Crypto Portfolio Update: What am I Holding?

Disclaimer: this is not financial advice to invest in these projects. Make sure to do your own due diligence and consider the risks associated with cryptocurrency.

If you talked to 10 crypto investors about creating a portfolio, there’s a pretty good chance you’d get 10 very different answers. Some advocate for just holding Bitcoin, others, only Bitcoin and Ethereum. There’s also a large contingent of funds and individuals that are further out on the risk curve and are exploring investments in medium and small-cap cryptocurrencies. Like traditional markets, how an investor crafts their personal strategy is dependent on their investment objectives, market thesis, and risk tolerance.

Currently, my portfolio contains exposure to 8 different cryptocurrencies and 1 NFT project. While Bitcoin and Ethereum make up a significant part of my holdings, I’ve enjoyed targeting some medium and low cap projects with a strong development team, unique vision and market fit, and token utility. Most importantly, I’m investing in projects with long-term potential, tokens that I don’t mind holding in case there’s a major market correction.

In this blog, I’ll detail what projects I’m invested in and my general thesis for why these protocols have long-term upside.

1. Bitcoin $BTC ($1.2 T market cap, Rank 1): the largest and oldest cryptocurrency protocol is as relevant as ever in the global financial landscape. Recent positive developments such as the Bitcoin ETF in October and the highly anticipated Taproot upgrade in November have propelled Bitcoin to All-Time Highs. Scaling solutions built on the Lightning Network seek to improve accessibility and reduce transaction fees for fast, cost-efficient global payment infrastructure.
2. Ethereum $ETH ($540 B fully diluted market cap, Rank 2): the transformative smart-contract platform has resumed its torrid pace this fall. There is a constant stream of new developer talent to Ethereum-based protocols and scaling solutions. As investors and protocols compete for block space on the Ethereum main chain, transaction fees are becoming prohibitive to smaller investors. Ethereum compatible “bridging” solutions like Avalanche, Fantom and Polygon are rapidly improving user experience and addressing scaling concerns. With Ethereum 2.0 looming in the next 6–12 months, Ethereum has both short and long-term upside.
3. Solana $SOL ($71 B market cap, Rank 5): while Ethereum is the entrenched leader of smart contract solutions, there is not a lack of competition in the market. Solana is a lightning-fast solution that measures final settlement time in seconds and transaction costs in pennies. Many investors are betting these value propositions will eventually attract companies to build out their cryptocurrency architecture on Solana, where users are able to quickly and cheaply transact. Solana is well funded by Venture Capital firms that introduces a tradeoff of exceptional development and investment for concerns around decentralization. My $SOL investment is essentially a hedge against Ethereum’s market dominance.
4. Sushi $SUSHI ($1.4 B market cap, Rank 83): starting as an Automated Market Maker (AMM) for token swaps, the Sushi development team is among the most ambitious and expeditious groups in crypto. After their fork of Uniswap, a pioneering AMM service, Sushi has proved itself an innovative and forward-thinking protocol, differentiating itself from the competition. Sushi has made transformational improvements to the process of liquidity provision, revenue sharing, token creation and launchpad services. Recently, they announced Shōyu, a NFT marketplace and metaverse that will compete with OpenSea and distribute transaction fees back to the owners of the protocol. Personally, I’m staking my Sushi tokens and earning about 8.5% APY in Sushi rewards.
5. Alchemix $ALCX ($337 M market cap, Rank 241): a protocol that lets users take an advance on their future yield, Alchemix is a savings technology built on Ethereum. Users deposit their cryptocurrency in Alchemix and can borrow against their collateral. The borrowed amount is treated as debt that is automatically paid-off over time through yield available in lending/borrowing protocols. The development team for this project is well connected and highly respected in the Ethereum community and has developed deep partnerships with acclaimed protocols like Yearn Finance, Chainlink, Olympus DAO, Sushi, Bancor and Tokemak. Like Sushi, I’m staking my Alchemix tokens and earning about 60% APY in ALCX rewards.

In addition to these five projects, I’m also invested in Cosmos ($ATOM), AAVE ($AAVE), Abracadabra Finance ($SPELL), and Parallel NFT. I’ve found it challenging to learn about all of the transformational projects, but be selective about those that I’m investing in. Therefore, a few projects on my periphery include:

• Polkadot $DOT (Rank 8): another interoperability protocol that is similar to the Cosmos blockchain
• Avalanche $AVAX (Rank 13): an Ethereum bridge solution that is attracting significant development resources through a grant program
• Fantom $FTM (Rank 38): another Ethereum bridge solution, led by renowned developer Andre Cronje
• Olympus $OHM (Rank 54): a protocol designing a floating reserve currency based on locked treasury value. Also, Olympus offers bonding services that let treasuries buy liquidity, rather than rent
• Convex Finance $CVX (Rank 122): a shared treasury service dedicated to helping investors more effectively use Curve Finance ($CRV)
• Immutable X $IMX (Rank 123): blockchain gaming infrastructure that is working to incorporate NFTs into new and legacy gaming franchises
• Tokemak $TOKE (Rank 203): a transformative liquidity provisioning protocol that will help crypto projects strategically direct token liquidity to exchanges
• Rari $RGT (Rank 210): a revolutionary lending and borrowing protocol that gives users more flexibility to use the crypto assets of their choice