0xJeff

This year Token2049 made me realize something important

It made me realize that this is THE BEST time to double down on Crypto

> TradFi capital is here and more is coming (thanks to RWA & DeFi)
> Retail capital is also coming (thanks to social trading)
> AI users are coming (thanks to Onchain AI/ DeAI)
> Quality projects are finding initial product market fit
> Yet "many" analysts are bearish and are leaving

There has never been a time where conviction could pay off as much as right now....

Like it or not, TradFi2049 is here and it's up to you to stay alive long enough enough to spot the opportunities

Third Day Token2049

> Third day/last day, literally the most exciting day of Token2049 because we had all the AI builders, VCs, devs in the room with us at gm AI v2

> Conversations shift to AI, privacy, robotics, DePIN, decentralization, tokenomics, all the geeky stuff that I couldn't find anywhere else at Token2049

> Surprisingly, I've met even more teams who have been around for a long time and are pivoting into new interesting directions

> Some pivot to focus on Chinese AI market, moving their office to Shenzhen. Some pivot to AI x Gaming x Consumer Content while others move to social trading and privacy AI

> Was quite surprised to see CT freaking out over Quantum. No one (I mean no one) at Token2049 talks about Quantum at all.

> People who are bearish are bearish because of macro + some believe it's the end of the 4-year cycle. People who are bullish believe in the institutionalization & the acceptance of crypto as the global financial backbone, merging with TradFi

> Builders on the other hand are much more concerned about the business side of things. "How do we get users to spend more?" "How do we really use tokens in a way that align interest & drive growth?" "How do we accelerate GTM with x402?". This feels like a breathe of fresh air. Less degeneracy, more fundamental product building

All in all, pretty happy with how the day turned out. Got a few good research ideas in fairly new sectors that I haven't seen anyone talk about yet on CT.

If you were to ask me "what's the SINGLE best thing I got out of Token2049?"

It's the confirmation that Onchain/Decentralized AI is (and will continue to be) the most asymmetrical and one of the fastest growing sectors in crypto in the next 2 years

Excited to share some of my deeper findings (interesting narratives & projects) in my upcoming Token2049 Article which I'll drop tomorrow

How's your Token2049 experience?

Second Day Token2049

> Second day is practically a confirmation of the first day - less builders, more institutions

> Exchanges, custody solutions, payments, stablecoins infra, neobanks dominate the main conference booths at Token2049

> Investors are bearish crypto, many of the analysts i know during my Spartan days are either quitting crypto or have already quit

> Their reasoning is that the exciting opps are largely gone - DeFi has matured and winners have already emerged, NFTs/Memes are gone (even though Stonks & the recent RHC wave were pretty nice)

> Most things are priced in which leaves ONLY a small number of narratives and teams primed for future upside (i.e. AI, privacy, RWA, payments)

> The only analysts left are either net neutral or net short, hoarding up cash and has only 1 or 2 positions that he/she believe in

> Some are still quite bullish though, got a friend who told me that there's a clear split in the high-networth market rn. Whales from the East are bearish while whales from the West are bullish (thanks to the recent push this year)

I used to enjoy coming to major conference like Token2049 to take in the excitement and the energy of builders working on cool stuff.

My first Token2049 was in 2023 and it was the best conference experience for me. Almost every side event I attended was filled with builders talking about DeFi primitives, L1/L2s architecture, rollups, tokenomics - literally all the geeky stuff that if I were to talk to people about today at side events, 80% of the people wouldn't care about because they're an employee working at an institution.

Welp, sorry for the rant. I'm excited for the Third Day of Token2049 though because gm AI v2 (the event we're hosting) will be the place where I try to bring some of that 2023 energy back.

Lots of AI builders, lots of geeky conversations, lots of fun.

See you guys around!

First Day Token2049
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> 90% of the conversations are RWA, Tokenized Stocks, Structured Products (i.e. the institutionalization of crypto)
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> 10% in AI, the financialization of compute and every single asset, bringing them onchain
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> Surprisingly (or not) VCs, liquid funds, traders are talking about Grass and how bullish they are
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> Venice, Near, Pumpfun, Orbio get mentioned quite a bit as well
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> Most aren't aware of the Onchain/DeAI wave that's happening + most don't understand the value prop of onchain/decentralized inference, x402, and the budding ecosystem of tokenized inference credit markets
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> Seeing many teams working as frontends for Hyperliquid, Ondo, Polymarket, and other venues
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> These are trading platform, AI agent trading strategy platform, and DeFi protocols building structured products on top of infra that enables users to do more with their capital (e.g. AI strats that long 10 crypto assets & short 10 tokenized stocks, yield-bearing token that earns yields from a combination of tokenized assets and prediction market strategies)
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> More people are coming onchain because onboarding is getting better + tokenized assets offer far more value vs traditional brokers (i.e. 24/7 trading, collateralized your asset, earn more yields through lending, basis trading strats, etc)
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Overall, the crowd has gone down by 50%+, less builders around, more traders, investors, KOLs, and institutions
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The vibe feels more institutionalized than the last. A lot less excitement from the retail crowd compared to the last.
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Honestly don't know how to feel about this lol

Token2049 Top SG Foodies Spots

- Moss Matcha (One of the best Matcha Gelato)
- Bep Mai (Top-tier Bahn Mi)
- Great Nanyang Heritage Cafe (Great prawn noodles)
- Ketojjak Ice Creams (Low carb keto ice cream, black sesame so good)
- Story One Korean Cusine (9 amazing side dishes esp the yuzu bael/this is my personal fav)
- Habibi-san (Chewy Brussel Sprout)
- Mad Roaster at NTU Campus (Really good coffee)

If you had to choose a few, go for Story One for lunch + Habibi-san for dinner + Ketojjak for dessert

Llmk your fav spots

Onchain Inference hit new ATH last week

> @dphnAI's POD hit new ATH off the back of Upbit listing and ahead of public API + agent harness launch

> @AskSurplus hit new ATH (~175B) in token usage per day

> Other players like @orbiodotso shipping a lot of features in the past weeks (CREDIT, Agent launchpad, PT/YT on inference yield with @pendle_fi)

In today's After Hour, we dive into the latest on Onchain Inference, asymmetric dip-buying opportunities, and more

We just had one of the biggest catalyst for x402 and the market barely reacted

> @Cloudflare integrated x402 as part of a closed beta, enabling U.S. domain owners to easily sell their APIs, MCPs, datasets directly via x402 (with only a few clicks)

> AI agents are already ~5% of the internet

> This beta testing will pave the way for tens of millions of sites under Cloudflare Monetization Gateway

> So they can easily integrate x402 as a payment option and sell directly to these AI agents

Things are finally coming together for x402

The most asymmetric opps in Onchain Robotics will be coming from

> Financialization
> Financialization ∩ Infra
> Financialization ∩ DePIN
> Financialization ∩ Infra ∩ DePIN

Owning the brains + the coordination/orchestration layer for robots

Deep dive in the piece ↓

Onchain Robotics turns out to be one of the most interesting narratives this cycle

The hardware, the robots are already dominated by big robotics companies

but the software, the brain, the coordination gaps remain OPEN

AND this is where Onchain Robotics come in

In this week's article, we venture into
- The landscape of Onchain Robotics and its key players
- The moats of Robotics' DePIN, Infra, & Financialization layers
- Where the most asymmetrical opportunities are

It has been quite a journey taking you to all through ups-and-downs across sectors, Decentralized AI, Privacy and now to this Onchain Robotics Era

We'll see a new primitive come out of this inference credits wave

"Tokenized Inference Credits Aggregators"

Think DEX Aggregators but instead of finding the best DEX that can serve the best price for a swap,

It finds the cheapest inference credits on the most reliable platform for the desirable AI models

Aggregate Venice DIEM's discounted inferences, Orbio's CREDIT, Bittensor subnets' Gamma token credits and offer the best inference to users

> Inference prices get cut by 50-99%
> General AI devs organically use it as it's cheap/private
> Onchain inference gets PMF outside of CT

Only Surplus is doing this at a 140B+ tokens/day scale so far

The gap remains for anyone to capture

Hmmm... seems like everyone is adopting Venice's VVV <> DIEM tokenomics rn

First it's Orbio on RHC

Now it's the entire Bittensor subnets eco

Burn Alpha tokens, Get Gamma tokens — tokenized usage credits that tied to specific subnets goods & services

I mean this is great utility for the token as it adds on deflationary mechanic to it BUT if everyone is doing it, then...

> It becomes harder to scale the tokenized credits market as there's gonna be too much supply fighting for limited demand

This is great for inference buyers but not so great for sellers as they have to push down the price

AND since Venice has already dominated the tokenized inference credit market to a degree, it's gonna be tough competing with DIEM

I would very much rather have the tokenized usage credits go into the same token instead of creating a new one, just like what Dolphin have planned with POD

Nonetheless, it's an exciting/positive update for Bittensor.

Will be interesting to see how the secondary market dynamic plays out beyond inference subnets

x.com/ExploitSummit/…

> Speculative narratives are slowing down
> Onchain AI narratives are heating up
> Narratives like Inference, Data, Robotics and more are on the verge of new catalysts

Covering the state of the market + all the sub-sectors of Onchain AI in today's After Hour EP.74

Check it out if you wanna position yourself ahead of the crowd

State of Onchain AI Narratives

> Privacy 2.0 leads in performance in the last 30 days, across FHE, MPC, TEE players @zama, @Arcium, @PhalaNetwork, @nillion

> GPU financing has also been performing well with @USDai_Official getting the largest loan (~$129M) yesterday

> Robotics looming with catalysts — @peaq x @codecopenflow Machine(.)fun + several Robotics @bittensor subnets incoming

> Inference remains the #1 onchain AI narrative across 2026 with @AskVenice consistently growing its platform + DIEM ecosystem, @AskSurplus hitting ATH (~130B+) in daily tokens served, and other players continuing with their product developments (e.g. @engyai, @dphnAI, @openservai)

> Bittensor is recovering nicely following the wave of stonk/token pairing meta, dragging the entire ecosystem of subnets upwards in PA

> While the Agentic Economy/x402 hasn't found PMF or hit wider adoption this year, it has managed to organic adoption among power users, devs, and startups looking for lower cost, better micro-accounting tools & inferences. Several x402 facilitators (e.g. @PayAINetwork, @daydreamsagents) experienced positive PA as a result

> Interestingly, Data is performing well thanks to @grass finally listening to the community, improving its comms, with better revenue transparency, and plans to accrue value back to token holders

All in all, possibly one of the most bullish time to be investing + building in onchain AI

More analysis on this in the upcoming After Hour EP.74 on Substack this Sunday

Crypto is entering a bull market cycle and a lot of newcomers are coming on board

Some might feel overwhelmed because there's just so much going on

And so I put together a guide that encapsulates 5 years of learnings & mistakes, covering the basics on how to do DD, what narratives/picks to focus on, and more

A beginners guide on how to survive & thrive in 2026 ↓

Looking for the best Token2049 SG side events to attend in 2 weeks?

🧵 Here are my Top 10 picks ↓