Examples from previous cycles included:

• every Layer 1 needs its own ecosystem;
• high TPS automatically creates adoption;
• every brand needs NFTs;
• blockchain gaming would onboard the next billion users;
• every DeFi token would capture protocol value;
• Bitcoin could never be accepted by traditional finance.

Some narratives failed completely.

Others were correct, but happened much later than expected.

That makes contrarian thinking useful.

Right now, the market has several widely accepted assumptions:

• institutions will continue accumulating crypto;
• stablecoins will keep growing;
• tokenization will become a major financial sector;
• Layer 2 networks will remain essential;
• Bitcoin will continue separating itself from the rest of crypto;
• AI and blockchain will eventually converge in a meaningful way.

At least some of these will probably be wrong, or correct in a very different way from what investors expect.

The difficult part is identifying which one before the market does.

What current crypto narrative do you think is fundamentally wrong or massively overvalued?

And on the opposite side, what trend do you think the market is still underestimating?

Some common examples:

• holding through a complete market cycle without taking profits;
• using too much leverage;
• buying a token only because it was trending;
• ignoring token unlocks;
• trusting an exchange too much;
• sending funds to the wrong network;
• approving a malicious smart contract;
• losing access to a wallet;
• investing in a project without understanding the token model.

What interests me is not the loss itself, but the lesson that changed behaviour afterward.

For example, after experiencing a severe drawdown, some investors start using position sizing and predefined exit rules.

After a wallet security incident, users often become much more disciplined about approvals, hardware wallets and seed phrase storage.

After getting caught in an illiquid altcoin, traders usually start paying much more attention to liquidity and market depth.

Markets are expensive teachers, but those lessons tend to stay.

What was your most expensive crypto mistake?

And more importantly:

What rule do you follow today specifically because of that experience?

If you could only hold three crypto assets until 2031, you would probably care less about short-term narratives and more about survival.

My criteria would be:

• strong liquidity;
• decentralization;
• developer activity;
• real economic usage;
• security track record;
• sustainable token economics;
• regulatory resilience;
• ability to remain relevant across multiple market cycles.

The obvious choices for many people would be Bitcoin and Ethereum.

The third position is much more interesting.

Possible approaches include:

Another Layer 1

Betting that multiple major ecosystems survive.

Infrastructure token

Exposure to an important part of the crypto stack.

DeFi protocol

Betting on decentralized financial activity rather than a base-layer network.

Stablecoin-related infrastructure

Less speculative, but potentially tied to one of crypto's strongest use cases.

There is also a reasonable argument for holding only BTC and ETH rather than forcing diversification.

The exercise is useful because it removes the temptation to chase every new narrative.

If you could hold only three crypto assets for five years, what would they be and why?

No portfolio percentages required, but I would be interested in the thesis behind each choice.

Back then, the dominant narratives were:

• censorship-resistant money;
• decentralised applications;
• replacing financial intermediaries;
• user-owned digital infrastructure;
• open participation.

Today, a large part of the market is built around:

• ETFs;
• institutional custody;
• tokenized securities;
• stablecoins;
• corporate treasuries;
• regulated exchanges;
• yield products.

That is not necessarily a negative development.

Institutional adoption brings liquidity, infrastructure, better custody, and wider access.

But it also raises a fundamental question:

Is crypto becoming more useful, or simply becoming another layer of traditional finance?

Bitcoin is increasingly treated as a macro asset.

Stablecoins are becoming settlement infrastructure.

Ethereum and other smart-contract networks are being used for tokenization and financial applications.

Meanwhile, many consumer-facing Web3 products still struggle to reach mainstream usage outside speculation.

I think the answer probably differs by sector.

Stablecoins clearly solve a real problem.

DeFi has genuine utility, but remains complex.

NFTs proved digital ownership was possible, but much of the speculative market disappeared.

Payments remain fragmented.

Which crypto use case do you think has proven real product-market fit outside speculation?

And which narrative do you think the industry overestimated the most?