Variational just created massive FOMO. And I understand why. → TGE confirmed for Q4 → 32% of supply allocated to the Genesis Airdrop → 100% unlocked at TGE → Unclaimed allocation gets burned People are now doing the math on what their points could be worth. But IMO, the biggest lesson from Variational isn't its tokenomics. It's timing. The farmers celebrating today didn't discover Variational after the tokenomics announcement. They positioned before everyone knew what the points were worth. And that's exactly why I'm still farming @risextrade and @TxFlow_L1 . Look at the difference in scale: Hyperliquid → ~$220B 30D volume Lighter → ~$50B+ Variational → ~$40B+ RISEx → ~$2.8B TxFlow → ~$2.25B Variational is already doing 10x+ the volume of either. That's not necessarily a weakness. That's the opportunity I'm looking for. 🔹RISEx: → ~$2.8B 30D volume → ~$27M OI → No token → Points already live → Only ~5.7K accounts receiving weekly points → New incentive mechanics are still being introduced 🔹TxFlow: → ~$2.25B 30D volume → ~$18M OI → No token → No live points program yet → Early activity confirmed to receive future multipliers And there's another reason I'm interested in both. Neither thesis is simply “another Perp DEX launches a token.” RISEx is being built inside the broader RISE L2 ecosystem. TxFlow is building its own L1 infrastructure. Of course, none of this guarantees a Variational-like outcome. Both teams still need to execute, grow liquidity, attract users and keep shipping. But that's precisely the trade-off. When CT is calculating point valuations, OTC markets are pricing allocations and everyone agrees an airdrop could be huge, you're no longer early. I prefer looking one step before that: - Real product. - Real volume. - No token. - Much less competition. Variational is showing everyone today why timing matters. I'm trying to apply that lesson to where we are before the next tokenomics announcement. Early doesn't mean guaranteed. It means the potential upside hasn't been fully competed away yet

Week 6 - @Lighter_xyz × Robinhood points Best week so far. → 45.5 pts this week → $905.7K volume → +58% points vs last week → Previous week: 28.8 pts Halfway through the week I started changing my strategy: less focus on generating raw volume and more on maintaining OI, mainly through the SPY / QQQ strategy I explained below. And the first results look promising. The important part: this wasn't even a full week running the new strategy. Next week I'll try to maintain around $50K OI throughout the entire period and keep rotating positions roughly every 24h. That should give us a much cleaner comparison. Still too early to draw conclusions, but OI is becoming increasingly interesting to me vs simply chasing volume. If you want to track your own weekly activity/points, the tool I built is in the quoted tweet below. Let's see what W7 brings.

RISEPUNKS SOLD OUT. The start was slower than I expected during GTD and WL. But once the public phase opened, everything changed. The remaining supply disappeared and @RisePunks officially sold out. Honestly, congrats to the RISEPUNKS and @stage0_ teams. We've been following this collection since very early, when the Discord had barely a few hundred people and everyone was fighting to get Infected. Today it became the first NFT collection on RISE and sold out its entire public supply. Now the fun part begins: Let's see what happens after the mint. More than Punks. 🦠

RISEPUNKS MINT DAY. If you've been following the RISE ecosystem with me, today is the day. @RisePunks is a 2,000-piece genesis collection built alongside RISE and hosted by @stage0_ . Here's the simple when, where & how: MINT - September 24 → GTD: 12:00–12:45 UTC — Ξ0.008 → WL: 12:45–13:45 UTC — Ξ0.009 → Public: 13:45–19:45 UTC — Ξ0.01 Important detail about GTD: GTD only guarantees 2 RISEPUNKS, despite the overall wallet cap being 4. That means GTD wallets can't simply take 4 each during their guaranteed window. So depending on GTD participation, a meaningful part of the 2,000 supply could still reach WL. Max: 4 per wallet overall. Before minting: → Check whether you're GTD/WL: risepunks.wtf → Bridge ETH to RISE using the official RISE Portal: portal.risechain.com/bridge → Switch your wallet to RISE Mainnet → Mint through Stage0: stage0.xyz/presales/ Use the same wallet that's on the InfectedList and make sure you have enough ETH on RISE for mint + gas. I've been following RISEPUNKS since very early on. Today we finally see how much demand there actually is. GTD → WL → Public. Good luck, infected. 🦠

The $JUMP plot just got more interesting. While rumors are circulating about a possible @jumperapp sale on Legion, $75M FDV, $3M raise, September 29 The CEO of Jumper is pushing a very specific message: > “Crypto fucked this up by normalizing token + equity double dipping.” And: “Jumper is doing it differently.” We still don't know what happens with XP, whether there's an airdrop, or whether the leaked Legion details are even real. But the message seems clear: they don't want $JUMP to become another worthless token while equity captures the real value. And well... at least the video starts with an apology: “Sorry for fucking you over and over again.” Apology accepted. Now please don't do it again with $JUMP. 😭

RISEx may have just opened the door to “buying” more points. The new Impact Pool looks designed to incentivize larger, more aggressive trades. To participate, you need to execute $50K+ trades that immediately take liquidity from the order book, and @risextrade tracks the slippage paid beyond 1 bp. Qualifying traders then have a 50% chance of receiving additional RISE Points, with rewards proportional to qualifying slippage. > My interpretation? RISEx wants more aggressive volume. And there's another important piece. It's NOT officially confirmed that market orders earn more points in the regular Ignite distribution. But market orders have higher fees, and from what we've observed while farming, they appear to be rewarded differently/more heavily than passive limit activity. Now Impact Pool explicitly introduces another incentive for taking liquidity and accepting execution costs. So we're moving further toward: More fees + more spread/slippage → potentially more points. In other words, we're increasingly able to “buy” points through execution costs. This already existed indirectly. Impact Pool just makes that relationship much more explicit. And IMO, this incentive seems much more attractive for whales than for the average farmer. If you're already executing $50K+ orders, getting additional points for the impact you're already paying makes sense. But if you're a smaller farmer, I wouldn't suddenly increase size or intentionally eat more slippage just to qualify. More points ≠ better farming. What matters is what those points cost you. I'm still waiting for a few answers from the RISEx team before changing my strategy, especially around the weekly pool size and exactly how qualifying trades/slippage are calculated. But my first takeaway is clear: The door to spending more to earn more points just got wider. Whether that's profitable is a completely different question.

$JUMP is official. Now the question is: what happens to our XP? @jumperapp just confirmed the $JUMP ticker. And with both Jumper and Legion teasing a “BIG WEEK”, I have a theory... What if $JUMP launches through @legiondotcc? I see 3 possible scenarios: 🔹XP → Airdrop: the dream scenario, but probably the one I expect least. 🔹XP → Sale allocation: your XP determines how much $JUMP you can buy. 🔹Legion sale: XP is just one factor/multiplier alongside Legion's own allocation criteria. To be clear: the Legion sale is just my speculation. Nothing has been announced. But after farming Jumper XP for this long, I'm very curious to see what role they actually play. And yes... the meme explains exactly what I'm expecting.

RISEx Week 9 - farming is getting more expensive, but the opportunity is still there. Another 200K points distributed by @risextrade. My Week 9: → $962.7K volume → $798.2K limit volume — 82.9% → $129.18 fees → 162.5 points → $0.79 cost per point Compared to last week: Volume: $667.9K → $962.7K (+44%) Points: 166.8 → 162.5 (-2.6%) Cost/point: $0.64 → $0.79 So yes, my farming was less efficient this week. But $0.79/point is still below my personal $1/point threshold, so I'm comfortable continuing. And here's the other metric I'm watching closely: 5,721 accounts received points this week. W4 → 5,757 W5 → 5,895 W6 → 5,736 W7 → 5,740 W8 → 5,646 W9 → 5,721 Five weeks later, we're basically in the same place. More expensive farming for me, yes. Massive dilution from new farmers? Not yet. That's why I'm still accumulating. And remember: don't judge your farming by someone else's points screenshot. Measure your own efficiency. I built the RISEx Farming Analyzer to track your activity, cost per point and farming efficiency. You can find it in my bio.

Bulls are celebrating. Bears say they'll be crying soon. BTC has ripped back above $85K, but the market still feels strangely quiet. > BULLS - BTC went from ~$80K to $87K+ ~$999M flowed into spot BTC ETFs in a single day - Institutional demand is showing up again - Risk appetite is returning > BEARS - BTC is still ~30% below its $126K ATH - The move has been extremely fast - Part of the rally was fueled by short liquidations - One strong week doesn't confirm a new bull market But there's something else I'm noticing that isn't on the charts: - Crypto still feels quiet. - Discords, Telegram groups, timelines... I'm not seeing the level of excitement I'd expect after a move like this. And I think there are two possible reasons: 1. People still don't believe the bull is back. or... 2. A lot of people were waiting for much lower prices and are now watching BTC pump from the sidelines. And the second one would explain a lot. It's hard to celebrate a pump when you're underexposed to it. So I'm curious: Was the bottom already in and the bull is back? Or are the Bears right and this is just another trap? BULL or BEAR? Pick a side and tell me why.