@a16zcrypto just published a 60 page report on the Global State of Crypto

It covers upcoming trends, narratives and key metrics.

I read it all so you don't have to 🧵

Chain Trends to watch

New Layers 1s: Solana, Aptos, Sui, Avalanche, Near

Application-specific: zk-Sync, Cosmos, Optimism, Polygon, Polkadot

Optimistic Rollups: Optimism, Arbitrum

ZKs : StarkNet, zkSync, Aztec, polygon

DA: Celestia, EigenDA, Protodanksharding

Ethereum Trends

• Rollups are scaling: 7% of ETH fees paid by L2s

• Eth now consumes 0.001% of the energy YouTube consumes annually (Post merge)

• Ratio of total value secured ($417B) to value staked ($33B): 12.6x

ZKs

A cryptographic method for proving a statement is true without revealing any information about the statement.

Recent developments:

• Hardware costs ↓
• More educational materials
• Languages Noir & Leo maturing
• ZK-EVMs launching: ZK-EVM, Polygon zkEVM, Scroll

The ZK field heating up

• ZK related academic publications ↑
• Daily transactions verifying ZK proofs on Ethereum ↑
• GitHub stars for ZK repos ↑
• ZK tech improving at Moore's Law like pace

NFTs

• NFT creators made $1.9B in royalty revenues
• Big brands are entering Web3, starting w NFTs

Web3 Games

Huge opportunity to onboard new users to Web3

• $67.9B spent on in-game purchases in 2022
• 717 new web3 games in 2022
• Web3 games generate 23x more on-chain tx than Defi

If you want catch up on Web3 games, here's a thread I wrote: https://twitter.com/Cov_duk/status/1642777868706144258

Web3 Governance is experimenting

• Communities are driving public-goods funding for new projects
• Governance is moving beyond simple token voting
• DAOs are becoming formal legal entities

Participation in DAO governance is growing

The U.S is losing its lead in crypto

• Banning new technologies isn't American (drives jobs/growth elsewhere)

• Clear rules will protect consumers and help the web3 industry flourish.

• Businesses should be the focus of regulation, not the tech

https://a16zcrypto.com/content/article/web3-regulation-apps-not-protocols/

Regulation is being debated

• Proposed market legislation could provide clarity

• Courts are set to decide many impactful cases

• Government and industry are actively engaging

• Bipartisan momentum is building

To catch up with Crypto regulation:
https://twitter.com/Cov_duk/status/1639849730745466880

Innovation Metrics

• Bull market devs are sticking around (50k+ devs are actively interacting)
• etter tooling led to exponential growth contract deployers
• Verified smart contracts at ATH
• Crypto becoming a significant academic research area
• Increase in crypto jobs

Adoption Metrics

• Active addresses & web3 adoption increases ↑
• Transactions exploded with reduced fees
• # of mobile wallet users has declined
• DEXs are trading 100B+ mothly
• NFT buyers slowly rising
• Still high demand for stablecoins

What's Next?

• It's still early. Some of the most iconic products will be built in the bear
• On-chain games will become popular
• As blockspace becomes more available, other uses of tokens will increase
• Hiring, treasury management & sustainable funding will pop off


State of Crypto Index

A16z is also releasing a tool to track innovation & adoption metrics

Check it out here: https://a16zcrypto.com/stateofcrypto/

And that's it.

I hope this summary was helpful.

I highly recommend you check out the full report here:

https://a16zcrypto.com/content/article/state-of-crypto-report-2023/

If you found this useful,

• Give this a RT
• Follow me @Cov_duk for more!

Global State of Crypto Trends Report Highlights

GameFi is set to be the next MASSIVE narrative in crypto

To crush it, you need to understand:
• Why Web3 + Games makes sense
• The current problems
• Game Tokenomics

Here's your guide to Web3 Games 🧵

This thread covers:

• The problem with traditional games & where crypto comes in
• The benefits and challenges w games & game designs
• Some Game Tokenomics & what to look out for
• Future outlook & a GameFi space that will be HOT

Let's dive in

This thread is adapted from my MUCH longer article on web3 games.

I recommend reading that for a better experience, this thread is more of a tl/dr

You can check it out here:
https://covduk.substack.com/p/crypto-games-the-past-the-present

Keep scrolling for the thread version:

Traditional Games:

Traditional games exploded in popularity: the space is now larger than Hollywood (~$200B) and still growing at ~13%.

But:
• Power & resources became concentrated with a few big publishers
• Games became more extractive


Games started off with a 1 time fee

Then came:
• Paid in-game items
• DLCs & upgrades
• Microtransactions
• Loot boxes & Battle passes
• Pay to Win

Studios started to squeeze every drop they could:

The Skewed Dev-Gamer Equation

The cost to play and fully experience a game has only been going up.

Some of this can be justified by the increasing production costs

But, what the players receive has stayed the same.

Studios are compensated for their time & resources spent.

Gamers are arguably the most participant. But they aren't compensated for their time.

Fundamentally, gamers aren’t fully compensated for all the resources they spend (their time).

In fact, they've been getting less.

The core problem

The core problem is the extractive publisher monopolies, which leads to:
• Extractive monetization method
• Huge barriers against smaller builders.
• Not all key participants are rewarded for their contributions.
• Community Opinions don’t always matter

This isn't to say trad games bad, crypto good

There's a lot to learn & appreciate with traditional games. BUT there are problems that are getting increasing worse.

And crypto offers solutions to some of them.

Crypto's Promises

Crypto ethos of decentralization, community focus and interoperability works well some of these problems.

And tokens can (hope) to align the mismatched incentives between gamers and studios

Game Economies

Game economies have been a part of games forever: RuneScape CSGO, TF2

I spent so many hours trading items in this game called Arcane Legends.

But, typically, there's a BIG difference between traditional game economies & open economies

Spending money is a 1 way street

Once it’s in, you can’t take it out & the game maker sets the exchange rate & item prices: it’s always extractive.

Game makers can make their games open (money can flow in & out) w/o crypto.

But, w/o crypto they have no reason to

Crypto creates open economies

With crypto & tokens, games are incentivized to create economies where money flows in and out.

Players can exchange "real" money for in-game currency (& items) at the market-determined exchange rate.

And importantly, withdraw money from the game.

Gamers can monetize their time.

When they're done playing, they can sell their game assets for fiat/crypto

The items they earned playing the game & therefore their time spent can be traded for money.

Tokens can balance out the skewed equation.

Tokens incentivize game makers to create open economies

If money can flow in & out, game makers can charge a cut on transactions -> new revenue source

This alternate revenue source can replace existing extractive sources

However, game Tokenomics are HARD

In practice, this is way harder to execute correctly

Also, as @nateliason put it:

“The primary use of a token in a crypto game should be to improve the game economy in some way that is not possible without a token”

Tokens make sense when

• they are used to align incentives between studios & gamers
• create open, two wayed economies

Tokens are the bridge between real money & the game

Tokens cut both ways

Integrating sound tokenomics is very challenging:

• Being able to earn real money changes user mindset
• Game transforms from a game to an investment
• Promotes a player base that will leave as ROI drops

The case of Axie

Axie was the biggest web3 game.

It had two tokens: SLP (no supply cap) and AXS (fixed cap)

Holding Axies gave you SLP & SLP's only use was to create Axies, which would give you even more SLP.

Classic case of hyperinflation. And as ROI droppped, gamers left.

The key issues with Axie

• Most players were there to make money, they left as soon as price tanked

• Axie's model relied on growth of the user base outplacing inflation. Once growth slowed down, the loss of value due to inflation was too much

Game Token Models

Broadly, we've seen a couple of token models:

• No supply cap token model (RuneScape)
• 2 Token Models

@nateliason has a great piece on game tokenomics that dives into this deeper:
https://crypto.nateliason.com/p/one-vs-two-tokens

Burns & Sinks

Games need to incorporate ways to reduce inflation. When you're analyzing a game, make sure you look for these.

Some ways of doing this could be through :
• Utility costs
• Special event items
• Mechanisms like staking

@AlienWorlds does a good job at this

Gameplay focused rewards

Actions that reward users with tokens shouldn’t be too predictable. This leads to speculators & farmers.

Make sure rewards are contribution focused.

I was trying out @TheImmortalGame, they do a good job with this.

The more you play -> more you get

Different Genres have different affinities for economies/tokens

MMORPGs have always had economies at the center, they can have complex designs

FPS games could do w simple designs

Here's a good thread by @amytongwu
https://twitter.com/amytongwu/status/1445680600501796870

There's still a long way to go:

At the moment:
• Most games aren't fun
• Token models need to be improved
• The problem pure profit seekers needs to be addressed
• Retaining a player base has proved to be very tough

The list goes on

But there's good news

Player retention is slowly happening, even in the bear

@AlienWorlds is averaging ~250k active users
@splinterlands is currently at ~80k active users

In fact, AlienWorlds is experiencing growth in this market

The reasons for their success

• Both games are simple to understand and play (low friction)
• The cost of entry is low
• Both games involve relatively robust economy designs.
• Leverage DAOs and communities to gamify crypto elements.
• A community that enjoys the game


Casual Games

Requiring a $5K NFT before you can even play the game is a losing strategy: and that's changing

I believe we'll eventually see a lot of freemium game add in elements of crypto and succeed.

Traditional Freemium games

are free to play. But super annoying. Paying gets rid of ads

Crypto will redefine this genre.

Free-to-play is best for user acquisition. Instead of annoying ads, studios can make money through cuts on in-game currency/NFTs/items.

To make it sustainable, I think we'll see changes to traditional freemium models

• Games may charge a fee/ require an NFT for the rewards part
• Users could earn premium benefits through gameplay

Freemium games & casual/ hyper casual games are insanely popular

And crypto allows for a less annoying gamer experience + an alternative monetization model

This is certainly a space to look out for

And that's it!

Despite the current issues, the future for web3 games is bright.

If you want to dive deeper into web3 games, I highly recommend @0xRyze's articles:

https://metaversus.substack.com/

Thanks for reading.

If you enjoyed this thread:

• Give this a retweet!
• Follow me @Cov_duk for more

Guide to Web3 Games and GameFi

Regulation is coming to Crypto in full force.

Keeping up with regulation is keeping with the future of crypto.

Here are 12 reads on everything you need about Crypto Regulation 🧵

Resources that cover:

• Current state of regulation across the globe
• Crypto is a commodity vs security debate
• The SEC evaluation framework (Howey Test)
• Gensler’s actions so far
• Positive regulatory recommendations
• Recent regulatory news and why it's worrying

1.  PwC’s Global Crypto Regulation Report

Good summary on global regulatory frameworks https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/new-ventures/cryptocurrency-assets/pwc-global-crypto-regulation-report-2023.pdf

2.  Is crypto a security or commodity debate

https://www.sofi.com/blog/crypto-commodity-vs-security/

3. SEC’s Framework for digital asset analysis

How the SEC classifies something as a investment contract/security (Howey test)

https://www.sec.gov/corpfin/framework-investment-contract-analysis-digital-assets

4. Bitcoin is a commodity

https://cointelegraph.com/news/cftc-chief-says-bitcoin-is-the-only-commodity-in-the-wake-of-ftx-collapse

5.  Why the SEC is likely to regulate Crypto https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/is-the-sec-the-new-crypto-sheriff-in-town

6.  Gary Gensler and the SEC’s approach to crypto:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/21/technology/gary-gensler-crypto-sec.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

7.  @a16zcrypto's recommendations:

https://a16z.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Andreessen-Horowitz-%E2%80%94-Response-to-FSB-RFC-12.15.2022.pdf

8.  Kraken-SEC staking settlement & how staking as a service could be reshaped

https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2023/02/13/how-the-sec-could-reshape-ethereums-staking-landscape-for-the-better/

9. @PaxosGlobal Receives a Wells Notice https://decrypt.co/121225/paxos-says-its-prepared-to-vigorously-fight-sec-lawsuit

10.  @coinbase receives a Wells Notice from the SEC
https://www.coinbase.com/blog/we-asked-the-sec-for-reasonable-crypto-rules-for-americans-we-got-legal

Here’s @brian_armstrong with more info:

https://twitter.com/brian_armstrong/status/1638654192138199041

11.  White house says crypto has no fundamental value

https://decrypt.co/124168/white-house-president-economic-report-digital-crypto-assets-report

12. Crypto reforms coming:

https://cointelegraph.com/news/crypto-reform-coming-to-us-in-2023-says-former-white-house-chief-of-staff

Crypto regulation is moving in a harmful direction.

We need a strong, coordinated response from the crypto community.

Here is @twobitidiot on his game plan:
https://twitter.com/twobitidiot/status/1638884999922581509

Also, checkout @Delphi_Digital's policy paper series:

https://twitter.com/Delphi_Digital/status/1638209123551412226

That's it!If you found this useful,

• Give this threat a retweet
• Follow me @Cov_duk, more coming soon!



12 Must-Reads on Crypto Regulation

GameFi is set to become the next Hot Space in Crypto

CMC released a GameFi report containing:

• The state of the industry
• Top tokens, games & chains to watch

I’ve read it all so that you don’t have to.

Read this to understand everything about the next hot space in Crypto

In this thread we’re diving into:

• Current state of GameFi
• Top Takeaways from this year
• What the VCs are doing 
• Upcoming game & tokens to watch 
• Thoughts & Comments along the way

Let's dive in 

Crypto X Games Synergy

Crypto, NFTs & Games have a natural synergy.

• Trading & Selling In-game items as NFTs ( ownership of virtual assets)
• New ways of funding games → More experiments→ Better games
• Community Owned 
• Better monetization methods 

Learn more here:

https://twitter.com/bottomd0g/status/1512473932431257600

We’re not there yet.

Despite the benefits, we’re yet to see a revolutionary crypto game.

• Good Games take lots of time & money to make
• Existing games are unsustainable 
• Blockchain tech is new, building on new tech is difficult
• Gamers outside web3 detest crypto & NFTs

This will soon change

This will all change through a great game that is actually fun & sustainable. 

Right now, there’s a huge rush to create a breakthrough game, led by industry veterans & huge amounts of money.

Here's where we're at:

GameFi Overall Market Performance

2022 has been a rough year for crypto, with everything moving downward due to bad macro & rising inflation.

GameFi active users (unique wallets interacting with games) gradually declined

This is the first bear cycle for the GameFi industry.

Top Chains by Volume.

Ronin, BNB & Harmony were the volume leaders.

BNB: low fees & ease to build brought on a lot of projects

Ronin: All the Volume came from Axie Infinity

Harmony: All the Volume came from DeFi Kingdoms

Top Chains by Transactions & Average Users

@WAX_io & @hiveblocks, gaming-focused chains, stood at the top.

Wax has 29% & Hive has 24.2% of the Market Share

Key Takeaways 

1.  Mainstream hype during the bull market has not been a good indicator of sustainability or future success

2.  A dominant, go-to chain for GameFi projects has yet to emerge

3.  Developers are increasingly aiming to create multichain ecosystems

Let’s dive in

Mainstream Hype & Sustainability

Axie & STEPN became household names. 

However, now, neither of them is close to the Top 3 games by number of average active users. 

They came & they went.

Crypto games people enjoy

Conversely, Alien Worlds & Splinterlands are dominating, even after a price drop

They’re both averaging around 200k active users, even in this market. 

Clearly, people enjoy playing them. 

Hyped games come & go, but so far they haven't stuck around 

There’s no go-to chain for GameFi yet.

Wax & Hive are GameFi leaders by number of transactions.

But, both are largely dependent on the success of a single game each.

55% of Wax’s market share comes from Alien Worlds

99.85% of Hive’s Market Share comes from Splinterlands


Devs are going Multichain

DFK & STEPN expanded to 2 chains each in March to get more users & disperse risk.

But it hasn't been smooth sailing. There’s been some tokenomics trouble.

Multi chain projects face tokenomics trouble

STEPN launched on Solana & expanded to BNB.

At it’s peak, there was a 9x difference between the price of GST (utility token) on Solana & that on BNB.

Multichain price discrepancies will continue to be a problem for multichain games.

The Death Spiral Problem

The curret play to earn model has a big risk: death spiraling

The model has positive ROI as long as new players join the game

When there’s a price drop or the number of new players reduces, there's reduced ROI & mass dumping

https://metaversus.substack.com/p/social-contract

Gameplay first or Earning First?

The first popular model in GameFI was play to earn.

Games primarily focused on the earning aspect & users came on primarily to earn money.

But, the risk of death spiraling is real. Games need to acquire users with a fun game instead. 

Play & Earn

Play & Earn offers a middle ground.

Play a fun game & earn a little along the way. 

With Crypto & a long term focus, they can offer some ROI, while being more sustainable.

@0xRyze talks about this more here: https://metaversus.substack.com/p/play-and-earn?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web

Top GameFi Tokens To Watch

Here the tokens to watch according to the report.

@binary_x & BNX

Despite the declining prices, BNX increased 8x from its lowest point in June, following new gameplay & upgrades


STEPN, GMT & GST

STEPN saw a drop across most metrics

Despite that, GMT has the highest trading volume: $1.1B

GST (Utility token) also saw a surge in trading volume, signaling that STEPN is unable to control token dumping.

Also most projects lost liquidity in the bear. 


VCs in GameFi

2022 has been the year for GameFi fundraising.

Metaverse & Gaming fundraising saw a huge increase from $874M (2021) to $2.4B (2022)

Metaverse & Gaming projects got more than tooling, trading & lending projects


https://twitter.com/Cov_duk/status/1560503678015983616

The Big Players are doubling down

Epic Games received $2B

Animoca Brands invested in 52 projects

There’s a lot of money coming into the space. 

Both Traditional studios and Crypto focused studios are raising big rounds to create a gamechanger title.


Games to Watch

@illuviumio: Promises a AAA game led by a solid team of devs

@the_phantom_g: A collaboration between proven traditional and blockchain studios, backed by huge resources

@playbigtime: Led by the co-founder of Decentraland, promises a AAA RPG and easy onboarding.


We’re still early.

48% of the investments were in the seed stage. GameFi is still early in the development phase.

We’ve proven studios, industry veterans, huge amounts of money coming in.

It’s only a matter of time before we’ve a breakthrough game.


I’m excited.

I’ve been playing video games from before I can remember. 

The stars are aligning. It’s a good time to be a gamer. And there’s money to be made.

If you want to dive deeper, I highly recommend you check out the full report over here:

https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/article/coinmarketcap-and-footprint-analytics-2022-gamefi-industry-report


That’s all for this one. If you’ve enjoyed this, help me out by:

• Giving this a RT
• Following me @Cov_Duk for more

Also, subscribe to my youtube channel, I’m dropping a new video soon:

https://www.youtube.com/c/Covduk


VCs have been sitting on Billions, investing in the next generation of web3

Keeping up with their investments can help you spot the next Hot Space

Here are projects that the top investors are betting

(Including a database of recent raises & investments) 🧵

I’ve looked at the recent investments by crypto VCs

 Keep reading to understand:

• What these projects do
• The problems they seek to solve
• And thoughts on them

Here’s a database with investments made this month (not exhaustive, will add more):

https://covduk.notion.site/August-VC-investments-8bf4ba234ded446e98d4663113b40cd9

@Satellite_im | A decentralized chat platform

$10.5M seed led by Multicoin & Framework

The problem with current chat platforms:

1. Tracking & Stealing data

2. There is no web3 native platform

Data breaches & theft, limits on quality, censorship, the list is endless

What is Satellite?

Satellite is a decentralized, web3 native messaging platform with a strong focus on security & privacy.

Messages are fully encrypted & do not depend on a centralized servers

This means that your data isn’t stored & no one (including Satellite) can look at it

Core Features

• Hyper focus on Security

• Open Source: Users can build on top of it & create custom bots

• High Quality Video & Audio: 4K steaming, send 246mb files & 4gb of free storage

• Web3 native: Leverages decentralization & trustlessness 

My thoughts

We've all been waiting for better messaging platform

I like projects that solve irl problems. Mass adoption of crypto is going to happen through solving such problems. 

The team seems solid & from what I’ve seen so far, it’s promising

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmn7RtVyrJs&t=295s

@datawispio | No code data analysis

$3.6M seed led by CoinFund.

Data is an incredibly powerful tool.

But accessing, using & interpreting data requires specific knowledge that most people do not have.

Datawisp is trying to make data (both web2 & web3) more accessible

What is Datawisp

Datawisp is a no-code data platform that allows users use & visualize data without technical knowledge.

How it works:

• You import a data source
• Use simple blocks to customize & visualize it
• Set KPIs & datawisp helps make the data useful for you

My Thoughts

There’s so much data in web3, but a lot of it is:

• Hard to make sense of
• Locked behind technical barriers

Bubble, a no code app building platform, saw a lot of success for similar reasons

Breaking these technical barriers is good for the ecosystem.


@GunzillaGames | AAA battle royale with in-game item NFTs

$46M led by Republic Cap

Video games have a natural synergy with NFTs & crypto.

However, most games right now either:

• Focus on P2E & not on the game itself
• Look boring as hell

What is Gunzilla Games?

Guzilla games is a games studio making a cyberpunk battle royale called Off the Grid

A central part of the game will include crafting, customizing & trading in-game item NFTs

The teaser looks pretty good

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6InNyCE2Rc&t=1s

My thoughts:

Web3 games are going to make big waves.

Right now, however, gamers hate NFTs & crypto games. 

Overcoming this will be challenging. Also, the BR genre is quite saturated

It’s all going to come down to how fun the game is & how seamlessly NFTs fit into the game.

Good games are hard to make

Web3 Games are not just competing with each other. They're competing with Blizzard, EA, & other big names. 

And that takes years & millions. 

No gameplay is out yet but the team seems solid & so far it's pretty promising. 

@debtdao | financing for DAOs & protocols

$3.5M raise led by Dragonfly

Debt can be a powerful financing tool.

But DAOs & protocols rarely use debt, because their options are limited:

• Overcollateralized Loans require lots of capital
• Undercollateralized loans require KYC


What is Debt DAO?

Debt DAO provides trustless, revenue based financing.

Their initial focus is on DAOs & protocols with on chain revenues

How it works

1. Their contract, Spigot, secures a portion of the borrower’s on chain cashflows. This cannot be changed by the borrower

2. A portion of the revenue is escrowed

3. The interest & principal is automatically paid back from escrowed revenue


My thoughts

DAOs are struggling: coordinating 1000s of people in a decentralized way that works is tough.

For them to work, we need good tools & infrastructure. 

Giving DAOs that generate revenue a financing option without the need to sell tokens will be beneficial for growth


@joincreatordao | Invest in & support creators

$20M seed led by a16z

A 9 year old kid playing with toys on Youtube made $200M in 2019.

We’ve seen a huge surge in the number of creators, platforms & $$ in the space. 

The nature of work is shifting.

What is CreatorDAO

CreatorDAO aims to be like YC for creators.

The DAO will:

• Enable members to invest in creators
• Provide creators support & mentorship from top creators
• Be a community for creators to meet other creators, receive help & support

My thoughts

Investing in creators is not the same as VC

For many, having support, mentors & a solid community > getting capital

This sort of DAO structure is interesting because it addresses the other forms of support that other ‘invest in people’ platforms do not.

Boosting the creator economy. 

Crypto has great synergy with creators

If done right, could be a powerful boost for the creator economy.

As a crypto creator & someone who used to work in VC, this is really exciting.

https://creatordao.com/blog/why-i-founded-creatordao-2/


Dragonfly acquires MetaStable

Metastable is one of the oldest crypto funds founded by @naval in 2014

It has over $400M in assets under management & was an early investor in Ethereum, Cosmos & StarkWare.

Dragonfly Capital (if you don’t know them) is a prominent web3 VC.

• In April, they closed a $650M fund (they’re rich)
• Before this acquisition, they’d ~$2-3B AUM

This is pretty big news. Dragonfly now added MetaStable’s 400AUM, making it a lot more expansive.

“Crypto is Dead”

Despite the bear market & crashes,

Investors are sitting on top of piles of money.
Builders have been building

A new wave of solutions & projects is upon us. 

https://twitter.com/milesdeutscher/status/1559729861736169472

We're in some exciting times

We're witnessing the future being build from the ground up. 

There were more interesting projects that I didn’t cover.

If you enjoyed this & would like to see more, let me know by:

• Giving this a Retweet! 

• Following me @Cov_duk for more!

We’ve seen lots of exploits & hacks recently

It’s time to get a hardware wallet.

Here’s everything you need to know to get it set up

(Small thread)

Broadly, there are 2 types of wallets:

1.  Hot Wallet - Metamask
2.  Cold Wallet - Trezor & Ledger

Hot wallets like Metamask are connected to the internet

They’re easy to use - You can access them from your phone or laptop.

But, there’s a big problem.

2/ 

The problem with Hot Wallets 

Because hot wallets are always connected to the internet, they are vulnerable.

It’s easy for scammers to exploit them. 1 wrong click & you could lose everything 

You NEED a cold wallet

3/ 

Cold Wallets

Cold wallets typically resemble a USB stick.

They’re isolated and make it MUCH harder to steal your funds.

They’re not as convenient & cost $80-200. But they’re essential if you want to survive.

4/

Popular Cold Wallets

The most popular cold wallets are made by Ledger & Trezor

Here are some cold wallets varying in price:

• Trezor Model T - $250
• Ledger Nano X - $150
• Trezor One - $85
• Ledger Nano S - $80

You can buy one on Amazon or directly with Trezor/Ledger

5/

Links to Buy: 

https://shop.ledger.com/ 

https://trezor.io/#comparison 

Or just search on Amazon 

6/ 

Verify Authenticity

Before you get started, make sure it isn’t a counterfeit

Different companies have different ways of showcasing authenticity. 

Look at the authenticity checklist for your device. 

https://blog.trezor.io/psa-non-genuine-trezor-devices-979b64e359a7

https://support.ledger.com/hc/en-us/articles/4404389367057-Check-if-the-device-is-genuine-?support=true 

7/ 

Setting it up

Hardware wallets have step by step guides to help you set up your device based on the model

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqmyNmjMmME&t=18s

https://wiki.trezor.io/Setting_up_Trezor_One

It doesn’t take long & it’lll keep you safe.

8/

It's a necessary investment & it's easy 

There are a LOT of resources to help you set up your hardware wallet.

It doesn’t take long & it’ll keep you safe.

With so many exploits going on, it’s an essential investment.

Nothing sucks more than losing money due to negligence

9/ 

Other Safety Practices:

• Don’t reuse passwords
• Enable 2FA
• Uninstall extensions 
• Revoke approvals https://revoke.cash/

Here's a good thread on safety practices by @bobbyong 

https://twitter.com/bobbyong/status/1403881080902471680

10/

That's it, thanks for reading, I hope this helps. 

Don't be lazy go get one rn. 

Give this a RT so it can reach more people! 

11/ 

Tracking the right wallets can make you rich. 

Etherscan is a great way to do this for FREE. 

Here's how you find & track wallets in 5 minutes 🧵

I have a step by step video demo on my youtube. 

Here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHkVYjduBGo&t=509s


2/ 

 Investors & whales have more information & leverage than you do. 



You can make a lot of money by following them. We're diving into:

• Using Etherscan for wallet tracking & watching
• Using @DeBankDeFi
 • NFT wallet tracking

3/ 

Let’s use Etherscan
 

Go to https://etherscan.io/tokens. You’ll see all the ERC tokens here.


This is the page for $HEX. There’s a bunch of useful info here for research.


Go to the holders section.

4/ 

This tells you a lot:



• If the tokens are concentrated, it could be a bad sign, because if they sell price will tank.



• If a large % of tokens are sitting in exchanges, could mean that holders are only there for the short term

5/ 

Your goal is to find wallets who got in big positions early.


You can filter through based size of holdings

6/ 

You can also look through the transfer history to do this. 


Sort by Last. 


You essentially want to look through the first few weeks & look for accounts that made big plays early.

7/ 

You can do this for ANY token. 


Just go to CoinGecko and search up the token. 


Here’s a random token that I found. When I found this, $LYNK up 26%. 


Grab the contract address.

8/

Search it up in the relevant block explorer and you can start your wallet hunt.   


Let’s use LYNK to demonstrate wallet finding & tracking.


I sorted by oldest transaction and went from there. 


The goal was to find an address that took a big position early on

9/

This trade caught my interest. 


This account bought 60k $LYNK tokens 4 days after launch. 


I wanted to investigate more.

10/ 

You can copy their address & paste in the block explorer. 


It will pull up their transaction history, their account balance & what they’ve invested in.


This is their Erc20 transfer history. 


Looks like they’re used to buying large portions of unknown coins.

11/

I want to know if they’ve a history of success to determine if they’re worth watching. 


This is the hardest part. 


You can look through their Etherscan data to get some insight.

12/

Analyzing successful wallets is a great way to learn. 


You can gauge how they allocate, what they look for & how they ape. 


It’s a great way to become a better investor.


For more organized analytics, use  @DeBankDeFi. It gives you a breakdown of their holdings.

13/ 

Examining their profile, it's not what I am looking for.


No problem, let’s repeat the steps until we find someone.

14/ 

I repeated the steps above and found a new address. 


Turns out it’s pretty good. This account is the #757 ranked account on DeBank.

15/

Use these methods to find wallets. 


Once you find an account you want to keep track of, you can follow them on Debank & periodically look through their transactions on a block explorer.

16/ 

NFT wallet tracking. 


You can do the exact same for NFTs. 


Go to https://etherscan.io/nfttracker or search up your NFT. Search through transactions & holders.

17/

You can look through their NFTs & portfolio on DeBank

With that, you have a solid approach for finding & tracking wallets. 



This can be replicated across chains using different block explorers.

18/

Be VERY careful. 


Scammers use these tools as well. 


They airdrop NFTs & tokens to top wallets in order to deceive people like us. 


Wallet tracking is just one part of your research process. 

Couple it with proper due diligence.

19/

I hope this guide on wallet tracking was useful!   


• Give this a RT 


• Follow me @Cov_duk  for more 


• Subscribe to my Youtube for guides, demos & interviews!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk43im8I5y_noyb08D5w4OA

Crypto is made up of startups & VCs

Understanding them will give you an edge. 

Here are 8 lessons from the Startup World 🧵

This may be better to listen to. Here's the video on my youtube channel:

https://youtu.be/nkHOGhNS91k

Like & Subscribe! 

2/ 

1.  Lean Startup Philosophy

The lean startup methodology is a more recent way of thinking in the startup world.

There’s a key flaw in how most people approach building.

A lot of people like to build the “perfect” product first, then get it out to the market.

3/ 

The problem with this approach is that your image of perfect is usually wrong.

You can come up with a list of features, make it look pretty, do great marketing.

But, that’s YOUR image of a perfect product. 

When you’re building something, your not making it for yourself. 

4/

You're building for your users.

Your initial idea of a perfect product isn’t going to be the user’s image of perfection.

Why? Because you came up with this definition by yourself.

Instead, the lean startup method focuses on talking & learning from the users.

5/ 

It focuses on 

Getting out there, 

Talking to potential users, 

Identifying what they truly want

Learning as you go & then building.

This is a very useful framework that forms how I approach most things in life.

6/ 

Often, we wait too long to do things because we fear it’s not perfect. 

However, your pursuit of perfection is holding you back.

7/

Instead, 

1.  Do basic research & jump right in.

2.  Talk to people who know more than you. A 30 minute conversation can teach you way more than hours of research.

3.  Learn as you go. Keep an open mind. Look at the data & what people are saying. Keep adapting. 

8/ 

I started this twitter account on a similar basis. 

I was reading a lot about crypto & wanted to write.

But I kept putting it off, waiting for that perfect topic & the perfect 1st thread to come in.

Finally, I jumped right in. My first thread didn't do great. 

9/

But that’s okay.

I kept writing everyday, I kept what worked & discarded what didn’t

Slowly, I got a LOT better at writing, grew the account, & it opened up countless opportunities.

It all started because I let go of this notion of perfection & learnt as I went

10/ 

2. Customer Discovery

Customer Discovery is another part of this lean startup methodology that @sgblank talks about.

We’ve established that your definition of perfection is usually wrong.

The way you figure out the right one is by talking to people (potential users)

11/

Your goal is to learn

Want to start writing threads?
Reach out to threadors, ask them how they approach things

You want alpha? 
Talk to people about their market views

There’s no info in the building. Get out, start now & learn from others

https://steveblank.com/2020/04/07/customer-discovery-in-the-time-of-the-covid-19-virus/

12/

Here's a task for you guys. 

Set up 1 call this week with someone in the crypto space.

Do that consistently & you’ve become 10x better.

13/

The 1% chance of success.

A lot of good VCs tend to perform this though experiment.

They imagine the slight possibility (1% chance) that this actually succeeds.

Then, they think about all the factors that would need to happen in that situation.

14/

Is that realistic? 

This is rooted in first principles.

In crypto, narratives change fast, you make huge gains by getting in early.

Look at projects with a similar mindset. What needs to happen for this this pop off?

Break things further

https://twitter.com/Cov_duk/status/1535430989622611968 

15/ 

3. Networking.

Knowing the right person will unlock the door.

It’s pretty straightforward. Just aim at having a conversation with someone.

Reach out to someone similar & set up a call.

Here’s a good thread by @Crypto8Fi on networking:

https://twitter.com/Crypto8Fi/status/1543672686693388290

16/ 

4. The power of leverage.

Small things compound.

Start right now, talk to someone new, write something & repeat.

https://twitter.com/naval/status/1002106224123432960

17/

Say you talk to 1 person every week, by the end of the year

• You’d be connected to 52 people interested in crypto
• You’ll get info on different areas of crypto
• Tons of opportunities that you can’t event imagine

18/ 

5. Set up Small Tight Knit groups

Find people you vibe with & w different areas of interest

Share mistakes & learnings. As a group you might make 10 mistakes

But as an individual you’d only make 1, cuz everyone is sharing what works & what doesn’t

19/

6. The team

Teams make or break the project. VCs would rather bet on a good team with a bad idea than vice versa.

In your research, pay special attention to the team. If it’s a bad team they’re not going to succeed.

20/

This is harder with undoxxed founders. 

But you can look at:

• How they communicate
• How they deal with obstacles, 
• Whether they’re learning from the community.

21/ 

7. A lot of things are held together by strings

With startups, there’s always a new fire that needs to be put out.

It may look pretty from upfront, but behind, a lot of things are barely working.

22/

This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, good projects fix these problems as they go.

However, it’s important to be aware & to make sure that what actually matters is working.

23/ 

Being Dynamic

Crypto is very fast paced.

What works today will not work forever. Keep moving, learning & getting better.

Your old trading strategies won’t always work. The current narrative won’t stick around forever.

It’s critical that you experiment, adapt & move. 

24/ 

I hope these 8 Lessons from startups were useful.  


• Give this a RT 



• Follow me @Cov_duk for more



• Subscribe to my Youtube for guides, demos & interviews!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk43im8I5y_noyb08D5w4OA 

Using on chain data in your investing research will give you a huge edge. 

You can do so for FREE with Etherscan. 

Learn how to use Etherscan effectively in 5 minutes  🧵

Etherscan is a block explorers that allows you to look at on chain data on eth. 

It has a lot of valuable info for free & can be a great source of alpha. 

Other chains have other block explorers that are similar to Etherscan.

2/ 

Before we start, if you're not too familiar with the basics, 

Here’s a tweet by @manabubannai that goes over the basics of Etherscan: 

https://twitter.com/manabubannai/status/1494579357637312512

Here’s an explanations of key terms: 
https://docs.ethhub.io/guides/deciphering-a-transaction-on-etherscan/

3/ 

One of the most popular features is the gas tracker. ETH gas can be very expensive. 



Etherscan can help you choose the lowest/best gas price.

4/ 

6. You can look at the current gas prices and estimate what the lowest would be for the transaction to go through. 



A useful thing to do, when your transaction isn’t time sensitive, is to look at the gas price history and make estimates off of that.

5/ 

Look over the 7 day gas history. When you hover over this, you get info on the lowest gas prices over the week. 



For this week, the lowest gas prices for the last three days were 6, 3 and 5.


6/ 

If my transactions isn’t time sensitive, I would change the gas price on metamask to around 5. 

Gas is super low atm. Now would be a great time to take care of low priority tasks on eth. 



Here’s how to change your gas prices.
https://metamask.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360022895972

7/ 

Based on the past few days, I can roughly estimate how low gas will go at its lowest



The transaction may take a couple of hours or even a day or two, but when you’ve time, you can save a lot on gas.



Tip: Gas is usually cheapest over the weekend and between 1-3am UTC

8/

You can use Etherscan to research ERC-20 alt coins 


Etherscan pulls up key data, including marketcap, volume and number of holders. 


https://etherscan.io/tokens

9/

This is the breakdown for USDT. 


You can pull up a bunch of information including the breakdowns & names of holders, analytics and contract information. 


This is really useful.

10/

Following smart money & identifying who holds what & how much is one of the best ways to gain insight into the project’s merit. 


If you see a bunch of top dogs holding a particular token, that usually means that this project is worth looking into.

11/

You can see how much money is going in, how much is going out and change in holdings


This can tell you a lot about growth of the coin, whether top money is dumping it or whether they are buying more 


This gives you one of the best overviews of the ETH ecosystem

12/




With Etherscan, you can search up transactions. 


Copy a public wallet address and paste it in the search bar. 


Etherscan will show you all the assets in the wallet, total value, number of transactions and more. 

It can even put it in a nice chart if you’d like.

13/

In addition to this, you can gain a bunch of insights about each individual transaction. 



This has multiple uses. You can very easily reflect and go over your own transactions.

You can look at other people’s public wallets and gain insights 

14/

You can identify good wallets to track with Etherscan. 

I dive into it deeper & show the step by step process on my youtube channel. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHkVYjduBGo

Subscribe to my Youtube for more demos & crypto content. 

15/

Remember, it is very important that you do not just copy trade. 

Use these tools as just one piece of information when you are conducting research

16/

You can find smart contracts on Ethereum. 


https://etherscan.io/searchcontract 


There are so many scams in crypto. It is very easy to send money to the wrong address.

17/ 

Using Etherscan, you can find the accurate contract address. 


Go to the token page (link above) → click on the token you’re looking into → Click on the contract address.

18/

This will take will pull up a bunch of useful info on transactions, ether balance & more.

 
If you connect your wallet, you can even read the contract’s code, allowing you to quickly identify the legitimacy of the address.

19/



Etherscan allows you to track NFT transactions and mints. 


Similar to the token breakdown, Etherscan provides you with a bunch of super useful details for NFT analysis. 

You can pull up info on the holders, the contract & more. 

https://etherscan.io/nfttracker#mint

20/

This is the breakdown for an NFT collection that’s just getting minted. 


This is a powerful tool - You can look at holders, transfers and more. These can tell you how well an NFT is doing or will do. 


Most don’t look at this data, use it - it can give you a big edge

21/

You can do the same for Dexs and trading pairs  


Etherscan is a very powerful tool. Blockchains are transparent & open, there’s a lot of value in looking at the data and analyzing it 


There’s a reason why all the top researchers & analysts spend hours and hours on data

22/

There’s a lot to Etherscan, don’t let that intimidate you. 

A lot of it is actually pretty simple and it can give you a big edge. 

Just dive in, play around with it, you’ll learn as you go. 


Treat Etherscan as one tool in your research arsenal.

23/



I hope this Etherscan guide was useful. 

• Please give this a retweet! 

• Follow me @Cov_duk for more

• Subscribe to my youtube channel for guides, walkthroughs, interviews & more! 

I’ve made a lot of investing mistakes.

Read this thread to avoid years of losses & pain in 2 minutes. 

Here are 16 common investing mistakes & how to avoid them 🧵

1. The Sunk Cost Fallacy.

When you’re losing money, it’s hard to cut your losses.

I failed to cut losses in time because I thought “I’m down 50% already, how much lower can we go”

And every time I did this, I regretted it. 50% is better than 0. 

Cut your losses.

2/ 

2. FOMO

It’s very easy to resist the urge of aping into a coin that’s pumping.

Everyone is talking about it. Everyone made millions, except you.

It’s super hard to resist the urge of joining them. I’ve done this countless times & it’s always ended up in losses.

3/ 

3. Not taking profits.

When I just started out, I had a $500 trade reach $11K (unrealized) by pure luck.

I was euphoric - the adrenaline was pumping & I was staring at the screen 24/7

But I was greedy. I was hoping it would go higher & didn't take profits.

It crashed.

4/ 

This is a big one that everyone does.

In the bull run, everything was pumping & people didn’t take profits.

When the market became bearish, the people who didn’t take profits & stuck to their bad bull habits suffered. 

A lot of the blood we’re seeing now is due to that.

5/ 

4. Don’t revenge trade.

Don’t allow one loss to cascade into a string of losses.

It’s easy to get triggered by a loss & let the emotions take over. 

This always ends up with poor investing decisions that your rational self would normally never allow you to make.

6/

A good rule to have it to step away for a bit when you get hit by a loss.

Don't make investing decisions when your emotions are running high. 

7/ 

5. The Cults.

Cults & echo chambers can be hard to beat.

We saw this with Terra: Anyone who criticized them was torn to shreds.

As a result so many folks were sucked into the echo chamber & lost money. Always be on the look out for echo chambers.

8/

6. Don’t be in love with yesterday’s narrative

Narratives change.

In crypto, every cycle has multiple new superstars. But things move quickly here.

If you’re blindly stuck up on a certain narrative, you’ll miss the new ones.

9/ 

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