, bridging to other blockchains outside of the Solana chain wasn’t easy. So a lot of that wealth from those early Solana users stayed in the ecosystem.

2. Flywheel. The JTO airdrop brought attention to the ecosystem, with money flowing to go after opportunities. This includes Solana platforms previously without a token. The DEX Jupiter, for example, benefited from the Jito airdrop and earned lots of fees on trading. Jupiter launched their own JUP token in January of 2024.

3. Tokens. Solana, when compared to Ethereum’s ERC-20, turbocharges the token trading experience. There are no approvals for transfers and transaction fees are megacheap - making deploying new assets much easier. Solana tokens are, simply put, more efficient relative to the ERC-20 standard (insert sorry sad-face Vitalik).

4. DeFi. After the Jito airdrop and Jupiter started fueling the network, DeFi apps appeared on Solana in 2024. Pump.fun, Raydium DEX, Drift perp swaps, etc. DeFi on the Solana network was pretty nascent when compared to Ethereum to start out with. However, by January 2025, Solana was soundly beating Ethereum DEX volumes.

5. Memecoins. Everybody’s favorite casino after Binance, pump.fun launched exactly into the hockey stick price growth of SOL (see price chart above). Remember now, Jito airdropped big bucks in Dec 2023, then Jupiter exacerbated it in Jan 2024. Pump.fun launched hysteria allowing people toss SOL at thousands of memes.

6. Loop. Ever heard of a self-reinforcing loop? All of these elements above have created a rinse and repeat mechanic that has propelled Solana to fresh highs in blockchain usage. The ingredients are simple. Bring on the speculation. Build the right DeFi. Launch products that feed off of liquidity. Crypto users will be the worker bees.

Despite the down market and SOL’s price exacerbated by massive token unlocks, the blockchain hit on a lot of things to make it successful. People can hate on Solana all they want for certain aspects of its ecosystem. And these massive SOL unlocks on a prayer there would be “crypto spring” around this time are going to depress prices for a while in 2025.

Yet the SOL still burns. Brightly.

Thanks to Wit Smieszek for insight into this.

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The cryptocurrency market cap has shot back up to over $3 trillion on Trump’s announcement of a strategic crypto reserve. Details are still scarce. But what’s known is the reserve includes assets such as BTC, ETH, SOL - and probably others. This comes ahead of a crypto summit being held at the White House on March 7.

Memecoins are surging along with the rest of crypto because of this news. The total memecoin market cap is now about $70 billion, with over $14 billion in daily volume. That’s a $10 billion increase in one day on crypto strategic reserve news!

This is the speed of crypto. And it moves in ever-faster cycles under the new cryptofication of America. Especially with a president that has his own memecoin.

Top cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ethereum and Solana - plus whatever else goes into the newly-announced strategic crypto reserve by Trump - play a bigger role in meme-mania than people think. Think about the past crypto cycles and the place memecoins have had in them.

The top memecoins with at least a $1 billion market capitalization, according to CoinGecko, are from supercycles. There’s dogecoin from the Bitcoin days. There’s Shiba Inu and Pepe from the Ethereum. Then there’s Bonk and Trump from this most recent Solana jump.

So while it’s important to remember that memecoins have come and gone over the years, a select few do stay around. And they are spreading to more top blockchains over time.

The most recent chain was Solana. The SOL-based pump.fun cycle was powered by the idea of “fair” launch tokens - which really weren’t always that fair. The concept once felt like an improvement - no “presales”, which were subject to scrutiny over the years for insider profiting.

But pump.fun is susceptible to unfair problems, including “sniping” where bots are able to profit from price hikes in the early life of a token. Then there are the ever-popular “rugs" where a developer simply exits out of their holdings, leaving dumbstruck investors with a worthless crypto.

Regardless of fairness, pump.fun as a crypto business model works. The platform has made over $500 million in fees over its short lifetime since launching in early 2024.

People like the crypto casino, it’s a simple fact. And future memecoins will be launched by apps that have a better handle on making things fair for users while copying the pump.fun business model. Some of them could include personal tokenization concepts like Clout, or gamification methods like Yapster.

The SEC guidance on memecoins having little value and aren’t securities is important. Now it’s clear they aren’t securities, many will focus on their place as community-based tokens.

A memecoin doesn’t have value without a community. There are well over 200 tokens that were launched on pump.fun that still have a $1m market cap. People are still holding those cryptocurrencies. Community takeovers, or “CTOs” of existing memecoins many people already hold will continue. Powered by whenever a resurgent crypto market occurs, groups will resurrect older memes to give them new life.

So love them or hate them, but memecoins bring in new adopters. As much as many hate to believe it, memes are doing good work to build up better infrastructure in crypto.

Why? Increased crypto infrastructure results in other interesting things people adopt: Stablecoins, real-world assets (RWAs) and easy-to-use apps. Not just speculation. Just look at the stablecoin market, which just cracked the $200 billion market cap at the beginning of 2025. More stablecoins are coming, as it is likely Trump will get stablecoin regulation done for financial service companies.

So - yes, many come to memecoins for the crypto casino. But then many often stick around, exploring crypto and becoming a native.

What’s wrong with that? And when will a community get a memecoin into some government’s crypto reserve?

It’s going to happen. Probably sooner than we can even imagine.

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There was once a time when Ethereum’s “world computer” concept seemed revolutionary and leading crypto innovation. But now it’s been surpassed by other, more centralized systems like Solana - to great success.

And even though people are currently shitting on Solana and hyping Ethereum because of the Argentina $LIBRA token scam, it’s mostly a distraction from the real issues at hand.

Ethereum’s decentralization mandate requires the network to currently use additional blockchains as scaling systems. And there’s probably no way to put that decentralization toothpaste back in the tube.

There’s been a number of amazing things Ethereum has accomplished. It launched the first really successful smart contract platform. It built the foundation for DAOs, DEXes, DeFi, NFTs and ultimately the web3 era. Ethereum even was able to audaciously move from proof-of-work to a proof-of-stake system with the “Merge” under co-founder Vitalik Buterin’s stewardship.

Problem is, Ethereum is moving into an entirely new phase. The network has an inability, due to decentralization desires on its base layer, to process enough transactions. This has necessitated “layer 2” blockchain solutions requiring users to be aware of which chain they are interacting with. And the introduction of “blobs” in 2024 for layer 2s to interact with the main chain has also hit limits, sometimes leading to an expensive fee market.

There is currently a propsal to increase the number of target blobs per block, but the argument - as usual - against this is that it further centralizes the network. Indeed, over 30% of blob usage can be attributed to a for-profit and centralized entity: Coinbase’s Base with 33%. Worldcoin’s World Chain comes in third at 11% of blob usage.

Meanwhile, Ethereum-heads are loving the Argentina scam, whose president tweeted endorsement of the Solana-based $LIBRA token. Only to have $100m of the liquidity quickly drained from the coin, known as a “rug-pull” scam.

The advent of pump.fun and other web3 user adoption apps on the more centralized Solana in 2024 has caused Ethereum trouble. This is evident when looking at Dexscreener: The majority of tokens being launched with any traction are on Solana, using pump.fun and then the Raydium DEX when they “graduate” when the market cap hits $100k. Very few launch on any of Ethereum’s chains, bullshit Argentina rug-pull cryptocurrencies be damned.

So it’s easy to forget there’s been general chaos in the Ethereum ecosystem with what appears to be a bit of an identity crisis. Vitalik Buterin’s management style has been under scrutiny as a result. Community members have advocated for a new Executive Director for the Ethereum Foundation.

Problem is, the Ethereum Foundation runs like a non-profit, which is what it is. It’s not led by a CEO-style executor or “killer” style manager at the top. This would explain the waffling Buterin is now doing to appease the community concerned about ETH prices, proposing a raise in the gas limit which would also - ironically- raise the level of centralization.

Exacerbating this issue is that the price of ETH has tanked. The market prices things in, and the future of Ethereum, and ether itself, is more likely to be that of a settlement layer. Sorry, but that seems to be the direction this is all going in.

I suspect some of the recent thrash in the Ethereum community is humans clashing with this dose of reality: Ethereum, like Bitcoin, is going to be a settlement layer. And while I have shit on layer 2 solutions in the past, my problem is really the additional blockchains with that solution, creating a Lasanga-like experience for users.

Problem is, when you put a mass crypto adoption hat on, no regular user will ever care about all of these additional chains on top of networks that don’t scale. No one cares about how email works, it just does, and at the speed of the internet. Remember, outside of enterprise, email didn’t get super popular until tech companies started creating dead-simple web-based versions like Hotmail and Gmail.

Isn’t that the point of web3 in the first place? Create a crypto-based and easy-to-use web free from the walled gardens of web2?

The better solution is using cryptography to move computation away from complex layer 2 blockchains. This is where real concepts like rollups come into play: Instead of a secondary chain, this technology just uses cryptography to secure computation, and then use blockchains as the transactional settlement layer for finality. State channels in Bitcoin’s Lightning network is an example of this, although is by no means a reference for any sort of high-level adoption.

So, what the hell happened to Ethereum? Well, maybe it’s just becoming what it is supposed to be: A decentralized settlement layer with smart contract capabilities. Solana is exciting - despite its centralization, people want high staking yields, speed and low fees - scams like Argentina coin be damned. Users simply don’t care about decentralization.

Maybe that’s why Ethereum staking is seeing a huge pullback. Maybe that’s why so many people are angling for change with the Ethereum Foundation. Bitcoin no longer has a Foundation, but ironically has a bunch of centralized players (public companies, governments, lobbying groups) advocating for it in ways Ethereum simply doesn’t.

Deflecting the issues with Ethereum by pointing out scams isn’t going to work to change the forward momentum of Solana.

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Donald Trump is now the President of the United States. Again.

To preface, I am not a political person. I don’t even vote. Not interested in choosing a side. But I do work in crypto, and it is obvious the new administration, and Trump’s launch of his own memecoin, will be remembered as a significant moment for the industry.

It’s the beginning of a cryptofication for America that most didn’t see coming. Now that it’s arrived, it is a turn of events that should have been obvious. The amount of money from the crypto industry that influenced the 2024 election has created a hugely favorable environment for blockchain.

A lot of experiments are about to happen in this new era of cryptofication. Many of them will fail spectacularly. Some of them will blow off into space like one of Elon’s rockets. Consider that:

Trump’s Memecoin Will Spawn a Copycat Industry

Not long after the official $Trump memecoin lifted off the launchpad to become one of the most popular memecoins of all time in a matter of hours, degens began foaming at the mouth. We’ve already seen the $Melania coin launch, although its tokenomics don’t appear nearly as favorable as the Trump token.

There’s already a shitload of copycat coins looking to seek out opportunity from slippery-fingered traders who can’t tell the difference between what is real and what is not. And I expect to see thousands of people launch their own coins in the aftermath of $Trump and the beginning of cryptofication. Of course, many of these will not succeed. However, those who follow the lead of creators like the Unicorn Fart Dust guy, who transitioned from a skeptical boomer into a crypto zealot, can find their way in this space.

AI Agents Will Supercharge Traction

The convergence of artificial intellgence and crypto has arrived. Yes, a lot of the AI agents now popping up on Twitter/X are nonsensical in what they post. Glorified chatbots is a often-heard criticism. But the reality is that these agents are able to build followings - Terminal of Truths has hundreds of thousands - and these following are obviously made up of (mostly) humans.

The combination of tokens and AI agents will allow projects to take off faster than ever before in this world of cryptofication. Sure, there will be terrible ideas and outright scams. But the ability to launch a token and an AI agent will allow the best ideas to shoot to the moon faster than ever before. The entrepreneur with a brilliant idea (like Yesnoerror) will be able to get something out to the world much faster. The idea generators will be able to launch and fail much faster than ever before.

The Trump Administration Will be Hands-Off

Over the past four years, the crypto industry has lived under the specter of a U.S. administration that ruled via enforcement. I assume this may have something to do with Biden’s overall inability to understand crypto, relegating SEC chair Gary Gensler to rule with impunity. The situation sounds terrifying to me, which certainly limited a number of people from wanting to do things like launch tokens.

The new president now has his very own token. And the first lady has a cryptocurrency literally called “Official Melania Meme”. As cryptolawyer Preston Byrne has noted, even the Biden administration took a hands-off approach to memecoins. I think we’re about to see a ton of different cryptocurrencies beyond the meme concept due to lax regulation in 2025 and beyond. This could spawn some never-thought-of use cases, and foster some really exciting innovation in the space.

Good for America, Good for the World

This post is quite America-focused, but I certainly am not. As a digital nomad, I’ve traveled the world over the past few years and therefore have a very diverse worldview. As such, I see things not from just an American angle. The U.S really does lead the world in a lot of sectors. America has some really amazing homegrown industries, from Silicon Valley’s tech, Hollywood’s entertainment, Wall Street for finance and even Nashville for the music industry.

Cryptofication could create the first digital-only non-geographical homegrown industry with cryptocurrencies as the engine. Instead of new crypto business moving out of the U.S., as many have in the past, they may start moving in. American innovation and entreprenuership can now focus on crypto for the next few years. And this can ultimately benefit the world. Consider stablecoins, for example, that are almost all denominated in dollars and are accessible globally.

Bitcoin Maxis Shed Alligator Tears for Four Years

Bitcoin maximalists, also known as maxis, are a subset of the blockchain community that adhere to an almost religious belief that only BTC is the true cryptocurrency. Despite needing banks, stablecoins and the public market in the form of ETFs in order to succeed, bitcoin maxis use terms like “decentralization”, “premine” and “shitcoin” regularly to justify their ‘get off my lawn’ existence.

I expect them to continue to chafe, despite the most crypto-friendly administration in U.S. history coming in to foster enormous technical ingenuity. Instead of welcoming innovation in crypto, the cult of Bitcoin maxis will continue cry like little babies. Their personal development is so ridiculously arrested by Bitcoin, the lashing out will be comical and quite popcorn-friendly for at least the next four years of cryptofication.

Thoughts? Hit me up in the comments or @danielcawrey.

If anyone is looking for a crypto narrative in 2025, it’s probably going to be the rise of blockchain combined with artificial intelligence. Blink if you’ve missed it, but over the December 2024 doldrums into 2025 a new narrative has emerged.

Some people call this idea “decentralized AI”, “decentralized finance artificial intelligence (DeFAI)” or “on-chain AI”. The pace of AI development is moving real quick. And crypto as a mechanism for incentives makes a lot of sense.

The most interesting projects in crypto have always been those with the right incentive structures in place. On most blockchain networks, this is done in the form of fees.

Base layer chains essentially use fees as an economic structure to pay for transactions and complex computation. That’s a disincentive to attack a network because it would cost money to do so.

For the Bitcoin network, fees reduce the incentive for spammers to fill the chain with pointless transactions. For Ethereum, fees are used as “gas” in order to pay for transactions or computation. Although the methodogy often differs, other EVM and smart contract chains also do this.

These base layer incentives make sense. And tokens building on top of these chains can also build out economic incentives. A great example of this would be the Helium token on Solana’s base chain. Helium allows people to set up wireless hotspots and are incentivized for doing so in the HNT token when users want to access it. This is a simplied explanation of how it works, but is an example of what’s being called “DePIN”, or decentralized physical infrastructure.

This is where artificial intelligence comes in. There now are tokens that are building foundational incentives for constructing actual on-chain AI services. The two most prominent examples of this are Virtuals and ai16z.

These are networks that foster the launch of AI “agents” by paying in the corresponding native crypto. This is why people are calling this “agentic” AI. The cool thing, though, is the potential staying power of those networks and related tokens. This because a cryptocurrency is used to power the network. The Virtuals cryptocurrency is required to pay to lauch an agent on that network. Ai16z and its Eliza OS platform is expected to be the same way when it launches.

Expect to see a lot more of this crypto-economic structure within AI to emerge. Just think of the things crypto can do for AI. Blockchain networks enable capabilities regular payments or the traditional financial system cannot. Super-low fee transactions, including trading/swapping. Borderless payments. Microtransactions. Privacy.

Artificial Intelligence is expensive, in terms of the electricity and computation required. For example, Microsoft is spending a whopping $80 billion on AI infrastructure in 2025. Microsoft and other AI infrastructure companies are expecting an ROI.

Over time, some of the demand-side econonics will be coming from cryptocurrencies. Think about the possibilities. AI agents could pay infrastructure providers in crypto for resources. Agents could pay one another in tiny amounts for sharing data. And there will be numerous marketplaces powered by cryptocurrency far beyond just Virtuals and ai16z.

Tthis is a dynamic that once it takes off will have enormous impact and potential. The convergence of crypto and AI has arrived, and the results will likely be spectacular.

By all appearances, 2025 is shaping up to be a banner year for crypto. A brand-new Trump administration has many wild-eyed on cryptocurrency prospects. Mr. T, Elon and Ramaswamycoin have enthusiasts pumped about what’s ahead. And Trump has made a crypto about-face with the fresh cast characters surrounding him.

During his previous administration, Trump was not a cryptocurrency fan. This was made crystal clear in his 2019 thread regarding bitcoin. But by all appearances, the stage does seem to be set for there to be a better future for crypto ahead. This compared to Biden's wishy-wash policy by enforcement.

Now there is literal foaming at the mouth by some over potential blockchain regulation. The majority of 2025’s Congress is expected to be favorable to cryptocurrency. At least 300 of the 535-member incoming class are crypto complimentary, according to CoinDesk. Because of this, there seems to be a lot of echoing that positive crypto regulation is coming.

Source: Public Citizen

Is it really? Getting something made into U.S. law is not easy. But there could be motivation in the form of eye-watering corporate crypto campaign donation amounts. That's what $119.2M for the 2024 cycle can do!

Yet sound regulation is likley a taller task than many realize. The Republican majority in Congress’s House is very slim. This is assuming no Democrats go for a potential crypto bill. In that case, it would take every Republican to pass any bill in the House given its razor-thin majority.

How many realize the difficulty to get a bill to passed in order to make something a law? A great example of this is the “I’m Just a Bill” video from Schoolhouse Rock.

Bills die all the time, then have to go back for a vote, on and on... Consider all the the government shutdown turmoil just prior to Christmas. How much of an appetite will lawmakers have to pass crypto regulation? What would those regulations even look like?

Stablecoin regulation is something banks are desperately looking to get passed. This is due to the immense profits stablecoin issuers like Tether have reaped over the years. It might be more palatable to simply pass something in a line-item to allow banks to hold crypto. There’s a start.

Meanwhile, apeasing the degens could prove challenging. The out-of-nowhere December IRS rule for DeFi to verify users is already unpopular. Figuring out how to regulate people YOLO’ing memecoins on pump.fun might be a taller task.

In fact, some crypto degenerates would probably prefer no regulation at all :)

Michael Saylor, CEO of business intelligence firm MicroStrategy, is on a bitcoin roll. Saylor and his publicly-traded company (NASDAQ:MSTR) now own 1% of bitcoin’s circulation.

But why? Here’s a breakdown:

As a writer and author, I’ve come to realize the medium people are using most now is video. Because of this, I’m capturing topics like Michael Saylor’s bitcoin voyage in video “snacks” and publishing on Instagram and YouTube. Please give a subcribe or follow to support my work in cryptocurrency education.

And although Saylor has been criticized for his FOMO and buying BTC at the top, that’s his own perogative. Just like mine is to explore the world of video to educate people about what’s going on in crypto.

It could be genius. Either way, I hope you’ll join the adventure with me.

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Crypto has MASSIVE potential - fast, flexible and specifically designed so it can’t be counterfeited...

...yet so far it’s been a terrible form of electronic cash, which is what it was invented for.

Remember the Bitcoin whitepaper? Here’s the title and abstract in case you forgot:

But hey, when bitcoin’s hitting all-time highs again no one wants to spend BTC - it’s HODL time.

And just because bitcoin (or crypto in general) can’t be used as cash right now doesn’t mean that it could never be… but right now we’re in the Beanie Baby era. Check out my recent piece for Blockworks to read more.

My latest book, “Understanding Crypto”, is now available for Kindle, paperback and hardcover.

Please support cryptocurrency education by grabbing a copy and leaving a review. Let me know what you think!

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“Understanding Crypto” is a guide anyone can pick up and learn something new about cryptocurrencies. It goes through the foundations of crypto - and a lot of the important things people should know they might not read anywhere else.

So, please check out “Understanding Crypto” today - it was just released on Kindle. Audiobook and physical copies are also coming this summer. It’s basically all the stuff that I’ve learned in a decade working full-time in crypto-world.

“Understanding Crypto” is everyone interested in this subject. Check it out today and let me know what you think!

Special thanks to Brett Noyes and the great team that helped with this.

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Some may say the crypto winter is upon us. Some are fearful of what regulation may do to the blockchain industry as a whole.

But crypto’s nowhere near being on life support. The ecosystem is strong. Despite some uncertainty, now is the best time to be building.

Join me Thursday, March 30 at 10AM EST/2PM UTC for a special event. “Why Crypto’s not Dead” is a virtual presentation hosted on LinkedIn in conjunction with Pace Ventures.

We’ll cover:

• How DeFi can displace banks

• Why smart contracts are so revolutionary

• Crypto’s impact on the SBV viral bank run

• Why web3 technologies could kill some web2 businesses

• The 5 important things I have learned after 10 years in crypto

I will also be answering some questions following the presentation. Those who ask questions will receive a free signed copy of my upcoming book “Understanding Crypto” which is currently in pre-sale on Amazon.

Please join me for “Why Crypto’s not Dead” - RSVP now!

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• Virality is fostering strange dynamics in the world of finance

• Pointing the finger just at venture capital for banking runs is misguided

• Greed, technology and fight-or-flight behavior are factors for these issues

• The meme stock craze was a flashpoint; SVB is just the latest

It seems that many have forgotten just how quickly the speed of technology can topple things in this day and age. The phrase “the bigger they are, the harder they fall” may be more apt now, this era of what should be called viral bank runs.

What’s wrong with customers wanting a bank to operate properly and not do irresponsible things? Banks are supposed to be stewards of capital, safeguarding it. SVB wasn’t managing risk properly, leading it to report a loss on its capital.

This sparked the first-ever viral banking run, and the second largest-bank failure in U.S. history.

Venture capitalists rely on institutions like Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) in order to do business. SVB’s bank run was based on business people fearing the inability to, you know, do business.

Fear led to a cascade of bank runs and consolidation in almost a lightning-quick series of events. At least when considering the sloth-like pace of the banking.

A Dilemma Unwrapped

Molly White is a thought-provoking writer. Her website, Web3 is Going Just Great, is a sarcastic chronicle for the foibles in the crypto world. She’s encouraging healthy debate about what’s bad in blockchain, and the community needs that.

“The Venture Capitalists Dilemma” is a recent post from White’s newsletter. It is a foray into what’s happened with SVB’s viral bank run and the involvement of venture capital. The argument is that libertarian, free market VCs are perfectly fine turning around on a dime when it’s personally advantageous.

Basically, it’s this idea of the “prisoner’s dilemma”. Betrayal for individual gain or cooperation for mutual benefit is the definition of prisoner’s dilemma. However, it’s arguable that blaming a subset of the population, venture capitalists, as the focus on this problem is misguided.

The true problem is the mixture of greed and technology enabling super-fast panicked decision making by the masses. And we’ve already seen this dynamic before, with 2021’s meme stock craze.

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Bank Street Bets

It’s hard to not see this viral bank run phenomenon much differently than the Wall Street Bets craze. You know - the subreddit that led the retail investor craze back mid-pandemic? It led to huge run-ups in stocks that made no fundamental sense.

No one was, for example, going to movie theaters during pandemic lockdowns. But the AMC movie chain’s stock jumped like crazy. Led by a CEO who later decided to purchase equity in a gold mine that later struck coal, AMC played its hand magnificently.

Now, with movie theaters open and blockbusters playing, AMC is behaving like it did before the madness: Like a regular stock. And I suspect, despite the doom-saying, that this is what we’re going to experience post-viral bank runs. A congressional investigation, a couple of policy tweaks, lessons learned and back to normalcy.

But we’re certainly witnessing a new dynamic in play, one that now seems repeatable. If 2021’s meme stock craze was a singular moment, so has been 2023’s cascading viral bank runs. The “stonks” virality was replaced this time with utter insta-hysteria over a bank reporting a loss on its balance sheet.

Other cascading-type of events in the future are to come. Crypto and artificial intelligence are surely ripe sectors for it. Because we’ve entered into a new era. One where the combination of technology, greed and FOMO are a recipe for things to move very quickly, with decisiveness outweighing careful consideration.

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• The term “Bitcoin NFT” has become a loaded term in cryptocurrency

• Bitcoin Ordinals has brought fresh debate about the original blockchain

• Critics concerned about high spam and fees due to emergence of Ordinals

• Ordinals could change currency narrative to block space concept instead

Since January, a new dynamic has emerged within Bitcoin. It’s one of the most thought-provoking developments as it pertains to the world’s oldest cryptocurrency in years.

Bitcoin NFTs.

Yep, it’s a loaded term. And the proponents of this would prefer it called “digital artifacts” or “Ordinals” and not NFTs. That’s not a bad idea. Because the way this is designed is actually quite different from how NFTs work on other chains such as Ethereum - where most NFT activity exists now.

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Atoms, Not Links

Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonym inventor of Bitcoin, long ago quoted in Bitcoin ‘s codebase about the concept of “atoms”. The idea was to enable user reviews or other “attestation” data within the network. Ordinals are different from that, but the a key idea from this atom concept that is super interesting: The uniqueness of satoshis.

That’s where Ordinals come in. Every single satoshi, the smallest unit of bitcoin at 0.00000001 BTC, has a unique place on the blockchain. The Ordinals handbook goes into more detail on this. Here’s some basic notation how one satoshi is not like another. A perfect use case for non-fungible tokens or NFTs - the concept of uniqueness.

The ability to “order” Ordinals is what makes this implementation more elegant than other blockchain NFT systems. Whereas on other blockchains a link is often used as a pointer for an NFT, Ordinals are different.

Data is actually stored on the Bitcoin blockchain, thanks to the Segregated Witness (2017) and Taproot (2022) upgrades to the network. But these upgrades were designed to scale Bitcoin, not “spam” or inundate it with fees as some critics believe is happening with Ordinals.

What’s the Spam Problem?

Criticisms of Bitcoin NFTs are of course part of crypto discourse now. There is concern among some in the community that artifacts will clog up the Bitcoin blockchain. Worry also exists that fees will rise as JPEG-stuffers fill blocks with what these critics consider flimflam.

Both of these criticisms have some merit. Since the end of February and into March, the amount of text being inscribed on the Bitcoin blockchain using Ordinals is higher than those of images.

Surely some of this text inscribed is spam, just like images. But it’s text that should be concerning. If the blocks are filled with worthless text, that is a scenario for a blockchain full of junk. Not good.

But it’s not just junk floating out on the chain: The project Ordinal Loops is an example of ASCII art text being inscribed as images. That’s pretty cool, but may just be an outlier in a huge sea of blockchain junk.

We’ll see.

What’s the Fee Problem?

As for fees, there has been a spike in fee costs on Bitcoin recently. However, there’s been higher spikes in the past year. And bitcoin price has been jumping, which always correlates with higher transaction fees. Ordinals didn’t get off the ground until late January, so the fee argument needs more time for merit.

What is true is that there are a lot of fees being paid for the creation of Ordinals. Over $1.5 million in fees have been paid for inscribing bitcoin artifacts on the blockchain. So despite the criticism, it’s fair to consider that miners don’t have a problem with this.

This is all fine and well now, but there is some concern about the future. One of the worst things that can happen is that a fee market can develop.

This has happened before, and it’s not fun. A fee market basically means there is competition to be included in a block. When transactions start filling up the chain, prices start to go up.

As this dynamic plays out, a regular person not jacked into what’s happening with crypto just notices that network fees become exorbitantly high. Bitcoin’s decentralized nature means there isn’t a lot of broadcasting to users what is going on.

Bitcoin just becomes expensive.

Is Bitcoin Becoming Like IP Address Space?

The less Bitcoin block space available, the more competition to be included in blocks. So fees start to rise, and those able to afford higher fees will get included in the blocks first. That’s a simple supply and demand issue, of course.

Scaling solutions have been talked about for solving this, but this is a discussion for today, not tomorrow. It makes me think Bitcoin is going more towards the IPv4 address space in its form and function over a currency.

Amid bank failures crushing crypto liquidity, over-the-counter desks are popping with requests to buy crypto, and especially bitcoin, as an alternative to the banking system. Galaxy Digital certainly thinks so, although competitors like FTX and Genesis and others are dust now, so of course the last desk standing might be doing okay.

There’s no easy comparison to the world’s oldest cryptocurrency as a traditional banking hedge versus old-school IP address space still being valuable. Is there? Thus, the debate about Bitcoin NFTs, artifacts, Ordinals - whatever you want to call it - is interesting. It’s resurrecting much-needed debate about the O.G. coin and its place.

So maybe thinking this is all a mistake might be more about thinking about what Bitcoin should be versus what it is actually becoming. Because reversing this Bitcoin NFT thing ain’t happening.

When you live in a world where people suddenly find out Roku streaming devices only use IPv4, you start to wonder how much of the modern internet is underpinned by ancient shit that just works.

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• Silvergate Bank has been serving crypto exchanges since 2015

• Well-known crypto exchanges will have a key service shuttered

• Crypto has a long history of banking problems affecting the industry

• Silvergate saw billions of dollars of deposits withdrawn during 2022

Silvergate Bank, which has been serving cryptocurrency-focused businesses since 2015, is shutting down a key banking service for crypto exchanges.

The service is called Silvergate Exchange Network, or SEN. It allows Silvergate Bank customers to transfer funds to other interbank accounts. Exchanges and other crypto businesses can move fiat dollars at any time with this, matching the 24/7 nature of cryptocurrencies.

It’s been previously reported that Silvergate’s exchange customers have included Coinbase, Kraken, Paxos, Circle, Gemini, Crypto.com and Bitstamp.

It’s been a long slog for crypto businesses over the years to get banking, and this closure is likely a turning point for the industry. It’s a clear sign that regulators are going to strangle crypto by limiting fiat currency capabilities.

For cryptocurrency stakeholders deeply invested in the ecosystem, this could become problematic. Banking is critical to crypto and it’s not good to lose this type of liquidity product.

A Brief Banking Background

Cryptocurrency advocates have long believed blockchain technology could help reduce the influence of the banking sector. “Long Bitcoin, short the bankers,” is a well-known phrase used by a certain cryptocurrency influencer. This person clearly understood very little about the influence of banks on the rise of crypto.

Coinbase, founded in 2012, and the now-defunct Tradehill, started in 2011, were two early exchanges that were able to obtain banking during crypto’s nascent years. Tradehill was able to onboard with the Internet Archive Federal Credit Union, and Coinbase with Silicon Valley Bank.

However, Tradehilll struggled with Internet Archive Federal Credit Union’s antiquated technology. It couldn’t compete with the Coinbase-SVB partnership. Internet Archive Federal Credit Union eventually de-banked Tradehill due to a lack of regulatory clarity. The exchange, founded by Jered Kenna and Ryan Singer, shut down in 2013.

This is where Silvergate Bank enters the picture, previously known mostly as a construction lender based in La Jolla, CA. Somewhere along the way, around 2015, Silicon Valley Bank decided it didn’t want Coinbase as a customer. Silvergate then took the mantle, brought on Coinbase, and was off to the races.

Slow, Then Fast

For a period of time after onboarding Coinbase, Silvergate was very picky about bringing on cryptocurrency businesses as clients. Having a personal connection to the bank was one of the only ways to get onboarded. They carefully screened potential crypto clients.

But by 2017, Silvergate was bringing on many cryptocurrency customers. These customers included Alameda Research, which later founded the crypto exchange FTX in 2019. Alameda and FTX were more closely intertwined than many realized, with commingling (and spending) of customer funds taking place.

Volatile dollar liquidity is what has now led to the change in Silvergate’s policy recently. It has been revealed in public filings that Silvergate needed to tap into a U.S. government liquidity provider, Federal Home Loan Bank, for financial help in 2022. Lawmakers noticed, and began to scrutinize Silvergate post-FTX.

Cash Crunch

In announcing its Q4 financials back in January, Silvergate announced it used Federal Home Loan Bank at the end of 2022 for a $4.3 billion advance. The bank had at one point a whopping $17.6 billion in total crypto-related deposits in Q2 of 2022. However, the second half of the year saw bank deposits decline to as low as $3.5 billion while the FTX saga began to play out.

Speaking of FTX, and back to the subject of exchanges, they have loved using Silvergate. The Silvergate Exchange Network system and its 24/7 bank transfers between clients have been a key cog in crypto. SEN was responsible for $563 billion of dollar transfers between clients in 2022.

Now cryptocurrency businesses will need to go somewhere else for a similar service, if they can even find it. There are very few options. New York-based Signature Bank has a similar service called Signet. But that bank has made clear it is trying unload its crypto exposure, by up to $10 billion in deposits, not add to it.

As for Silvergate? It’s not looking good. Bloomberg is reporting the bank is delaying its annual report as it reviews whether the company is even viable anymore.

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I asked the ChatGPT AI chatbot to put its HR hat on and get me a job description for what seems like a very hot job these days:

Social Media Troll

We are seeking a talented and experienced social media troll to join our team. As a social media troll, you will be responsible for engaging with users on various social media platforms and creating controversial and inflammatory content to generate attention and stir up conversation.

Responsibilities:

• Create controversial and inflammatory content on social media platforms to generate attention and engagement

• Engage with users in a confrontational and provocative manner to keep conversations going

• Utilize a variety of tactics to disrupt online communities and cause chaos

• Stay up-to-date on the latest social media trends and platforms

• Work closely with our marketing team to develop and execute social media campaigns

Requirements:

• At least 2 years of experience as a social media troll

• Strong written and verbal communication skills

• Ability to handle intense and sometimes hostile situations

• In-depth knowledge of various social media platforms and their respective cultures

• Strong understanding of internet culture, memes, and trends

• A willingness to push boundaries and break social norms

• Must be able to work under pressure and meet tight deadlines

• Must be able to work independently and as part of a team

Additionally, the candidate must be well-groomed and professional in appearance, and must be able to wear a suit while working. This position may require some travel.

If you are a skilled social media troll and are looking for an exciting new challenge, please apply today!

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• Top 200 blockchains outside of Bitcoin and Ethereum are influential

• Developers entering crypto and DeFi often still discover Ethereum first

• A Big Five group of blockchains developers build on might be rising

• Ethereum not dominant chain anymore, as 50% of devs use something else

A few weeks ago, I wrote about crypto developers. It was discovered that most crypto software developers aren’t working on Bitcoin or Ethereum.

So what are they working on? Just like last time, I used the 185-page 2022 Electric Capital Developers Report as a guide.

One of the biggest areas crypto developers are working on is DeFi - and that makes a lot of sense, given it underpins some of the market structure that makes crypto work.

“DeFi Summer” was in 2020 as programmers were at home during COVID lockdowns. It was a catalyst for programmers getting into crypto.

Top 200 Getting More Powerful

The top 200 blockchain ecosystems by market capitalization outside of Bitcoin and Ethereum are gaining traction. 50% of all active software developers are focused on top 200 blockchains, up from 25% in 2018.

It’s entirely possible many developers start with Ethereum, code smart contracts and learn how to use the EVM. Then they get excited about another blockchain for whatever reason.

A lot of entrepreneurs seemed to be getting motivated on starting something on smaller, lesser known blockchains. Which is great for the health of the crypto ecosystem overall. Diversity of chains is good.

The speed of adoption is staggering: There are over a dozen blockchain ecosystems in the top 200 with 50 full-time developers.

Some of this likely has to do with venture capital and promising token incentives, or perhaps both in some instances. But it’s working and getting software people interested in crypto.

The Ethereum Entry Point

It’s clear that the summer of 2020 was a turning point for the development of the cryptocurrency ecosystem. And because of Ethereum’s first-mover advantage, developers on that blockchain were 70% of the total DeFi developers at that time.

Cosmos, BNB Chain, Solana, Polkadot, Polygon, Avalanche and Kusama made substantial gains in developer share from 2020-2022. Yet Ethereum’s developer community is huge in terms of full-time developers.

This movement to other blockchains probably has to do with Ethereum’s scaling issues it experienced in 2020. Some of it probably has to do with technical details of these blockchains.

And then at least some of it probably has to do with the culture of a particular blockchain ecosystem that motivates a developer to join.

When it comes to DeFi in particular, it seems Ethereum, Cosmos and Solana are the biggest dogs in the fight right now.

We’ll see what happens with Solana in 2023, as it has been revealed FTX’s disgraced former CEO Sam Baloney-Fried (SBF) was a biger financial supporter of it than many knew.

Is There Now a Big Five?

The strength of the top 200 blockchains outside of Ethereum is promising. But there are a few chains grouped into that top 200 that may need to move into a Big Five programmable blockchain categorization.

This is because there are four ecosystems outside of Ethereum with more than 1,000 devs. Solana, Polygon, Comos and Polkadot are starting to look like they are moving ahead of the top 200 pack.

Major ecosystems are emerging beyond Bitcoin and Ethereum. Solana, Polkadot, Cosmos and Polygon grew from fewer than 200 devs in Jan 2018 to over 1,000 each by the end of 2022.

Of course, the overall speed developers could adopt another blockchain may render that moot. Outside of Bitcoin and Ethereum, the top 200 blockchains grew 12% year-over-year.

Things may move too fast to be able to group chains in the near-term. But the Big Five are indeed dominating for the time being.

Moving Forward

According to the Electric Capital report, by the end of 2022, 3,901 developers were working in DeFi on various blockchains. That’s a 240% increase since 2020’s DeFi summer.

Some may say a winter cycle has arrived for crypto. But progress has been made. Crypto just has seasons, and newer entrants will adjust to these cycles.

Also, the adoption rates for each of these larger breakout chains is all over the board. This makes it hard to predict where and how things will shake up. Some new chain could come out of nowhere and dominate in a way that’s not been seen since…

Ethereum.

To take a look at the 185-page 2022 Electric Capital Developers Report, check out the firm’s Github repository.

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• “Super Pumped” tells the incredible rise of Uber out of seemingly nowhere

• In many cities, Uber initially outran local authorities with strategic tactics

• Many don’t know the strategic methods this company actually took to win

• Do parallels exist with crypto companies trying to stay one step ahead?

Do you remember the first time you ordered an Uber? Got in the car? Got out of the car without having to exchange money? The experience was magical, a product that combined mobile phones, digital payments and GPS.

It could take you where you wanted to go. Frictionlessly.

Then, do you remember all the negative stuff about Uber? Its CEO Travis Kalanick? The horrible press? Most of us do. And now Uber is public, quietly rolling along with a different and decidedly total opposite type of CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi.

“Super Pumped” tells the inside story of everything that happened. And some of the crazy tactics Uber used to keep ahead of local governments to survive and grow in its early days. There feels like some parallels to crypto here. One has to wonder what crypto entrepreneurs are doing to survive, especially right now with the SEC making noise.

Maybe someday they’ll be a book like “Super Pumped” about crypto. There’s already a TV show about “Super Pumped” on Showtime (it’s free on Amazon Prime right now). But the book has all the nitty gritty details. If you’ve seen the show or read the book, share a comment or drop me a line. Would love to know how you feel about it.

“Super Pumped” is on Amazon.

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• Brian Armstrong founded Coinbase in 2012 to push crypto forward

• Now he is talking about protecting his customers from the government

• Armstrong’s tactics great marketing for Coinbase in a bear market

• The ChatGPT AI software tells us the story of what might happen next

Most people in crypto are familiar with Brian Armstong, the CEO and co-founder of Coinbase. Since 2012, Coinbase has built a platform that makes cryptocurrency user-friendly for people. It takes care of the wallet software and its security. On top of that, it has a suite of services that help people get started with crypto.

When Brian writes Tweets like this, it emboldens Coinbase’s customers. Oftentimes, crypto is marketed with a “middle finger to the man” type of thinking. And it works. Myself and many others, however, are skeptical. What can Coinbase really do other than continually and perpetually fight the government in courts?

The proliferation of AI creation tools like ChatGPT allow us to use technology as a lens - plus it’s fun to use. For this reason, I asked the AI to tell me the story of Brian Armstrong’s battle with the government. Enjoy. Please subscribe or pledge to this newsletter if you like this content!

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Once upon a time, in the world of crypto, a young and visionary entrepreneur named Brian Armstrong emerged. He founded Coinbase, a platform where people could safely and securely buy, sell, and store their cryptocurrencies.

As Coinbase grew, so did the attention of the government. Officials became suspicious of the decentralized and unregulated nature of cryptocurrencies and began to explore ways to control and monitor the transactions taking place on Coinbase.

But Brian wasn't just a savvy businessperson; he was a true believer in the power of crypto to empower individuals and resist government overreach. So, when he heard of the government's plans, he sprang into action.

Brian threw himself into the fray, working tirelessly to protect his customers from government overreach. He employed top-notch security measures to store the private information of Coinbase's users.

However, the government wouldn't give up that easily. They demanded access to Coinbase's data, but Brian refused to comply. He knew that doing so would compromise the security and privacy of his customers, and he was willing to do whatever it took to protect them.

Days turned into weeks, and weeks into months as Brian engaged in a battle of wits with the government. He used his cunning and intelligence to stay one step ahead, always finding new and innovative ways to keep Coinbase secure.

And finally, after months of intense fighting, Brian emerged victorious. The government was forced to back down, and Coinbase's customers were safe and secure.

From that day forward, Brian became known as the defender of crypto, the protector of privacy, and the guardian of individual freedom. He inspired countless others to join him in the fight against government overreach and to take control of their financial futures through the power of crypto.

And that is the story of how Brian Armstrong, the founder of Coinbase, became a true crypto superhero.

I appreciate you reading Reverie. Please subscribe, pledge or reach out to me if you like this newsletter!

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