Was MKR a good trade at $500? Yes. Fundamentals were 📈 without any reward.

Does it currently generate a ton of earnings? Yes among the top in DeFi and 📈

But is the competitive outlook for MKR bright? Debatable. Seriously challenged in lending, synthetics, and stablecoins.

1/
We discussed this opportunity back in August.

Back then Dai supply was going parabolic but stability fees were stuck at zero.

All MKR needed to do to turn on the cash machine was get rates up which it did.

messari.io/article/an-opp…
That said if I had to project 2 years out, how confident would I be that Maker won’t be disrupted on all three of the lending, synthetics, and stablecoin fronts?

Maker is resilient and battle tested, but Lindy effect only goes so far if Maker is fundamentally flawed.
Of course protocols can evolve so current imperfections can be addressed with time.

But Maker governance is notorious for moving slow.

Also doesn’t help that it seems to be more handicapped by US regulations than competitors.
Only time will tell but for now MKR is king of DeFi again.

messari.io/screener/defi-…

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More from @RyanWatkins_

9 Jan
SushiSwap 2021 Roadmap TL;DR:

Deriswap (SushiSwap V2 AMM)

Mirin (customizable franchised liquidity pools + secret @AndreCronjeTech project)

BentoBox (lending + more)

Layer-2 (ZK-rollups w/ Yearn eco)

Miso (Token launchpad)

SushiBar v2 (auto-claim rewards + no lockups)

1/
Other notables:

New domain, consolidated UI, and IPFS support

Governance V2 (Either Aragon V2 or council similar to Synthetix)

Cross-chain integrations (THORChain + Moonbeam)

Cross-chain implementations (Polkadot)

MEV integration (ArcherDAO)
Excited to see this all roll out.

SushiSwap has come a long way since it’s challenging start over the summer.

messari.io/article/the-su…
Read 4 tweets
3 Jan
The most effective meme I’ve found for Ethereum is “Digital Economy”

From there it’s easy to layout how Ethereum is the foundation for a variety of digital institutions (protocols) built upon the same principles of decentralization as Bitcoin.

1/
With “Bitcoin : Digital Gold :: Ethereum : Digital Economy” as the framing its then much easier to describe what a bet on ETH is.

I first explain DeFi (the new Wall Street), NFTs, Web3, and all the other mind blowing projects built on Ethereum...
...then illuminate how ETH is at the center of all it.

If BTC is like gold - an asset that people store value in but don’t use as money.

Then ETH is like money - the most liquid asset in Ethereum’s on-chain economy that is demanded for a wide range of economic uses.
Read 5 tweets
30 Dec 20
Many will scoff at this but it’s not far fetched.

The flip side of cheering on bankers and billionaires as they pile into Bitcoin is that it is re-enforcing the status quo wealth distribution.

If we’re not careful it may even exacerbate it.
With the way many Bitcoiners romanticize the gold standard, you would think that the gold standard was actually popular when we were on it.

Hint, it was not.
I strongly believe BTC is an important check on privileged parties controlling the money supply and abusing their power.

I also believe the certainty Bitcoin provides people over the preservation of their wealth is important as well - Bitcoin is stable, apolitical, and reliable.
Read 4 tweets
28 Dec 20
Excited to share our 2020 #Bitcoin review.

2020 will be remembered as the year the long fabled institutions finally arrived and #Bitcoin became a bonafide macroeconomic asset.

Below are the top highlights of each month for Bitcoin’s historic year.

1/
Bitcoin is now at all-time highs capping off an extremely successful year.

But it was by no means stable ride up.

2020 was a historically volatile year.

@YoungCryptoPM and I provided a detailed overview of every month of 2020 in all its glory.

messari.io/article/bitcoi…
Jan.

3 days into the new year the US assassinated Iran’s top general Soleimani.

BTC surprisingly reacted to the events behaving like a safe haven as the risk of war increased.

The events provided the first hints of BTC potentially having graduated to a legitimate macro asset.
Read 23 tweets
28 Dec 20
Nearly all the recent growth in total value locked in DeFi since the summer has come from BTC, stablecoins, and other ERC-20s.

What does this mean for ETH?

1/
Pet rock 1.0 (BTC) looks like it’s about to reach parity with pet rock 2.0 (ETH) in total value locked in DeFi 👀
Lol gave ETH bulls hopium earlier today, now giving them hard questions.

I’m actually not too concerned about the above charts, but I can’t pretend it’s not a risk.

We’ve been talking about this for a while.

messari.io/article/defi-i…
Read 5 tweets
22 Dec 20
On the surface index protocols appear to just be vehicles for passive exposure to cryptoassets.

However under the hood they're much more powerful than that.

Through meta-governance index protocols may be an attractive DeFi aggregation play through voting power accumulation.

1/
It all starts with the premise that index protocols are fundamentally community governed pools of assets that can be used to provide investors:

1. Passive asset exposure
2. Yield from vault strategies
3. Governance delegation through meta-governance

Index protocols are the latest attempt at DeFi aggregation - a topic we’ve explored multiple times.

The reason why is simple - Web2 aggregators have accrued trillions of $$$ in value by occupying powerful positions in value chains throughout the economy.

messari.io/article/value-…
Read 6 tweets

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