jakiro
Author: Divine Grace
Stop fooling yourself and others, it’s time to face the bloody reality
Late last night, a fan sent me a message: “Teacher Shen’en, BlackRock’s Bitcoin ETF has passed, why is my altcoin position still shrinking?” This sentence probably reflects the aspirations of many people.
We see news like this every day: a certain ETF is launched, a certain giant integrates blockchain, and supervision is more friendly… but the assets in the wallet are not given any face at all.Today, let’s put down the filter and talk about this heart-wrenching topic.
Truth 1: The market always sets prices in advance, and your “good news” is already old news
There is a deep-rooted illusion in the crypto community: “As long as institutions come, prices will skyrocket.” But the only key issue in the investment field is——Have the markets priced in these benefits in advance?
Think about it, when the news is overwhelming, those big funds have already been deployed.They do not buy after the news comes out, but quietly enter the market during the rumor stage.When everyone knows the good news, it’s a good time for them to take profits.
It’s like watching a football match. When you cheer for a goal, the crowd in the stadium had already celebrated 10 seconds ago.The market always moves ahead of the news, which is why “buy rumors, sell news” has become an eternal rule.
Fact 2: What exactly supports the $1.5 trillion altcoin market value?
Bitcoin has a clear narrative – digital gold. Its market value is about US$1.9 trillion, while gold is about US$29 trillion. This logic still holds true.
But let’s look at altcoins: Ethereum, Solana and all other cryptocurrencies outside of Bitcoin have a total market cap of approx.$1.5 trillion.What’s behind this number?It is an ecosystem with only about 40 million active users, but it has supported such a huge market value.
Compare this: It is rumored that OpenAI will IPO with a valuation of nearly US$1 trillion, and its user base is the largest in the entire encryption ecosystem.20 times.Has the product come out?The pricing of most altcoins already includes perfect expectations of 100-fold growth in the future, but there is no margin of safety at all.
Truth 3: Your “value investing” is actually “casino tickets”
A lot of people point to staking rewards and say, “Look, this is value capture!” But the truth is, staking rewards areInflation and dilution, rather than real profit.The real value should come from the fees users pay.
Let’s do a simple arithmetic problem:
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Ethereum has a market capitalization of approximately US$400 billion, annual transaction fees of approximately US$2.7 billion, and a market-to-sales ratio as high as150-200 times
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Solana has a market capitalization of approximately US$80 billion, annual revenue of approximately US$1 billion, and a market-to-sales ratio of approximately US$1 billion.20-60 times
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As the most popular growth stock in the world, NVIDIA has a price-to-earnings ratio of only40-45 times(Note that this is the price-to-earnings ratio, not the price-to-sales ratio)
More importantly, these incomes are not stable recurring income, but “casino income” that is highly dependent on market speculation: perpetual contracts, Meme currency transactions, MEV withdrawals… The bull market surges, and the bear market evaporates.
Would you give a tech stock the same valuation multiple as a casino that only gets hot every three or four years?Anyway, I won’t.
Fact 4: Capital flows to hot spots, and AI is the current protagonist
This cycle,AI is the star, cryptocurrencies are a supporting role.Funds will always chase momentum. This is an iron law of the market.
Businesses follow business logic, not ideology.Stripe’s launch of Tempo is an example – companies will not use blockchain just because they love it, but rather see where they can better meet their needs.
When assets are priced perfectly, any slight disturbance can cause a crash.A hint from the Chairman of the Federal Reserve and a small fluctuation in Nvidia’s financial report are enough to cause a sharp correction in overpriced crypto assets.
Fact 5: Over-construction of infrastructure and insufficient real-world applications
We invested in infrastructureHundreds of billions of dollars——Building blockchain, cross-chain bridges, and Layer 2, but not investing enough in products that truly solve user problems.
We brag about TPS, block space, and Rollup architecture, but users only care about: Is it cheaper, faster, and more convenient?Does it actually solve their problem?
It’s like the Internet bubble in the 1990s. Everyone was building fiber optic networks, but there were few websites that really attracted users.The result?Most infrastructure companies went bankrupt, and wealth flowed to application-layer companies that aggregated users, such as Amazon and Google.
The revenue model is unsustainable and the casino economy is the root cause
The biggest problem now is that the entire industry’s “revenue” mainly comes from highly speculative activities rather than real practical value.
We have established a track that can transfer funds around the world instantly and at low cost 24/7, but we believe that it isBest use case is slot machines.This is greed in the short term and laziness in the long term.
When your flagship product is Fartcoin’s 10x leveraged perpetual contract, don’t talk about decentralization.To quote Netflix co-founder Mark Randolph: “Culture is not what you say, but what you do“.
If revenues across the industry cannot shift from speculative trading to real, recurring economic value, most valuations will be repriced.
Moving into the future: where are the real opportunities?
I’ve been ultra-long-term bullish on cryptocurrencies for over a decade, and that hasn’t changed.I still believe: Stablecoins will become the default payment rail; open, neutral infrastructure will underpin global finance behind the scenes; companies will use this technology because it makes economic sense, not because of ideology.
But I think the biggest winner in the next ten years will not be today’s Layer 1 or Layer 2.The biggest opportunity now isEmbedding this technology into businesses that already have scale.
Dismantle the antiquated financial systems before the Internet era and replace them with encrypted systems, provided that these new systems can really reduce costs and improve efficiency – just like the Internet has quietly upgraded everything from retail to industry because its economic effects are too good to ignore.
People embraced the Internet and software because it made economic sense, and cryptocurrencies are no exception.
It’s time to return to cash flow, to the unit economic model, and to the most fundamental question – who are the users?What are we solving?Where is the real room for growth?
Wake up, cognitive stage, let go of myths.Only in this way can you survive and make profits in this industry for a long time.
I believe in the long-term value of blockchain: stablecoins will become payment infrastructure and open protocols will underpin global finance.But the winners in the next ten years may not be today’s Layer 1, but those who canTruly aggregate users and create real needsapplication.
Friends, it’s time to wake up.Let go of your obsession with prices and focus on real fundamentals.The market never fails to treat rational people, nor does it fail to treat patient people.
