In this round of crypto market pump, who are the real beneficiaries?

In the current rise of the crypto market, the group that is truly profiting is actually not many. Let's analyze the situation of all parties:

Venture capital firms (VCs) have not yet gained substantial profits from this round of pump. Most of the projects they invested in have not started token issuance. Even those tokens criticized by the community for high fully diluted valuations (FDV) and low liquidity appear to have considerable rise, but if there is no small crypto market bull run next, a significant drop is likely when the VC unlock period arrives.

For ordinary investors, the opportunities for profit are relatively limited. Most retail investors mainly participate in meme coin speculation, small cryptocurrency speculation, and leveraged trading. While a few may make profits through these methods, the success rate is not much different from winning the lottery.

So, who are the real beneficiaries of this round of market pump? The following groups are worth paying attention to:

1. Long-term holders of Bitcoin: They have witnessed Bitcoin rise from about $25,000 last year to around $65,000 now, achieving considerable returns. It is expected that there is a high possibility for Bitcoin to break through $100,000 in the next year. However, many investors may miss this opportunity because they feel that this rise is not attractive enough.

2. Centralized exchanges: These platforms have always been at the top of the crypto market, generating significant profits from the entire industry. Of course, operating an exchange also faces enormous risks, such as regulatory pressure and legal challenges, but high risks often come with high returns.

3. Centralized Finance (CeFi) platforms: A stablecoin issuer earned $4.7 billion in the first quarter, surpassing the profits of most trading platforms. Moreover, some institutions providing encryption financial services, such as custody and wealth management platforms, are also quietly generating significant profits. These platforms provide important services to the industry, and their profits are justified.

4. Some operating teams of public chains and decentralized finance (DeFi) projects: Certain decentralized trading platforms have considerable traffic, and almost all transaction fees go into the team accounts, unrelated to governance token holders. Some public chains have also earned considerable income through daily stablecoin transfers. These projects do not rely on selling tokens to retail investors but rather make money by developing actual businesses, which is more akin to traditional internet business models and worth learning from for other projects in the industry.

5. Some high market cap projects that primarily aim to issue tokens: If their tokens have been listed on centralized exchanges, they may have made substantial profits during this round of market rise. Such projects often do not require actual revenue to maintain high valuations, such as certain projects that claim to use zero-knowledge proof technology; after airdrops, the on-chain daily active users may only be in double digits, yet their market cap can still reach tens of billions. There are also some DeFi tokens with highly controlled supply and GameFi tokens operated by small teams that are in a similar situation. These projects can be seen as negative factors in the industry, continuously extracting funds from the ecosystem.

In addition, there are some groups such as quantitative trading teams that have also achieved certain profits in the market, but their scale is relatively small.

Through the above analysis, investors can consider building a long-term profitable encryption currency investment portfolio, mainly selecting investment targets from the top four beneficiary groups while avoiding the fifth category of projects. This strategy may help achieve more stable returns in a volatile market.