Probably should write a brief note on EigenLayer. This won't be a deep dive or an economic analysis, but rather our personal take on the project, especially since our LPs have acquired a significant amount of EIGEN tokens. We've also analyzed one of the AVSs (currently raising a round) that is responsible for transaction validation.

All AVSs on EigenLayer operate using a Shared ETH model.
Essentially, users deposit ETH with an operator, and the operator distributes it among the AVSs. Most operators are working with more than five AVSs. This introduces a significant slashing risk.
In our opinion, sooner or later, one of these AVSs will make a mistake, get hacked, or face some other issue, as the risk level is orders of magnitude higher than with native staking. And considering many users are also using liquid ETH the situation gets even messier.

There's a lack of incentive to hold EIGEN tokens. From what we see, a lot of tokens are being dumped on exchanges. Who's buying them back? Perhaps EL itself.
Apart from the airdropped EIGEN tokens, the AVSs themselves generate minimal profit (practically none), because there aren't any projects that are eager to "host" on EigenLayer. Why? Mainly because there’s no need for it, and every project prefers having its own token issued on an L1 like Ethereum or Solana.
Will this change in the future? We think that's a big "if."

Since there aren't any projects paying AVSs for “hosting” on EigenLayer, AVSs are now planning to issue their own tokens to raise funds (at insane valuations).
But who needs these useless AVS tokens? That's unclear.

We're not here to predict the price of EIGEN or the fate of the entire ecosystem. But from what we’ve seen internally, there just aren’t any economic incentives to participate in the network (aside from the airdropped EIGEN). And there are no projects that really need EigenLayer at this point, for all the reasons mentioned above.
That said, crypto is unpredictable, and the famous VCs backing this project might just help it grow into something significant.

It’s been almost a month since Token2049 in Singapore, and what a wild few days those were! We've met an incredible number of new, interesting people at all kinds of events, including a couple of amusing closed-door ones. With this amount of crypto people in town, it felt like every other person was in the space, leading to some pretty weird situations, and some people we barely know are still messaging us on Telegram with various offers and sharing photos we took together :)

We also met quite a lot of VCs, and agreed to share deal flow going forward. When it comes to the value of in-person meetings, while Zoom is undoubtedly an indispensable tool these days, nothing beats the personal connection of face-to-face interaction. We managed to connect with a couple of tier-1 startup founders who had previously told us their rounds were closed and that they didn’t need more capital. But after meeting in person, we were able to change their minds. Will writing soon about the startups we invested in — a few of them are absolutely on fire!

As for startups, the founder of Directly.xyz was also in Singapore. It's a project that lets people buy real estate directly from developers with crypto and get a kickback (4-8%) in USDT — a commission usually pocketed by agents. They also have plans to tokenize real estate and launch a P2P crypto rental market in Dubai. During the few hours we spent together, we randomly met two amazing ladies, which led to some exciting follow-up. Soon, Cointelegraph will be covering his startup, and the founder will be pitching Directly on stage in just a few days at Blockchain Life in Dubai. Considering the launch was initially scheduled for January 2025, our brief stroll definitely accelerated things into hustle mode.
There’s so much more we could share, but we have to mention the epic parties every night — they were just awesome!

Continuing from our previous post about Singapore, we'd want to share something not directly related to investments or crypto, but more rooted in ideology.
Our core team entered the crypto space at its inception and still consider ourself largely a Bitcoin maximalists. It’s fascinating to watch how the community has evolved, starting as an underground movement and now going mainstream on Wall Street. Looking at the people we've met at Token2049, they’re clearly very different from those early meetups back in 2013, where people wore t-shirts with slogans like “Fuck the government.”
It got us thinking — have we abandoned the ideals of our founding fathers? :)

After all, this community was born from the cypherpunk movement, whose mailing list was where Satoshi first announced Bitcoin. They were the early adopters, and without them, crypto likely wouldn’t exist as it does today.
Timothy May’s manifesto predicted the creation of dark markets protected by cryptographic technologies, and we all know how that played out. Governments, with their strict AML/KYC regulations, now oversee and control the flow of cryptocurrency transactions. It’s like the famous saying: “If you can’t beat them, control them.”

If crypto was originally designed to free people from government control, now we’re seeing the rise of CBDCs (Central Bank Digital Currencies), which, in many ways, feel like the illegitimate offspring of crypto and the state, taking the worst aspects of both. With CBDCs, governments can decide when, how, and how much people can spend, effectively tracking every individual’s behavior with alarming precision. This level of surveillance could lead to deep intrusions into personal privacy, almost like a dystopian system—reminiscent of China’s social credit system. Step out of line, and you might not be allowed on a plane, or even into Disneyland.

But it’s not all doom and gloom. Shortly after Token2049, the Network State conference was held in Singapore. The idea is compelling: in essence, people can unite based on shared values and beliefs, rather than geographic location, and start building a new kind of “networked state.” Gradually and peacefully, these communities aim to replace outdated governmental institutions. Of course, they’ll need a physical hub to organize—and they’ve already found one: a beautifully ghost city in Malaysia, where these guys are starting to gather and get things moving. So, the whole Network State idea reminds us of “Nomad Capitalist” concept—go where you’re treated best. But the Network State idea goes even further. Their plan is to create a meritocracy based on libertarian principles.
It’s definitely something to keep an eye on.

Haven’t written in a while – it’s been a busy time. During a bull market, everything looks shiny, but it takes time to evaluate opportunities!

Our recent deals include:

- Levr.bet – A sports betting platform leveraging DeFi on Monad.
- DeSyn – A decentralized restaking platform offering curated low/medium-risk options alongside potential airdrops.
- Primex – A leveraged trading and yield farming app enabling users to amplify positions using lender liquidity on DeFi protocols.
- Nomad Fulcrum – A convenient platform for selecting crypto and related investments.
- OrdeeZ – A Bitcoin liquidity protocol that unlocks BTC’s potential by enabling users to borrow, leverage, and earn passive yields, or buy premium Ordinals with just 20% upfront securely built on Bitcoin L1.
- Sunrise – A DA layer designed to meet the high data demands of L2 apps, particularly in blockchain gaming and AI projects.

Couldn’t fit everything into this post, will share more updates soon!

Great experience, we were glad to participate—there are some fantastic teams building on Aptos!

V3V team is wrapping up an intense and inspiring week in Dubai — big thanks to the @token2049official crew for the world-class organization and support throughout the event! 🙌
It was a pleasure to be one of the main sponsors this year, and we truly enjoyed being part of both the main event and some amazing side events across the city.
So many strong founders, great investors, and new connections — we’ll be sharing more takeaways and highlights from TOKEN2049 Dubai very soon.
See you in Singapore next! 🇸🇬