Why are crypto projects no longer exciting?

Author: ignas Translation: Shan Ouba, Golden Finance

The year is 2032:

You wake up at the Four Seasons Hotel, feeling a little tired. Last night's two Negronis are still playing tricks on your mind. A notification pops up on your phone: You're checking your Rabby Wallet on your iPhone 23 XXL. Bitcoin has dropped 3% overnight. It's another panic caused by Saylor's strategy.

Yet, even so, the price of Bitcoin is still a whopping $1.2 million. You smile—that crazy Udi was right! You've already "retired," shouldering the financial burden of your entire family—though you entered the market at $114,000, you used 3x leverage and successfully got in with Hyperliquid. Although Cobie's prediction was slightly off: the truly difficult period was from 80,000 to 250,000, while 250,000 to 1 million was the "easy road." The 2024-2029 bull run was indeed unusual—that year, the four-year cycle ended, and your 3x leveraged trade miraculously survived liquidation. Thanks to Trump's third term, the United States successfully holds 5% of the world's Bitcoin reserves. A faint sense of regret arises: If you hadn't exchanged some of your ETH for private equity in OpenAI and SpaceX, you would have even more assets now. Sadly, neither company ultimately went public, instead tokenizing on NASDAQ's Ethereum Layer 2 network. Despite this, those tokenized shares still play a significant role as collateral on Aave and Fluid. Your mind begins to dream bigger: The Monad mainnet is about to launch, and the testnet airdrop is imminent. Once the funds arrive, you'll buy a second home in Antigua and Barbuda and get a passport. Next year, when the EU's 50% "crypto solidarity tax" kicks in, you'll be free to travel. However, your friends aren't so lucky. They've listened to experts from the Financial Times and the BBC and invested their money in EU defense bonds, yielding 4% annually, and holding EUR-CBDCs just to save for a down payment on a one-bedroom apartment. With inflation now at 8%, even a monthly universal basic income of €2,500 seems increasingly out of reach. You feel sad, but your conscience is clear: you tried to persuade them to invest in cryptocurrency, but they ignored you. Picking yourself up, you get dressed and brush your teeth. You open the X app—and suddenly a message pops up: "Please verify your age with a government-issued ID to log in." Oops, the VPN's down again. You quickly switch your IP address to Afghanistan, open X again, and finally log in. Visiting friends in the UK always feels so different. Time to "work" a bit before catching your flight home. Cryptocurrency sells dreams. The crypto world's most powerful selling point is its ability to inspire dreams of a better, more abundant life. This power of information is particularly evident in the current geopolitical and economic climate—people are struggling with bills, finding jobs, and experiencing the ongoing erosion of privacy (think of the UK's Cybersecurity Act). Whether you open the news, scroll through TikTok, or browse Instagram, your feed is filled with a sense of powerlessness and despair. But the atmosphere on Crypto Twitter is completely different. Cryptocurrency and Bitcoin are seen as the key to solving financial problems. This is why, in my opening story about 2032, I specifically mentioned the plight of your friends who haven't bought cryptocurrency. Coinbase understands this, and their messaging is brilliant. Their "Everything is Fine" ad, which satirizes the UK, made me laugh out loud, but they're not wrong. I love cryptocurrency because it's a place where people can dare to dream. But that's also why crypto skeptics don't like us. They don't believe our story, thinking our dreams are unrealistic and too far-fetched. Can blockchain change society? To them, it's just an "advanced spreadsheet." But as Nat Friedman said, "Pessimism sounds smart, optimism makes money." Cryptocurrency inspires big dreams because it's barrier-free and permissionless. This is also why scammers are drawn to this industry—they sell fantasies under the guise of a "better life" but ultimately destroy reality. But I'm not a scammer. And neither are you. We truly believe that cryptocurrency can have a positive impact on people's lives and society as a whole: 1) It strengthens the protection of personal wealth, and 2) it safeguards freedom and privacy in finance and the internet. Despite the crypto industry's tremendous achievements in just a few short years, I feel like many in the crypto community are forgetting how to dream big. We've all forgotten how to dream big. Our grand dreams once attracted countless retail investors to the industry. But why are new retail investors buying into ETH now? If even the most seasoned crypto users are still sticking with the $10,000 price target from the last bull run? ETH has seen such tremendous progress in recent years: spot ETF approval, traditional finance adoption, a growing stablecoin ecosystem, regulatory oversight, the tokenization of real assets (RWAs), and Robinhood's launch of its Layer 2 network... And all this only resulted in a 2x-3x increase? Perhaps we're too eager for mainstream recognition. So, when traditional finance entered the crypto scene, stories of "Lambos" and "skyrocketing" faded from the crypto narrative. Today, only those "silly coins" (XRP, ADA, etc.) and Bitcoin can still inspire dreams. At least BTC still paints a picture of a future "leading to millions." Meanwhile, ETH and most altcoins no longer talk about big dreams. But there's still hope for ETH to rediscover its dream. For years, the Ethereum community promoted the "supersonic currency" narrative. But with the successful network expansion and falling gas fees, this deflationary narrative collapsed. The technical and marketing teams ultimately lost sync. Now, the narrative has returned to basics: institutional adoption, stablecoins, and real-world assets (RWAs). While these concepts aren't new, this time, they're being told by louder and more credible voices like Thomas Lee and Joseph Lubin. Who tells the story is just as important as the story itself. The increasing number of publicly traded companies adding ETH to their balance sheets is also a contributing factor. This is giving investors who were still on the sidelines more confidence. Even bears are beginning to acknowledge that the strategy is working. But what if all this effort is ultimately just to get ETH to its target price of $10,000? Then ETH needs a more sexy, more imaginative story—a reason to hold ETH long-term. BTC is digital gold. What then is ETH? Digital oil? I believe that new story will eventually emerge. I remain bullish on ETH. Now let's look at Solana. In 2024, Solana, through its memecoin story of "grassroots success," enjoyed a brief period of immense popularity. However, as most meme investors lost money, the appeal of Solana and $SOL waned. $SOL isn't a traditional financial chain like ETH, nor does it have store-of-value properties like BTC. When people repeatedly lost money on memecoins, the story lost its excitement. How can we reignite people's dreams? "When I buy a token, I want to dream big." Yet, today, most projects focus solely on promoting technical features rather than depicting their grand vision. "The true meaning of a token is to empower the community to dream." — DefiIgnas (published on X) Looking back, it's amazing that a single oracle protocol, ChainLink's $LINK, could empower all of us to dream big. I once said to myself, "LINK is the most egalitarian thing we've ever seen. Its ambition is immense, and if it succeeds, it could reshape the entire fabric of society." Or consider Compound's COMP. What's so exciting about a lending protocol? A DEX aggregator? A cross-chain infrastructure? So what? These tokens were once exciting because they didn't exist in isolation, but were part of a larger movement: decentralized finance (DeFi). "Be your own bank." If you didn't like the team's direction, you could vote in the DAO with your governance tokens—you could influence the future! Back then, it felt truly revolutionary. But now, people no longer believe in DAOs. DeFi tokens have become investment assets, focused solely on revenue and fee returns, completely losing their narrative appeal. When projects like LINK, COMP, UNI, and YFI launched, they were at the forefront of the market, pioneers and early adopters of DeFi. They represented unprecedented innovation. But today, the emergence of a new DEX, lending protocol, oracle, or infrastructure project hardly captures people's imagination. Is this the price crypto has paid for its gradual maturation as an asset class? Most new project announcements or Time Generative Advancement (TGE) announcements on platforms like X lack any real excitement. Because these projects are either marginal upgrades to existing giants, or simply founders and VCs looking to quickly cash out their "big dreams" by issuing tokens, rather than serving the community. My advice to project founders is: invest time and money in crafting a coherent story and communicating your big dreams through storytelling. Marketing isn't just about posting paid technical posts on X, creating a beautiful UI, and using your social media manager to distribute memes. It's certainly hard work, but it will make you stand out. Investors seek support for big dreams. However, those peddling big dreams often lack the technical innovation to back them up, or are simply scammers. That being said, here are some projects that do a great job of marketing big dreams (though they aren't necessarily the best).

Projects and tokens that excel at "selling big dreams"

SPX6900

To be honest, I'm still not sure what this token is for. It seems like a meme, right? But Murad is a great storyteller, and this token is up about 15,000%. His pinned post on X is titled: "150 Reasons Why the SPX6900 Will Reach $1 Trillion in Market Cap." Remember, that's double Ethereum's current market cap! Outrageous? Ridiculous? Maybe, but who cares? The key is that he's empowering the community to dream. Murad's narrative also begins with that old comparison: Don't invest in crypto, AI will take your job, and you're doomed to fail. You might think this sounds like a pyramid scheme, but he's actually holding onto these coins, unlike many projects that dump them right after issuing them. Many crypto founders should learn from him. (Disclaimer: I don't personally own SPX6900.) Pudgy Penguins is my favorite crypto brand, bar none. It's hard not to like it: it's adorable, its price is rising (it was $2,000 when I bought the NFT), and its mission is to spread positivity throughout the metaverse. With billions of views on social media, Pudgy Penguins is currently the project with the greatest potential to become the public face of the crypto industry. More importantly, $PENGU is the only top memecoin native to Web3, unlike DOGE, PEPE, and SHIBA, which borrowed from Web2 culture. So, the Fat Penguin is effectively a PR representative for our entire industry, helping to address the public's negative perception of crypto. You may not like their unsettling AI iris-scanning sphere or their highly centralized token model, but there's one thing you can't deny: their ambition. Worldcoin's mission is to build a global identity and financial network, separating humans from AI and fostering global economic participation. Isn't this one of crypto's original core missions? Farcaster's X description might be the most unambitious one you'll see in the entire crypto industry: "A sufficiently decentralized social network." "Sufficiently decentralized" sounds unremarkable. But Farcaster is quietly building something big. It's building an open social network—as user-friendly as X, but censorship-resistant and truly user-owned. Rather than sacrificing user experience by moving everything to the blockchain, it precisely decentralizes only the essential elements: usernames, message content, and network read/write permissions. This ensures freedom while avoiding the complications of a full blockchain-based approach. Anyone can build new applications based on it, and no one can "block" you. Yes, certain front-end UI features might block you, but you can always switch platforms and continue to make your voice heard. Base's native integration into the new app proves Farcaster's approach works. I can't wait to see their coin launch. Hyperliquid: Needless to say. But to be honest, I wasn't a true believer until OKX and Binance teamed up to suppress Hyperliquid. Today, HYPE is more than just a trading protocol; it's a decentralized trading movement: a movement to move all trading from centralized exchanges (CEXs) to on-chain exchanges (DEXs). It aims to surpass Binance. Isn't that ambition enough? Isn't it enough to make you dream? HL is already a strong force in the perpetual contract market, and I believe it will dominate the spot market in the future. Hyperliquid is writing a new story. Polymarket: In this day and age, creating disinformation and spreading false news is incredibly cheap—almost effortless. But answering questions like, "Do vaccines cause autism?" requires billions of dollars in research and a long time commitment. The cost of truth is high. And in a world rife with fake news and AI-generated spam, truly understanding "what's happening" is more valuable than ever. Polymarket has proven its worth, predicting the US election results more accurately than traditional media. That's why Polymarket is one of the protocols that makes me dream. I can't wait for their airdrop to arrive soon. Since the Terra debacle, most have given up hope on building a truly decentralized stablecoin. Maker has turned to traditional finance and RWAs. Even Rai, the fiat stablecoin project Vitalik once championed, has changed course. Liquity may be our last chance to realize a truly decentralized, minimally governed stablecoin system. Although Liquity V2 is slowly developing, with a current TVL of only approximately $136 million and LQTY's market capitalization less than $100 million, it still has a long way to go in terms of user adoption. But their ambition is admirable. The crypto world will eventually need a decentralized stablecoin again. Liquity could be that answer. I know I'm their brand ambassador, but it's precisely because Fluid is the only project I'm willing to personally work on. When they announced their goal to surpass Uniswap in trading volume—despite being a lending protocol—I was shocked, but also deeply inspired. And they did it: for a day, Fluid's trading volume on Ethereum briefly surpassed Uniswap's. With the launch of Fluid DEX Lite, my goal for their trading volume, lending TVL, and FLUID token price is to "take off." Raise Your Aims The peak of the cryptocurrency dream was during the 2017/18 cycle. Back then, every token held a grand vision: a blockchain version of Uber or Airbnb, the Internet of Things (IOTA), supply chain management (VeChain), a decentralized advertising marketplace (Brave), a decentralized bank (Bankera), and so on. But back then, all of this was merely a white paper—without real technical support. 2020/21 was different: the ideals of DeFi and self-governance were supported by smart contracts and real, usable dApps. However, DAO governance and true on-chain decentralization remain elusive: DeFi ultimately became little more than an on-chain financial system. In this cycle, the market's focus has shifted to external drivers: ETFs, the tokenization of real-world assets (RWAs), and regulatory compliance. As a result, our dreams within the industry have become smaller, and our price targets have become increasingly conservative—despite the positive momentum of recent years. We're at a crossroads on the path to mass crypto adoption, but many are hesitant to dream big. All your price targets are too low. NVDIA alone has a market cap exceeding the entire cryptocurrency market. And NVDIA's stock price has risen 604% over the past few years. Crypto is now crossing the Rubicon: pro-crypto regulations are being implemented, and traditional finance is entering the fray. It’s time to dream bigger and raise your target price – by several fold!