A couple weeks ago a debate between @smyyguy and

@_Jonahw aired on @theempirepod .

Jonah made a point along the lines of: we need to forecast a forex rate when doing a DCF because yield for stakers is native yield (denominated in the staking token of the L1, not in USD).

Dan returned that forecasts for amount of activity is often denominated in USD. He also makes the point that native token price doesn't proportionally affect that amount of activity in USD (i.e. 10% drop in ETH doesn't mean 10% drop in USD denominated amount of activity). Combined these indicate that the forex rate is kinda being double counted and thus doesn't need to be considered in the DCF.

Jonah kinda dodged this point and emphasized that stakers are getting the native asset, not USD. I think this misses Dan's point by not getting at the idea that future cash flows are not (entirely) denominated in the native asset, so there is inherently some exchange rate already.

I think it's interesting to think about my own user behaviors. I still think about gas fees in USD (i.e. subcent fees on Base is better than 30c on mainnet, not ETH). My demand to transact on Ethereum, though, isn't really denominated in ETH or USDC, it's denominated in the utility that it provides to me and the opportunity cost of the fees i need to pay.

For example I spend much more freely from a crypto debit card I have vs a bank-issued card I have. It's the same USD cost, but it's annoying to withdraw to my bank.

On the other hand, I have no idea how this translate to analyzing a population of users' aggregate demand to transact—could be much different from a macro perspective.