Consumer applications become the new focus of the crypto market

Infrastructure construction has become saturated, and consumer applications are becoming the next frontier in the crypto market. After years of investment in new public chains, scalability solutions, and development tools, the marginal benefits of technology have become minimal, and users do not automatically flock in simply because "the technology is good enough." Currently, the key to creating value lies in gaining attention, rather than in the technical architecture.

Market liquidity is stagnant, and retail participation is insufficient. The total market capitalization of stablecoins is only about 25% higher than the peak in 2021, with recent increases primarily coming from institutions purchasing BTC/ETH for their balance sheets, rather than speculative capital circulating within the ecosystem.

Friendly regulatory policies will unlock a new wave of development. Clearer U.S. policies will expand market size and attract more Web2 users who focus on practical applications rather than underlying technologies.

The market prefers projects with real users and revenue. For example, projects like Hyperliquid( with an annual revenue of about $900 million), Pump.fun( with an annual revenue of about $500 million), and Polymarket( with a trading volume of about $12 billion) perform far better than some infrastructure projects that have high funding but lack users.

With the deepening integration of Web3 and Web2, the crypto market will also shift towards an attention economy that emphasizes distribution capabilities over technology. User-facing applications will be key to expanding the overall market size.

The consumer-grade tracks that have currently achieved product-market fit mainly include:

• Trading / Perpetual Contract
• Token Issuance Platform
• Information Finance and Prediction Markets

The next wave of potentially rising tracks includes:

• One-stop encryption financial super application, integrating functions such as wallet, banking, earnings, and trading.
• Entertainment/social platform, replacing the advertising model with on-chain monetization mechanisms

AI and the gaming sector are still in the exploratory phase. Consumer-grade AI applications require more secure infrastructure support, while Web3 games are constrained by the "wool party" economic issues. In the future, there may be a breakthrough in the market with blockchain games centered on gameplay rather than encryption elements.

Activity is positively concentrated on a few user-friendly "super chains" such as Solana, Hyperliquid, Monad, MegaETH, etc. Investors should pay attention to the killer applications in these ecosystems and the infrastructure that directly supports them.

When assessing consumer application investments, the focus should be on:

• Distribution and execution capabilities surpass pure technology
• User experience, speed, liquidity, and narrative alignment are decisive factors.
• Evaluate from a business rather than a protocol perspective: focus on real income, scalable models, and clear industry-leading paths.

In the next 5 years, transforming the encryption underlying technology into a daily application experience for millions of Web2 users will be key to generating excess returns.