Two Degens – George’s interview with Daniel Hwang, and more 5 Minute Crypto

Howdy, how is everyone?

Just some Two Degens updates to share. George had a great chat with his friend and crypto OG Daniel Hwang (who’s been in crypto since early bitcoin mining days, worked at Terra among others, and just knows a TON). Pardon the bit of background noise there.

I’ve also been doing the daily 5 minute crypto update. With a few breaks here or there lol

Check ’em out, and please let us know how we can do better. I have to admit it’s been a joy to get back to making content. We’ll probably add video soon so you can see our filtered faces ;)

a16z 2023 State of Crypto – a shallow dive + podcast episode

Went through the a16z 2023 State of Crypto and pulled out some interesting slides + my own notes. I also recorded a podcast episode about it (as part of the 5 minute daily update):

Here we gooo:

Screenshot 2023-04-17 at 3.12.18 PM

Web1 was decentralized (email protocol, web protocol) but limited functionality, and no value accrual

Web2 was centralized into Google, Facebook, etc, advanced functionality, but value accrued to big tech

Web3 is decentralized again, community governed, and value accrues to participants

Screenshot 2023-04-17 at 3.14.28 PM

Web2 take rates are something like 30-100%
30% for services like Spotify and Apple App Store
100% for FB, Twitter

Web3 take rates are much lower – or even pay participants (like ETH’s PoS)
OpenSea is 2.5%, Uniswap is 0.30%

Screenshot 2023-04-17 at 3.15.19 PM

With each cycle, the market gets larger
-higher price
-more usage
-more developers
-more projects

Screenshot 2023-04-17 at 3.15.46 PM

ETH is scaling through rollups
In 2022, L2s paid less than 2% of all ETH fees
Now it’s closer to 7%

Screenshot 2023-04-17 at 3.17.41 PM

The big brands are all here – from mass consumer brands like Starbucks and Adidas and Budweiser to luxury brands like Tiffany and LV and Porsche

Screenshot 2023-04-17 at 3.18.08 PM

DAO governance is growing
From barely 50K monthly proposals in 2021 to more than 200K today
2M unique DAO voters

Screenshot 2023-04-17 at 3.19.50 PM

More than 50K monthly crypto developers on Github

Screenshot 2023-04-17 at 3.20.17 PM

Active addresses steadily growing
From less than 5M in 2018, to more than 15M today, across all blockchains

Screenshot 2023-04-17 at 3.22.40 PM

What A16z expects in the coming years
-Zero knowledge tech will accelerate
-On chain games will grow in popularity
-Light clients will accelerate web3 and mobile
-in the US, bipartisan crypto regulation will pass

5 Minute Crypto – a daily addition to Two Degens podcast

For the last few months, a builder-investor friend and I have been doing the Two Degens podcast where we talk markets, macro, and invite guests (mostly friends thus far, mostly defi).

Recently, I added a new daily format to the feed, an experiment I’ve wanted to do for awhile. It’s a 5-minute daily update with a collection of crypto news items, hot tweets and threads, and recommended reads. I end with one or two brief clips from interesting podcasts.

Since it’s on our main feed, you can check it out here:

https://twodegens.buzzsprout.com/

Embedded below. It’s only been a week, but my plan is to do this daily for the foreseeable future. Except when I’m feeling blah or hungover.

Two new Degens episodes with Imran from Kyber, and George and I shootin’ the crypto breeze

Lucky to have Imran Mohamad, Kyber’s marketing lead, to discuss in his words:

And in a separate episode, Jorge and I catch up on all the latest crypto shenanies and macro hankies and bank bailout pankies. Yup.

Recommended crypto reads – and a soon-to-be-published podcast

A friend and I are starting a crypto podcast because we’re middle aged crypto nerds who want to hear ourselves talk.

I’ll be posting the links here, and often. We’ve already recorded 4 episodes and will publish them soon, and will also invite guests in the future

There’ll be brief takes on the state of the market and recent crypto news, but the podcast focus will be crypto-related media (like blogs, tweets, and podcasts) that we recommend and why. There’s just an endless torrent of good content, and we want to get wet and then share the water drops (great metaphor right)

Here are some examples that I’ll probably mention in future episodes:

Reality check on state of crypto today and what causes the bubbles / cycles:

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1592177325906726912.html

Imagine a world where the most active investors in traditional finance are Nasdaq Ventures and the NYSE, and the financial information on those listed securities is opaque. That is our reality in the crypto sector. This is what we have created

Approximately 9 minutes into this episode of All-In, Chamath gives the best explanation of what’s happening with the SBF / FTX fraud circus and mainstream media’s role in it:

https://pca.st/episode/5486ca04-b7c7-4ec8-a57e-65128ed0da7f?t=587.0

Perhaps my favorite bitcoin analyst, David has rare perspective from decades in tradfi and a unique lens to look at bitcoin price action (namely, focusing on whales):

https://david06280728.substack.com/p/month-end-analysis-b95

That said, and as I intimated above, it is always darkest before dawn and investor sentiment is as dark now as at any point over my thirty years of investing. I suspect a lot of readers did not experience firsthand how frightening the dot-com bubble and GFC were, but I did, so I can assure you that the FUD then was no less compelling than the FUD right now

Philosophical reflection on crypto market cycles and why we’re here

https://www.visary.io/next/

Free will perhaps exists on micro levels – individual and local – but on a broader scale, the human condition seems to be solidified in its ways and patterns. Markets are a great example where this constantly plays out – especially in the relatively nascent, less-regulated, more free-market crypto space where multiple cycles have occurred, all culminating and correcting in eerily similar ways.

Thorough explanation of the short and long-term debt cycles as popularized by Ray Dalio (through a bitcoiner’s lens)

https://bitcoinmagazine.com/markets/the-conclusion-of-the-long-term-debt-cycle-and-the-rise-of-bitcoin

In a free-market capitalist economic system, the most important pricing mechanism is that of money. When there is a monopolist institution setting the price of money, the market is inherently not “free.” There is nothing free about reducing the price of money whenever there is an economic downturn, including the most recent injections of hundreds of billions and now trillions of dollars into financial markets whenever a major liquidation of malinvestment occurs.

One of the more thorough newsletters covering crypto news with brief but thoughtful takes:

https://page1.substack.com/p/round-tripping-677

Ending with the tooting of my own crypto horn:

https://kevinhabits.com/when-things-become-free/

https://kevinhabits.com/bitcoin-is-a-simple-asset-david-andolfatto/