1. The Binance Alpha's popularity has surged, with 47% of people brushing at the 16,000 level. For small retail investors like us, there are hardly any bonuses left. I have seven accounts to claim once more, and I plan to give up five and keep two for a pig's foot meal.
The score-brushing activity of Binance Alpha has artificially created a prosperity in the BSC ecosystem. This wave has likely attracted tens of thousands of new registrations for Binance accounts. These newcomers have encountered such a simple way to make money in the crypto world, and while some may fall into contracts, others might buy memes or spot trading. Very few might rise to make significant money in the crypto world. Binance Alpha has become the entry point for newcomers into crypto. This method of earning has been extremely friendly to beginners, and its real significance lies in bringing more newcomers into the market and cultivating the habit of using Binance wallets among new and old users. This method of earning might become a mainstream way to cultivate users in the future.
2. The investment returns in the crypto circle consist of narrative returns and emotional returns. For coins like BNB, SOL, ETH, and UNI, the narrative returns are already quite weak. So-called narrative returns rely on a brand new story concept to drive expected development. The previous DOT narrative was 'mother of all chains,' EOS was about Web 3.0, and these are narratives that have been speculated. UNI represents the narrative of decentralized exchanges, while SAND and MANA represent the metaverse narrative. RENDER and WLD relate to AI depin, and the narratives of earning money without working have all been speculated through.
Currently, buying BNB, SOL, and ETH basically does not yield any narrative returns. What we can look forward to is the emotional returns that are relatively certain at the peak of a bull market, which means returns driven by emotional valuation. Other narrative returns cannot be anticipated; we can only wait.
The strongest narrative return for BNB is the cheap high-speed public chain and exchange stocks; for ETH, it is the narrative of blockchain application operations; for SOL, it is the narrative of high-performance public chains and quickly packaged projects that issue tokens. The sub-narrative among the three is the token price anchoring of NFTs. However, this is just an extension for token prices. NFTs themselves are actually part of the market's emotional valuation. They have all been realized now. What people mean by saying there hasn't been any innovation in this round is that there are no entirely new conceptual narratives to create market expectations. Therefore, there are no stories to tell, and currently, relying on narratives is not driving prices up. Those who were supposed to buy into these stories have already done so, and without new stories to attract more funds, it is difficult for them to rise.
In the future, if we expect them to rise, we can only rely on emotional returns. Valuations driven by emotions happen very quickly and end just as fast, just like human emotions—excitement, anger, sadness, happiness—these fleeting moments pass in an instant, and finally settle into a stable emotional state, which is a brief process.
Things driven by emotions are all fleeting; the long upper shadow only proves that it was once there, that you once had money.
If there is another bull market, I estimate that ETH and BNB will at most double in value, while SOL may exceed three times. If you expect five or ten times returns, it can only happen if there is some new narrative value that attracts new funds to speculate.
3. Today someone asked me if I like Labubu. I said I do, but it's too expensive, and I won't spend a lot of money on it. Buying this item is an emotional need. Owning Labubu gives me a feeling of emotional fulfillment; it has a cute yet slightly evil charm that compensates for my inner sense of loss, serving as a reflection of my inner self. I just don't have much interest in purely cute dolls that represent extremely positive characters.
I think everyone has this emotional need. For instance, my family, no matter how busy they are with work, will always go to church on Sundays, even in bad weather. Some people enjoy pets and will play ball with them. A small part of my emotional needs is fulfilled by watching beautiful female streamers. Maybe some people would look down on that and think it's a lecherous behavior, but I don't like watching those who talk about getting rich; when I hear what sounds like reasonable yet nonsensical talk, I just want to tell those greasy old guys to shut up. I don’t watch funny skits; I just love watching beautiful female streamers and occasionally chatting with them in their streams. It's truly a delight, but I rarely give gifts; consuming the emotional value of streamers is too expensive for me. I just enjoy watching. Who doesn't like beautiful things? Teacher Huang often sends me links to beautiful bloggers for me to check out; his taste surprisingly aligns with mine, showing that beauty is often recognized similarly.