Author: Lao Bai
Looking back at my prediction of this round of main line one year ago, I think it was half right. The current main and secondary lines currently feel like this
1. Payfi - This can't be counted wrong, but it should be more accurately called "stablecoin". Now RWA can actually be thrown into this line
The most noteworthy targets on this line are -
$CRCL - It is essentially a bet on Circle's position in the top two stablecoins. The current price of $135 is still not cheap based on market value and profit, but considering the 5-8 times expansion of stablecoins in the next five years and the big pullback from $300 to $108 in the past few months, it may be a good opportunity to get on board. I personally invested at $115
$PlasmaFDN - Since you don't have Tether shares, Plasma is the only target you can buy currently. Of course, I will wait for spot and mainnet instead of betting on contracts. Plasma currently far surpasses Stable and similar competitors in terms of funding, ecosystem development, and social media presence. The TVL of its mainnet launch is roughly $3-4 billion. The current pre-market/contract price of $6 billion is also very expensive, so wait for spot trading to launch and find opportunities. Similarly, the trillion-dollar stablecoin market in the coming years will create enormous potential for stablecoin public chains, and it will be interesting to see which stablecoin will emerge as the leader. Tron, the established leader, saw its USDT TVL fall from a high of $83 billion to $77 billion in the past month. Among the newer chains (Plasma, Stable, Arc, Tempo, Codex, etc.), Plasma currently holds a significant lead. $ENA - This is a hedge against the first two. Stablecoins are the clear-cut story, so bet on both centralized and decentralized options. The only decentralized asset worth buying is probably Ethena. USDE has already surpassed 13.5 billion, and the DAT and fee switch are ready. Its fundamentals are rock solid. Oh, and they also have the centralized USDTB, which is about to break 2 billion, and then there's Converge, their own RWA public chain... There are a lot of positives, but the price has been quite weak recently. Is it the market swindlers selling?! $Ondo - As mentioned in my previous Twi post, I bought my Crcl from Ondo. It's currently the only platform offering 24/5 trading of US stocks, with no KYC requirements (through 1inch) and backed by major institutions, making it relatively safe and reliable. If you're bullish on the borderless US stock market blockchain trend, Ondo is one of the few worthwhile investments. Of course, the market cap is a bit hesitant to invest. High control and high FDV are obvious traits, so good things don't come cheap... 2. AI Agents - This isn't entirely true. Last year's AI agents were Goat, ai16Z, and the like. They were indeed popular for a while, but then everyone realized they were just memes, and the hype died down. This year, quite a few truly usable AI agents with potential for PMF have emerged. For example, Skywork in Web2, and @HeyAnonai, @gizatechxyz, @Almanak__, and @ReiNetwork0x in Web3 are all good. Personally, I'm most interested in the Bitcoin halving early next year. If there's a good opportunity around that time, I'd consider investing. The leader remains the leader, and revenue for three or four subnetworks is slowly increasing. Overall, it remains the Web3 AI project with the most potential for success.
3. Meme - This is absolutely true. Meme has been popular since last year, and even this year, there was a fierce competition among major launchpads to grab market share from Pump. However, your uncle is always your uncle. Pump remains far ahead and has begun to enter the live streaming market, taking the Web3 TikTok route. The Alpha of the meme track is changing daily, and there is only one Beta: Pump.
4. In addition to the three main themes mentioned above, a potential new theme in this round is the prediction market. Polymarket's data has been steadily growing, and Kalshi's performance has been even more explosive. Its data performance in the past month has surpassed Polymarket by a wide margin. This year, the primary market has been flooded with dozens of new prediction market projects. Hyperliquid even launched HIP-4, a proposal specifically for event prediction markets (HIP-3 isn't well-suited for many event-based prediction markets). I also saw an article today from an insurance industry expert suggesting that prediction markets could disrupt the current insurance industry. After all, insurance is a financial wrapper around probability and mathematics. What if users could access and hedge these transparent probabilities and risk exposures themselves, rather than accepting the black box odds of insurance companies?
However, there are no secondary assets to buy in this track, so we can only wait for Polymarket to issue coins. It is said that it has a valuation of 3 billion, which is also very expensive...
Finally, there is another angle to look at the main line of this round, or the only main line, that is, projects that "have real income and profits and repurchase tokens". From this perspective, there are only two tokens to buy - $Hype & $Pump :)
To add, in addition to the previously mentioned CRCL, Plasma, ENA, and Ondo, the projects that I personally pay most attention to in Payfi/stablecoin/RWA are @tempo. The reason I didn't write about it last time was mainly because I felt that it might not issue coins
But after listening to the latest episode of Bankless's Podcast, I think Tempo should eventually issue coins
If you are optimistic about Plasma Some are drawn to Tether's investment, the founder's exceptional execution, and its connections to major blue-chip DeFi platforms and Binance. Tempo's optimism stems from Stripe's strong B2B distribution channel, serving millions of merchants, and Paradigm's direct involvement (not investment, but building) in the industry, as the most technically advanced and renowned VC firm. Hyperliquid's stablecoin "investment" campaign has demonstrated to the market the importance of channels beyond issuance. Perhaps the future of stablecoin public chains will be a dual-dominance model: Plasma for B2B and Tempo for B2B.
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