Liquid Ventures

WHAT IS PEAPODS FINANCE? Peapods is a decentralized, permissionless, and trustless on-chain index investing and volatility farming protocol. Peapods permits the creation of fully customizable index tokens called “pods” which can be created with any ERC20 token and enables users to capitalize on the inexhaustible volatility of crypto markets, unlocking yield opportunities for any liquid asset. PROTOCOL DYNAMICS Part of our Peapods investment thesis is predicated on their protocol design,...

INTRODUCTION Metablox Games is a Web3 gaming studio leveraging Roblox to become a collaborative gaming venture synonymous with groundbreaking gaming experiences. Metablox is adopting a four-point strategy of (1) game development, (2) game acquisition, (3) strategic investments, and (4) empowerment and education to become a cornerstone of the Roblox ecosystem. For those unfamiliar with Roblox, it is an online platform and game creation system that allows users to design and...

Throughout 2023, our research team has recommended seven venture-style investments, primarily focused on small-cap tokens. We have compiled brief updates on each of the projects in our portfolio to examine our initial investment theses and ensure they remain intact. Click HERE for the full report. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

INTRODUCTION We believe Blockchain has massive potential to create new opportunities for growth in the gaming industry, but that potential has yet to materialize. Fully native Web3 games have largely been unsuccessful, with projects that gained the most traction in the last bull cycle (Axie Infinity, Stepn) becoming case studies for how unsustainable 'Play to Earn' (P2E) can be. This issue has been exacerbated since Web3 games are generally viewed...

INTRODUCTION One of the major complaints about crypto is that the user experience (UX) is unintuitive and clunky. Moving funds from bank accounts to non-custodial wallets is a cumbersome multi-step process. Once funds have arrived on-chain, trading on decentralized exchanges (DEX) has its issues with giving token approvals and manually trading tokens at the market price. On-chain limit orders or stop-losses have previously been nonexistent for DEX traders, making it...

WHAT IS LYBRA FINANCE? Lybra Finance is a lending protocol built on Ethereum that utilizes liquid staking derivatives to allow users to borrow against their staked ETH. When depositors supply staked ETH, they can mint eUSD, Lybra’s interest bearing stablecoin, at zero cost, improving capital efficiency and providing interest income. INVESTMENT THESIS The investment thesis of Lybra is predicated on two main points:Lybra's Product-Market FitGrowth of Ethereum Staking _LYBRA PRODUCT-MARKET...

INVESTMENT THESIS Of all the financial instruments in TradFi, interest rate derivatives have arguably one of the largest total addressable markets. To illustrate, interest rate derivatives occupied over ~$500T in notional value in H2 ‘22, according to BIS. This market is generally supported by participants who want to speculate on or hedge yields on a myriad of asset classes, including foreign exchange, equities, commodities, and credit. This class of instruments...

INVESTMENT THESIS While Level initially gained prominence by becoming the _first GMX fork on BNB Smart Chain_, it has since grown to differentiate itself from other perpetual decentralized exchanges, or ‘perp DEXes,’ via multiple proprietary improvements from TradFi and DeFi. For a recap on, perp DEXes, check out our piece here. The first improvement implemented by Level Finance is tranched risk management for liquidity providers. Drawing inspiration from Mortgaged-Backed Securities...

INVESTMENT THESIS Given the rise in U.S. treasury yields (5.00% - 5.25% at the time of writing) and the suction of liquidity that ensued from risk assets, perhaps the most useful metric to gauge product-market fit at this stage of the bear market is Total Value Locked (TVL). Essentially, the consideration that is front and center in the minds of savvy investors is, ‘Would this investment or strategy yield better...