Have you heard about the WLFI incident recently? Sun Yuchen invested 75 million US dollars as a consultant, and as a result, 104 million US dollars worth of tokens were directly frozen by the project party just a few days after the listing! 😱 What happened to 'decentralized finance'? Doesn't it make you question 'decentralization'? This move has clearly exposed the industry's secrets —— many projects shout 'decentralization', but in reality, the team holds significant power, and we retail investors need to stay alert!
Sister Bai is here with 13 years of practical experience～This article breaks down the events, avoids the pitfalls, and also helps conservative investors uncover the 4 major truly decentralized cryptocurrencies to watch in 2025. Make sure to save it and take your time reading it～💖
1. Can we still get back Sun Yuchen's coins?
The older sister clarifies for the babies from both technical and legal perspectives:
First, technically, once a token is frozen by a smart contract, only the project party or those with special permissions can unlock it — Brother Sun shouted 'unreasonable freezing' on X to unlock it, but the WLFI team has not responded positively so far, which is like 'the key is in someone else's hand; it's useless for us to be anxious' ~
Looking at the legal aspect, this matter is even more complicated: WLFI has the endorsement of the Trump family, and Brother Sun was previously involved in a civil fraud case with the SEC. Now both sides are at odds, and it's basically hopeless to retrieve the tokens in the short term!
💢 This also serves as a reminder: when investing in projects, don't just look at 'big names backing it', first check whether 'tokens can be easily frozen'!
2. Decentralization isn't that simple! These real challenges must be known.
Many babies think 'being on-chain means decentralization', but there are many pitfalls here ~ The older sister has summarized 3 core challenges, babies, remember them well:
💢 Technical challenges are hard to overcome: Bitcoin only processes 7 transactions per second, Ethereum has often been congested in the past, and decentralization and scalability are basically 'like having cake and eating it too'; also, the PoW mechanism (like Bitcoin) consumes a lot of power, and environmentalists keep complaining, making it hard to balance!
⚠️ Governance hides risks: Fear '51% attacks' (if someone controls more than half the computing power, they can change the records), more afraid that the project becomes more 'centralized' — for example, if the core team holds the upgrade rights and the tokens are concentrated in a few hands, it superficially shouts community governance but actually decides everything themselves!
🔍 Regulation is tightening: Currently, countries are increasingly strict on cryptocurrencies. Some projects, to comply, quietly cut 'decentralization' in half, such as keeping 'freeze permissions' to deal with regulations, something retail investors cannot guard against!
3. Looking at the WLFI incident: Don't be fooled by 'pseudo-decentralization'!
WLFI is a typical case of 'pseudo-decentralization': the project claims to support DeFi, but with a single sentence, it can freeze the whale's coins — it seems to 'protect retail investors from being dumped', but it actually reduces 'decentralization' to nothing! 📄
The older sister has seen too many such tricks: using 'decentralization' for marketing to raise funds in the early stage, while keeping 'backdoor permissions' to control in the later stage. Babies, when investing in projects, ask yourself three questions first:
Can transactions be frozen or revoked casually?
Does the core team hold more than 30% of the tokens?
Are nodes concentrated in a few institutions?
If one of these three questions is 'yes', we need to be extra cautious!
4. How to determine if a coin is truly decentralized? Here are 4 tips to remember.
The older sister has condensed 13 years of experience into 4 easy-to-understand judgment criteria. Babies, remember them and use them directly:
✅ Look at the consensus mechanism: Prioritize PoW (like Bitcoin) or PoS (like Ethereum), and avoid 'DPoS where the team decides' — the former is 'everyone votes', while the latter is 'few people vote on behalf', which has a much lower degree of decentralization!
✅ Check node distribution: Go to the block explorer to see the number of nodes + geographical location. The more dispersed the global nodes, the better (for example, Bitcoin has thousands of nodes). If the nodes are concentrated in a few countries/institutions, it is likely 'pseudo-decentralization'!
✅ Focus on token distribution: Check the token distribution table in the white paper. If the core team + institutions hold more than 50% of the tokens, it's a direct pass; it's easy to be 'dumped by whales'; only those like Bitcoin that have no pre-mining and are fairly distributed are reliable ~
✅ Resistance to censorship: Check whether the project can resist 'external interference' — for example, no one can freeze transactions in Bitcoin, while WLFI can freeze at will, which is 'zero resistance to censorship', and we absolutely won't touch it!
5. Must-see in 2025! 4 truly decentralized coins!
The older sister has screened countless projects, and only these 4 are 'decentralized enough and won't get you scammed'. Babies, allocate according to your positions:
1. Bitcoin (BTC) — The ceiling of decentralization ✨
Degree of decentralization: ★★★★★
The big brother is truly the big brother! Thousands of nodes globally maintain it together, no one can freeze coins or delete transactions, not even the government can intervene — the next halving will come in 2025 (historically, after halving, prices have skyrocketed!), Standard Chartered even predicts it could reach 200,000 USD by the end of the year! 💸
Investment advice: Allocate 20%-30% of your position as 'a ballast'. After all, Bitcoin is the 'stabilizing force' of cryptocurrencies, and even with large fluctuations, it is more stable than smaller coins ~
Risk warning: Slow transaction speed (7 transactions per second), high power consumption, currently in a downward phase, don't chase highs and sell lows!
2. Ethereum (ETH) — The king of ecology, no pitfalls 💎
Degree of decentralization: ★★★★☆
After switching to PoS in 2022, it is now faster and more energy-efficient. Currently, institutions have staked over 20 million ETH! This year, it also introduced 'account abstraction', allowing gas fees to be paid with USDC, directly boosting the DeFi and NFT ecosystem — in August, the price surged to 4430 USD, and previously reached a new high of 4953 USD!
Investment advice: Allocate 30%-50% of your position during pullbacks, as Ethereum is the 'infrastructure' of Web3, and the more applications there are in the future, the more valuable it will be ~
Risk warning: Competing fiercely with public chains like Solana and Avalanche, there may be occasional congestion. Don't operate recklessly when gas fees are high!
3. Cardano (ADA) — Academic decentralized 💡
Degree of decentralization: ★★★★★
ADA is known for being 'academically driven'. After the Plomin upgrade in January this year, it has completely switched to decentralized governance — babies can choose 'delegated representatives' to vote, and what the core team says does not count! Moreover, the EUTXO model used is super secure, energy consumption is low, and even environmentalists can invest ~
Investment advice: Allocate 10%-15% of your position during pullbacks, as the ecosystem is still growing; once applications are implemented, there may be a big market ~
Risk warning: Slow technical iterations, the ecosystem is weaker than Ethereum, so patience is needed for it to explode!
4. Solana (SOL) — A high-performance decentralized dark horse 🚀
Degree of decentralization: ★★★★☆
SOL's strongest point is 'fast speed and low fees'. It can handle thousands of transactions per second. During the MEME coin craze, Dogwifhat's daily trading volume exceeded 20 billion USD, and its market cap is now over 90 billion! This year, after the Firedancer validator upgrade, network stability has improved by 50% ~
Investment advice: Allocate 15%-30% of your position for 'high elasticity configuration'.
Risk warning: Validator node distribution is not scattered enough, and there have been several network interruptions before, so keep a close eye on technical progress!
6. The future of decentralization & investment advice for babies
Although WLFI is troublesome, it also helped us filter out 'pseudo-decentralized' projects — true decentralization is not just 'on-chain', but also 'no one can act unilaterally'; the community makes decisions together and maintains the network together ~
Three small suggestions for conservative babies:
Don't allocate your positions randomly: mainstream coins (BTC + ETH) should account for 70%, potential coins (ADA + SOL) should account for 30%, don't be blinded by the short-term surge of small coins;
Keep an eye on on-chain data: Watch for whale transfers and node changes, and withdraw promptly if there are anomalies;
Don't trust 'marketing jargon': If a project claims to be 'decentralized', check the nodes and token distribution, let the data speak!
Are there any other coins you want to dig deeper into, babies? Shout at me in the comments, and I'll help you analyze one by one! If you find it useful, give a like, and next time I'll show you 'how to check on-chain data without falling into traps' ~👇
