“My new name is HAY, coz when I make P’s I’m HAPPY” - Skepta 

The last couple of weeks have been painful for the trenches. Every coin was nuking mercilessly while Bitcoin was teasing breaking key support levels. However, just as fast as we lost it all, we made it all back. BTC is back over $100K, the coins are pumping, and the future looks bright again. 

FUCK BEARS. 

This past week was pretty interesting. Despite the market looking like shit for 3+ weeks, the news has been relatively good. The majority of the developments were from the regulatory front since the trenches were relatively dead through the holiday period. 

So enough yapping from me, lets get int’s get into it. 

Trumpamania is just around the corner 

Mr. Donald J. Trump is about to be inaugurated in just a couple of days, and all eyes in the industry are on the USA and Trump's regime. 

He has by far been the most bullish crypto person in politics worldwide, and it just so happens he’s now leading the biggest democracy in the world. 

In the lead-up to the election, some interesting headlines have emerged regarding his crypto policies and what they will look like. Of course, everyone knows about the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve plan, but we have to wait and see how real that plan is.

But beyond that, it has been announced that people expect him to make a crypto-related executive order and implement the country's first Bitcoin policies within the first day or two of his taking office. 

This is pretty huge in itself, but there’s one thing that puts the cherry on top. 

Under his regime, once Gary Gensler resigns, the expectation is that the SEC’s level of intervention and enforcement over the industry will significantly decrease. The number of unjust lawsuits that the bald man put on some companies was criminal. Finally, that will end.

This is not just going to be a supercycle; it’s going to be a crime cycle in which we reach unfathomable heights before liquidating countries. 

DeFi updates.

• Vana (Data DAO) - Explains how Data DAOs are the perfect accelerants for AI agents

• Nillion (First blind computer) - Explain the partnership with Soarchain

• Core DAO (BTCFi) - Solving the blockchain trillema

• mETH Protocol (DeFi) - Announcing significant changes to come soon

• Superseed (L2) - Features complete ecosystem list

• Zentry (Gaming) - Now available to trade on OX.FUN

• SKALE (L2) - CodyFight game is now available on SKALE

• Sophon (Entertainment layer) - Check the dashboard within the Guardian App to track your rewards

• HMX (Perp. DEX) - Rewards APY reached as much as 217% in the past week

Tether Moves To El Salvador 

Speaking of crime, one of the greatest companies to ever do it, Tether, is finally shifting base. 

It’s no secret that El Salvador's president, Nayib Bukele, has been highly vocal about his support for crypto as an industry. He wants to attract crypto money and crypto companies to the region. 

The success of his strategy cannot be denied because he has managed to bring one of the most profitable companies in the world to his country, Tether. 

The reason for this move is simple: They managed to get a digital asset provider license in El Salvador, significantly reducing the regulatory headaches they face almost every quarter. 

In addition, El Salvador currently has a very favorable tax regime for crypto users and companies, which only sweetens the deal. After Tether, many companies will likely move to El Salvador.

Soneium shitshow 

Soneium is a layer 2 launched by the media giant SONY. 

This launch has been hyped up for a while and lauded as a major sign of mass adoption. An entertainment giant is launching its own L2, presumably to use it as a vehicle to launch products on crypto rails. 

As is often the case, just because they’re a big TradFi company doesn’t mean they’re smart. It’s often the opposite. 

On hour 1 of launch, they through the entire decentralized and permissionless mambo jumbo out of the window and started blacklisting coins that they didn’t like or that weren’t affiliated with the team. 

Some people were speculating that insiders were buying up these coins when blacklisted before opening them up again for trading, amongst other dodgy actions on some insider wallets. 

People often dismiss crypto as an industry because of the headlines that normies receive, but when you start dealing with people who are actually in the industry, you can get exposed very fast. Soneium is a good example of that. 

Hopefully, they fix up, but I think a lot of goodwill is lost. 

Short Mango Long Raydium 

Many of you may be familiar with the popular perp DEX on Solana called Mango Markets. 

They’d been live for a very long time and had a pretty decent product. Well, despite this, they recently put out a memo that they will be sunsetting the product.

This comes from the back of a hack that drained them for $110M, followed by an SEC case where they ultimately had to settle. They agreed to destroy the MNGO token and sunset the product since they couldn’t cope with it. 

As one door closes, another one opens. 

Raydium partnered with Orderly Network to launch a perpsDEX directly on the Raydium platform. 

Since basically all trades on Solana go through Raydium, this is a pretty huge deal. The level of degeneracy just got taken one step further, and I’m here for it. I wonder how well the product fairs in practice. 

What I’m looking at 

At this point, It’s basically all AI. 

Within AI I think key focus should be swarm projects like FXN, DeFAI projects (I personally like Trenchbuddy), Virtuals stuff should continue to do well, and AI gaming I think has a good chance of making a push with the CEO of Nvidia talking about it. 

That said, I will be signing off for the day and enjoying a couple of pints with my homies. I hope you do, too. To all of you who caught AGIXT, congratulations. I’m totally not coping and seething because I missed generational wealth in my sleep once again. 

Alright, have a good one, and I’ll see you back for another edition in two weeks' time.