People in the cryptocurrency circle, 2024 is about to end. Has your return on investment this year outperformed the increase in Bitcoin? Which coins are you heavily invested in? Do you know which tracks have performed best? Which wealth opportunities have you missed? If you haven't done a system review yet, you must like and collect this series of videos, which will take you through the full picture of the cryptocurrency circle in 2024 in 8 minutes. There was a king bomb in 2024. The Bitcoin ecosystem took the lead in breaking out. First, the popularity of inscriptions continued to ferment, and then the Bitcoin L2 developed explosively; then the Bitcoin spot ETF was approved for listing. The successive good news indicated that the Bitcoin ecosystem was about to start "killing all sides"! However, everyone knows the result. After a short period of prosperity, the Bitcoin ecosystem was silent. Although the Bitcoin ecosystem did not rise, it still ran out of several eye-catching tracks in 24 years. Next, I will focus on these tracks and take stock of the outstanding representatives in the tracks.
PerpDEX excellent representative: Hyperliquid The PerpDEX track has always been a big deal, claiming to be a business with a market of 10 billion, but in actual experience, the liquidity is poor, the user experience is poor, and there are not many innovations, not to mention challenging CEX. Although it has gone through several rounds of iterations, it has never achieved a breakthrough. But in 2024, Hyperliquid brought us a big surprise. It raised the valuation of on-chain exchanges to more than 10 billion US dollars, and single-handedly increased the valuation of the track by more than 10 times.
Let's compare the data more intuitively. Before Hyperliquid TGE, no other project in the track could compete. Well-known projects like DYDX and GMX also have FDVs below $1 billion. Everyone is discussing the dilemma, but only Hyperliquid seems to have found a solution. From model innovation to user experience optimization to embracing the community, Hyperliquid's approach has set a good template for subsequent projects. Although the market has experienced a correction in the past few days, as of December 27, the FDV of the HYPE token is still $26.8 billion. Looking forward to 2025, with Trump's inauguration, the compliance process of the crypto industry will accelerate, and PerpDEX will also have a wave of outbreaks: First, David Sacks' wallet has the old leader of the track, dYdX, and he is the "artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency czar" appointed by Trump. Second, the Trump administration plans to transfer the main supervision of the crypto industry to the CFTC. The CFTC is friendlier than the SEC. It has done a lot of work in the listing of BTC futures trading on the CME Group and is more friendly to the supervision of PerpDEX. We look forward to the emergence of an on-chain exchange that can truly compete with CEX in 2025.
Stablecoins
Outstanding representatives: Ethena, USUAL
If there is a sector that will surely grow steadily with Bitcoin, it must be stablecoins. In 2024, the total issuance of stablecoins continued to grow, and it has become a battleground. At present, the overall market value of this sector exceeds 200 billion US dollars, and the leader of the track, Tether, has made a huge profit of 5.2 billion US dollars in the first half of the year alone. Such high returns have also attracted the attention of other projects. For example, XRP's parent company Ripple recently issued RLUSD in an attempt to get a piece of the pie. However, looking back at the stablecoin track in 2024, the projects that performed well in decentralized stablecoins are Ethena and Usual.
Ethena
As early as two months ago, I analyzed Ethena in detail and was optimistic that the price of Ethena would reach 1 US dollar. This prediction has now been realized, and the VIP group has already tripled its income. There are two main reasons for optimism. First, it is one of the few blockchain projects that currently has income and stable income. Second, its mechanism design realizes a positive flywheel, opens up users' imagination of interest-bearing stablecoins, thereby bringing higher TVL, and further pushing up the price of Ethena. This model has also been verified, and the market value of its stablecoin USDe has jumped to third place in the market.
USUAL
USUAL is a "connected household" with a strong background. Its CEO and senior executives in Asia have close ties with the French government. Good political and business relations naturally become a strong moat. USUAL also has some Ponzi properties in token design. Simply put, the higher the TVL, the less USUAL emissions, and the higher the value of a single USUAL. The higher the USUAL coin price -> incentive to pledge USD0 -> TVL increases -> USUAL emissions decrease -> USUAL coin price increases, thus forming a positive spiral. Its token usual has also become one of the few currencies that have performed strongly in this round of callbacks.
Meme
Excellent representatives: pump.fun, Virtuals Protocol
In 2024, meme will definitely be the top narrative that dominates the market. According to a data released by Coingecko, meme will be the top sector in 2024. The fresh narrative coupled with the high volatility market has excited investors, and even major institutions have invested in the meme craze in the second half of the year. As of the end of November, the overall market value of Meme coins has reached 116.82 billion US dollars, accounting for 3.5% of the market share. Pump.fun and Virtuals Protocol are two representatives.
pump.fun
When it comes to memes, Solana is indispensable, and pump.fun is like Solana's super money printing machine. After it went online, it earned 368 million US dollars in fees in just 7 months. At present, the market value of the top 10 pump.fun tokens has exceeded 200 million US dollars. Among the memes launched on Binance (including spot and futures), 42.85% belong to the Pump.fun series. Its success factor, in addition to the soil of Solana, is one word, entertainment first. It can make anyone issue coins in a fool-proof way, and can also accept any type of narrative, allowing everyone to join the meme casino without any barriers.
Virtual Protocol
If pump.fun focuses on launching entertainment-oriented memes, then Virtuals Protocol launches memes with fundamentals. The Virtuals project team is very smart and knows how to grasp the hot spots. As early as 2023, after seeing the potential of AI, they transformed from a game guild to an AI Agent platform. In terms of the timing of the launch, they also followed the popularity of Goat and launched its token Luna. The reason for choosing the base chain is that the base chain provides strong technical and marketing support for the project, and the base chain does not issue coins. As a popular project, it can take advantage of people's enthusiasm for investing in the base chain to receive a large wave of traffic. The final result is that Virtuals also did it. It is currently one of the few launch platforms that can be compared with pump.fun, and the tokens launched by Virtuals are memes with fundamentals and combined with AI hot spots.
RWA
Excellent representatives: ONDO, MANTRA
2024 is a turning point for the RWA track, with favorable news coming one after another. First, the regulatory policies of various countries have gradually become clearer; second, the world's top institutions have entered the market and launched tokenized projects, including Blackstone, UBS and Franklin Templeton. The RWA projects that have issued tokens have also ushered in a new round of growth: the price of ONDO tokens has exceeded US$2.14, setting a record high; most RWA projects that have issued tokens, such as Maple and Swarm, have increased by more than 200%. Among them, ONDO and OM performed the best.
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ONDO is the 10x coin we recommended to the VIP group last year. Its strength has a simple, brainless but convincing logic, that is, BlackRock endorsement. At present, the protocol accounts for nearly half of the risk asset equity in the United States, and the United States accounts for 14.8% of the global risk asset equity, which has once again consolidated its market position. According to on-chain tracking, major crypto platforms and whales are hoarding ONDO. The highest point of ONDO is about 7 times the return from the recommended point.
MANTRA
The price of OM has been rising rapidly since the beginning of the year, with an increase of 9,000%. It is also known as the first RWA chain in Hong Kong. The current market value has surpassed ONDO and reached 3.5 billion US dollars. In 2024, MANTRA reached cooperation with a series of large institutions, such as the Central Bank of the United Arab Emirates, MANTRA Chain, etc. If the RWA market size reaches 50 billion US dollars, OM will have more room for growth.
The above is an inventory of the best tracks and projects in 2024. If you are interested in this series, be sure to continue to follow my channel. Next, I will also review the best memes in 2024, the worst performing tracks, and the outlook for 2025.