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In the cryptocurrency world, sects are in conflict; which type of disciple are you? Where there are people, there is a community, and the same goes for the cryptocurrency world. The dangers of the cryptocurrency space are hard for outsiders to comprehend. In front, there are counterfeit air coins; behind, there are Ponzi schemes; to the left, there are manipulators harvesting profits; to the right, there are small exchanges with tricks to lure traders. Deceit and ambushes abound. An outsider, having heard enough of the wealth-building myths circulating in the community, enters the cryptocurrency world with a pure belief in blockchain, as if gold is everywhere and easily attainable. Little do they know that what awaits them is one sharp scythe after another.

Most people begin to understand the cryptocurrency world through news headlines: "Virtual currency Bitcoin breaks $10,000, soaring 25 million times in 7 years," "College students achieve financial freedom in 3 months through trading digital currencies." What beautiful headlines, exuding a sense of "those who come close will prosper," radiating endless charm that calls people to approach. Over time, various sects naturally emerged in the cryptocurrency world, continuously attracting disciples with their impeccable "only I am correct" theories, growing and expanding. Just like the major sects in martial arts, each leading in its own way.

Ponzi Scheme Sect
In recent days, the number of Ponzi schemes that have run away is no less than dozens, with big ones like PLUS Wallet and the Tron Super Community (which has no relation to Tron coin), involving hundreds of billions in digital currency. One can imagine how many innocent investors have been harmed. Even though most people already know about the collapsed projects, ignorant newcomers still come asking how to join. Smaller schemes hear about the larger ones running away and quickly pack up and leave, claiming server upgrades or mainnet upgrades.

Blockchain records show that every minute, coins are continuously flowing into the PlusToken wallet... dynamic income, static income, team bonuses, promotional commissions—these terms are hot keywords of Ponzi schemes. Not only that, but Ponzi schemes are also good at disguising their exorbitant profit reasons: "We are quantifying arbitrage, plus exchange profits, mining machine profits, foundation profits, which can fully support interest payments." After seeing the high income of early participants, a steady stream of later participants joined this game, convincing themselves, "Well, if there's danger, I'll run; better safe than sorry." But you never know if you are the last one holding the bag, and you certainly won't think you will be the last one.

Shitcoin Sect
This sect occupies a considerable part of the cryptocurrency world, further divided into two types of people. One type consists mainly of middle-aged women and new investors who are lured into various "XXX hundredfold coin genesis communities," bombarded daily with advertisements from group leaders, thinking this is how trading works, seeing prices as low as 0.0000001. They think, "It's so cheap now; the potential for appreciation must be huge. I want to embrace blockchain, embrace digital currency; if I don't keep up with the times, I'll be eliminated by the times! I don't need it to rise to tens of thousands; if it just reaches one dollar, I'm rich—buy, buy, buy!" The other type consists of old investors in the cryptocurrency world, who seem uninterested in the daily fluctuations of mainstream coins and are keen on trading based on so-called news. They hear that a certain trader is about to pump a coin, or that a coin will surge 300% upon listing; they know the project team and are told to hold on, and they will call them when it's time to sell—this wave is stable! This model coin is good; all the media are hyping it, so it must rise. However, the results are not as rosy as everyone imagines; some people trade ten coins, but only one or two may be profitable. I have a friend who works for a cryptocurrency project; her boss often recommends some so-called reliable insider coins to her, but many coins either launch at a loss or take forever to list. Hundreds of thousands of principal have long been halved. One can imagine the plight of most external shitcoin players. Only the manipulators and a few lucky ones can make money.

Buddhist Faith Sect
This refers to those who hoard coins, mostly buying mainstream coins or Bitcoin, rarely holding shitcoins. The central idea is: "I want to hold this coin until the bull market; once bought, I won't look at it, treating it as if it doesn't exist, and when news comes out, I'll check back." There are also sub-sects of regular investment, where regardless of price fluctuations, I invest a fixed amount weekly, averaging the price and reducing losses. Various data calculations, historical backtesting, foolproof operations, turning tens of thousands into millions.

But is this really reliable? First of all, regular investment is an investment method derived from index funds, predicated on a strictly regulated stock market. If the risk is too high, the government won't allow it, so regular investment is a relatively stable fund management method. However, the cryptocurrency world is different; currently, there is no regulation in the cryptocurrency space, nor is there any legal protection. This means that the beliefs we hold could become worthless overnight. Many will argue that Bitcoin won't disappear and will definitely exist. We believe the probability of Bitcoin disappearing is very low, but that doesn't mean its price can continuously rise and fall between bull and bear markets. Suppose one day the consensus in the cryptocurrency world is replaced by another coin; your regular investment would just be a form of charity. Just as Apple replaced Nokia phones, the times will eliminate you without looking back. Another unseen risk is that most people only see the seemingly stable and simple operation of regular investment but never anticipate whether their timing for buying is correct. If they enter at the end of a bull market, they may find themselves buying more and more in a prolonged bear market, and over 90% of people cannot bear the losses, leading to panic selling. Those well-known regular investors started buying back in 2015 or even 2016; can you buy at their prices (1-2 thousand RMB for Bitcoin)? How many people followed the trend of regular investment during the peak in 2017 and ended up panic selling? The meaning of regular investment: it reduces your gains in a bull market and also reduces your losses in a bear market. But this doesn't mean this method is unfeasible; it requires several preconditions:

• Judging the market, starting regular investment at the end of a bear market.
• Having a long-term habit of persistence, such as running or fitness.
• Participating with idle funds.

But then again, if you can judge it's the end of a bear market, can't you buy a bit more...? The biggest risk in hoarding coins is that you lack the ability to judge whether a drop is a correction or the end of a bull market. You might end up holding a bag through a bull and bear market. Seeing account numbers with floating profits of 100% and then quietly leaving when down about 10%.

Technical Trading Sect
These individuals often transition from stock and futures markets, possessing rich trading experience. They don't have any blockchain faith; they clearly know this is just a trading market and won't pay much attention to market news, believing any news will be reflected in the charts. Their focus is limited to mainstream coins. Moving averages, MACD, RSI, and pattern analysis have long been fixed references in their minds for buying and selling timing. However, not many truly grasp this sect; it seems the skills are held by a select few, and most only know a bit of basic skills, getting beaten up daily—it's a mysterious sect.

Those who are proficient mostly hide in the community, living as reclusive heroes, but privately they have circles and only connect with fellow sect members. This is also the survival guide in the cryptocurrency world praised by the black box, as you must continuously strengthen yourself, using scientific trading methods to support your buying or selling, rather than blindly chasing highs and lows, and you don't need to listen to others' analyses—just make your own judgments. When you have confidence, trading is calm; all dynamics are within your predictions, strategizing effectively. Here are two martial arts manuals for everyone:

• "The Magical Trend Lines of the Cryptocurrency World" ( "Trading, One Moving Average is Enough")

There are also some small sects that are not mentioned and listed. They are rumored to exist in the community. Which sect are you from? Which sect do you want to join? Or if you have any supplements to other sects, feel free to leave a message for discussion. Friends who want to join the group chat can also contact the assistant.

Cryptocurrency Personnel#

The cryptocurrency world once had times when anything bought could yield hundreds of times returns, but now it's different; only those who see the logic clearly have a chance. If you enter blindly without understanding anything, you will definitely be the harvested leek. Have you noticed that now some friends in the cryptocurrency world rarely talk about trading anymore? When everyone occasionally gathers, they can basically only complain about the recent hot topics in the cryptocurrency world, alleviating each other's anxiety. Watching those who entered early around them achieve financial freedom without understanding anything, while seeing their carefully selected coins plummet or their team's project go silent, is basically the current situation for the lower strata of the cryptocurrency world.

The cryptocurrency world consists of six types of people, arranged according to the food chain:

• 1. Exchanges
• 2. Mining machine manufacturers
• 3. Big shots or funds
• 4. Token issuing project parties
• 5. Media
• 6. Individual investors (also known as leeks)

In reality, many projects' true bosses are from the third category, and some who entered midway can hardly escape seeking big shots for support. In contrast, among these six groups, mining machine manufacturers earn relatively clean money. Besides the lower-level leeks, other groups are more or less involved in some collusion to harvest leeks.

Now let's understand the four-part trick of deception in the cryptocurrency world:

1. Custom blockchain projects.
2. Finding someone to ghostwrite white papers.
3. Big shots come to endorse, collaborating with media for packaging.
4. Providing certain tokens to big shots and media for bundling.

This seemingly old-fashioned trick works repeatedly because leeks lack the ability to identify. If the ICO phase leads to leeks being harvested, it can be considered that the leeks' intelligence is suppressed. However, exchanges crazily listing air coins without identifying projects and colluding to harvest leeks is a bit hard to justify. Regardless of the model exchanges use to list coins, at least so far, it still revolves around how much compensation the exchange receives or how much of a specified platform token is purchased as a prerequisite for listing. This encourages air coin project parties to act without restraint in harvesting leeks; after paying the protection fee, project parties focus on how to recover funds from investors, with few putting effort into actual projects. However, there are not many leeks left in the market now, and many project parties have been harvested by exchanges.

Since the incident involving Li Xiaolai's recording exploded, regulatory authorities have begun to take strong cleaning measures.

1. Blocking various virtual currency trading platforms.
2. Prohibiting domestic payment and settlement services for virtual currency trading.
3. Banning media from promoting behaviors related to virtual currency issuance and speculation.
4. Cracking down on various virtual currency issuance behaviors.

Under government intervention, domestic virtual currency projects were almost instantly cooled down, and various project parties that previously issued tokens began to sell off the ETH they raised from investors overnight. Blockchain was originally a revolution for geeks, but it ultimately became a tool for scammers to harvest leeks.

At this point, shouldn't we reflect on why this is the case? Summarizing two points:

1. ICOs are unregulated, and most project parties are invisible; during the ICO phase, it's impossible to verify basic responsible persons and project location information. They are playing a game that is doomed to have no outcome from the start.
2. Listing rules do not follow the principle of product landing but rather play a numbers game with listing fees. It can be said that so far, 90% of tokens listed on exchanges are products that have not landed.

So, the cryptocurrency world is truly a place where fools have plenty of money, and few people have thought about what truly supports coin prices. Because the entire atmosphere of the cryptocurrency world, from ICOs to exchanges listing coins, is playing with air, it is this unregulated market that has thrown the verification work that should be the responsibility of exchanges onto investors. Exchanges have become a top-tier casino that makes money without risk, even if someone cheats, they don't need to take responsibility.

About the Black and White of Cryptocurrency Media Personnel

The responsibility of media personnel is to state facts or discuss data, but most media personnel in the cryptocurrency world report with an agenda. How to say it? For example, a trash project is packaged by some people and then promoted on some platforms to deceive the gullible into entering. However, if a person is gullible, they will have to pay tuition no matter where they are.

In fact, distinguishing the truth from falsehood in reports is not that difficult; as long as you learn to think about whether the article has clear beneficiaries, it becomes easy to identify its purpose. Usually, those who actively lead you to make money need to be considered carefully. In normal logic, no one wants to do something that is thankless. Even if they want to discuss, they should point out some data to tell you their viewpoint. Those who truly have good projects will invest themselves; there’s no need to wade through muddy waters for those who are not related. Investors need to have their own thinking and discernment abilities; whenever there is targeted promotion, one must think about why they are so kind to teach you how to make money and tell you about good projects. Why are they so eager to hype it up to the sky, inviting you to enter, and what benefits does it bring them to recommend coins to you?

Including various K-line masters, it’s hard to understand what they have analyzed in the past two months when there has been no market movement. I don’t understand the necessity of any operations. If they operate daily, can they earn back the transaction fees? Including their judgments on various supports, the current mining cost support is more reliable than any K-line indicator. Now, asking miners about support is the most accurate.

What those analysts say about $60,000 going down to $50,000, and breaking $50,000 to $40,000 is nonsense. The price of Bitcoin is influenced not only by the average buying and selling price and concentration price but also by a more important factor: mining costs. Since the current price is very close to mining costs, there’s no need to pay attention to what those analysts say about support levels; it’s of little significance. If it costs $50,000 to mine one Bitcoin, then the strongest support for Bitcoin is $50,000. Although there is a possibility of short-term breaches, once breached, since mining costs are higher than buying, miners will naturally stop mining and choose to buy directly. This is the support for mining-based cryptocurrencies (leverage is not discussed here).

Speaking of Bitcoin support, let’s also mention the support for application-based cryptocurrencies. The support for application-based cryptocurrencies is mainly influenced by application usage demand. So, it can be summarized that application projects are the easiest to undergo technological updates and iterations. There is no good or bad; it only exists in terms of market demand. Its brilliance passes, and what awaits it is more advanced technology to replace it. Since exchanges still use coin-to-coin trading models, when stablecoins replace existing coin-to-coin trading, the prices of application coins will become more realistic.

The only ones truly making money in the cryptocurrency world, besides those specifically harvesting leeks, are:

1. Early Movers
   These individuals got involved with Bitcoin very early on, starting from a point far ahead of ordinary people. When I learned about Bitcoin, it was already over $10,000; when they learned about it, it was only a few RMB per coin. For example, early game boosters mined while playing games, earning dozens of coins a day; the cost difference is unimaginable.

2. Mining Farm Operators
   These individuals are even more impressive; a single computer mining nonstop can only yield a few coins, but they directly lease land to build factories, using hundreds or thousands of professional mining machines. Even if their costs are slightly higher than the earliest batch, their quantity advantage is incomparable.

3. Exchange Operators
   How do you cash out the coins you mine? Naturally, you need a powerful exchange globally. Of course, they won’t let you trade for free; you have to pay some transaction fees. Looking at a single transaction, the fees don’t seem high, but the volume of transactions globally is substantial.

4. Miners
   How long do the early Bitcoin buyers need to wait for their Bitcoin to rise to $200,000? This is a question worth pondering for every investor. However, if you mine with Bitcoin mining machines, you have daily mining income, albeit not much, but it’s low-risk and stable, allowing you to avoid risks. If the coin price rises, the payback period will be faster; you can break even in a few months, and after breaking even, the income you mine is pure profit. This can be calculated with real-time data. Some might say, what if the coin price drops? Doesn’t that extend the payback period? Yes, but you need to know that short-term fluctuations have little impact on miners; at worst, they can hold onto the mined coins until the price rises again.

Most people feel that when Bitcoin prices were low, they didn’t know about Bitcoin, so they missed the buying opportunity. If given another chance, they would definitely buy. This is one voice, while another voice says: if given another chance, I would definitely hold onto Bitcoin and not sell so quickly. If time could flow backward, could the wishes of these two types of people truly be realized?

Let’s mention a fact that many are reluctant to believe: if you are one of the two situations mentioned above, don’t say just one chance; even if given ten chances, you still won’t be one of that 0.01%. The reality is often cruel; why? Why not me?

Let’s not go too far; just look at the recent surge of ACH! In just over ten days, it surged more than a hundred times! Many who hoarded coins and traded coins bought this coin, but very few could handle such a hundredfold increase!

Therefore, in this market, if you want to truly make money, using your idle funds to participate in mining is definitely your best choice!

Every day, people come to me asking about FIL mining! Every day, there are also people making payments to buy mining machines and participate in mining! However, many who inquire just disappear after that, which is very normal. Every penny we earn is a realization of our cognitive level!

We all know there’s no free lunch, but when it comes to investing, some people can’t help but be foolish, thinking they can get rich overnight by relying on others' investment advice.

Please believe one thing: those who get rich by luck do not deserve to possess vast wealth. If you do not improve your cognitive level, the money earned by luck will eventually be lost through strength. Money in the cryptocurrency world is not something you can just earn; we still need to have accurate judgments and choices.

This situation makes me, someone who always wants to discover money-making opportunities in various markets, talk about the ways to make money I see in the cryptocurrency world.

As a participant in the cryptocurrency world, I see various money-making tricks.

Small investors use a hoarding and regular investment method, proportionally allocating several mainstream coins, such as BTC 40%, ETH 25%, EOS 15%, ZEC 15%, and others 5%. This recent surge has allowed participants who have been continuously investing to see the rewards of this investment method.

Small investors engage in arbitrage. Exchanges opened by Chinese people mainly serve Chinese people, and the price differences exist between domestic exchanges and foreign exchanges for the same coin at the same time. As long as there is a price difference of more than 2% between two exchanges, arbitrage can be done. The key is to discover the price differences between exchanges, and obtaining this information is particularly important. Currently, it is mainly through the "Non-Small Number" public account to obtain real-time data from various exchanges to make judgments. Specific comparative data still requires personal comparisons to find coins with arbitrage opportunities. Arbitrage is a relatively stable way to make money in the cryptocurrency world, but it requires a lot of preparation time upfront, registering on many exchanges, understanding the trading processes of each exchange, and completing withdrawal verifications before operating. Moreover, some exchanges have long withdrawal times; without personal involvement, one cannot know the pitfalls, so initially, one must use a small amount of coins to try the arbitrage process at various exchanges, understanding the pitfalls and efficiency of each exchange before scaling up.

Arbitrage earns the profit margin, so for those with substantial funds, each time they move coins back and forth, there is still a high return. Generally, arbitrage looks at the coins in hand not increasing; the goal is to accumulate coins, and once there are more coins, they can use them to arbitrage for more coins. The need to convert them into cash in the over-the-counter market arises.

What I just mentioned is the way of making money for "gold diggers," but besides directly participating in "gold digging," one can also serve the gold diggers.

The most common way is to create a paid circle in Knowledge Planet, sharing ways and knowledge to make money in the cryptocurrency world. The most important point here is to seize the timing of the current demand. If you miss this timing, the service you provide will lose its value. For a newcomer to the cryptocurrency world, providing them with basic cryptocurrency knowledge is the most valuable, while providing this knowledge to veterans in the cryptocurrency world will not attract them, as they already understand it and won’t join your circle or buy your account.

Each period has new demands for participants in the cryptocurrency world; only by seizing the timing of these demands can one earn money from them.

With domestic exchanges shutting down, the exchange of fiat currency for cryptocurrencies has become a necessity in the cryptocurrency world. Some people have started WeChat circles for guaranteed over-the-counter trading based on their credibility, while those with technical development capabilities have fortunately set up over-the-counter exchanges. Providing shovels and jeans for gold diggers also earns them a fortune.

Ten Figures in the Chinese Cryptocurrency World#

• Li Xiaolai
  Li Xiaolai claims to be the richest Bitcoin holder in China. Together with Lao Mao, they formed Coin Capital, which has considerable influence in the cryptocurrency world as regulations arrived. First, there was the Yunbi trading platform, which, although often criticized by cryptocurrency enthusiasts for its erratic "pulling the plug," had a significant "Yunbi effect" at the time; coins listed on Yunbi would often see a surge, and everyone hoped their coins could be listed on this platform.

Li Xiaolai humorously claims his Bitcoin holdings are in six figures, with the first digit being 1. This means the value of his Bitcoin holdings has surpassed $100 million, though whether this is true remains unknown. It could be a marketing tactic.

In addition to investing in digital currencies, Li Xiaolai is also the author of "Treat Time as a Friend" and "The Road to Financial Freedom," sharing his investment philosophy through books. He occasionally appears online to share interesting stories from the cryptocurrency world, and a photo with traditional angel investor Xue Manzi at a meal caused quite a stir in the cryptocurrency community.

• Wu Jihan
  Wu Jihan, born in 1986, graduated from Peking University with a master's degree, holding dual degrees in psychology and economics, and is currently the CEO of Bitmain. The mining machines produced by Bitmain contribute over 70% of the global hash rate. If Bitmain can maintain its market share, approximately 3 million of the remaining 5 million Bitcoins will be produced by Bitmain's mining machines.

This name, imbued with a heroic aura, is not as well-known as others. However, in terms of influence within the community, it is no less significant. A low-key powerhouse, the emperor of hash rate, a generation of mining tycoon, "the only possible initiator of a 51% attack." If there is anyone in the world who can influence the development of Bitcoin by themselves, besides Satoshi Nakamoto, Wu Jihan is the most likely candidate. He is Wu Jihan.

At the end of 2011, Wu Jihan did something earth-shattering: he translated Satoshi Nakamoto's Bitcoin white paper "Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System" into Chinese, thus earning the title of "the evangelist of Bitcoin."

• Shen Bo
  Shen Bo, the renowned founder of Distributed Capital, was originally the founder of Invictus Innovations Incorporated (the founding team of BitShares) and has extensive knowledge and experience in hedge funds, investment banking, and securities. In July 2015, Shen Bo, Vitalik, and Xiao Feng aimed to establish a good relationship with the blockchain community from an investment perspective to promote industry development, subsequently founding the Wanxiang Blockchain Lab and Distributed Capital. Today, Distributed Capital is the largest professional investment fund in China's blockchain field. Compared to Li Xiaolai and Bao Er Ye, Shen Bo appears quite low-key and generally does not attract much attention. Of course, Shen Bo does not need to be high-profile. Sellers need to shout. He is backed by the strong financial resources of Wanxiang Group, and his strength is unquestionable. To some extent, Shen Bo is relatively close to us, as he belongs to the blockchain investment circle. As a top figure in the blockchain investment circle, Shen Bo's opinions are quite valuable for us. For friends who want to delve into blockchain investment, I recommend an article titled "Distributed Capital Shen Bo: The Future Killer Application of Blockchain Will Appear in '+ Blockchain'," which will provide a more comprehensive understanding of investment.

• Da Hongfei
  Da Hongfei, nicknamed Uncle Da, is the founder of NEO, a representative figure in China's blockchain industry, an early participant in the Chinese Bitcoin community, and a member of the Financial Technology Group of the Shanghai Pudong International Finance Society. A serial entrepreneur, he is a liberal arts student who can write viruses in assembly language.

He has profound insights into blockchain's underlying technology, application scenarios, and industry landscape and serves as a blockchain technology advisor for several banks, brokerages, and registration institutions. People generally regard Uncle Da as one of the main figures in the blockchain field, especially when it comes to discussing the popularization of blockchain in China; his words carry weight.

• Guo Ming
  Guo Ming, known as "King of the Leeks," is a veteran figure in the industry and the founder of Blockchain Pencil and ICOAGE. He is one of the earliest researchers and practitioners of digital currency and blockchain technology in China, a former enthusiast of the Austrian School, dedicated to spreading Bitcoin information and the concept of free currency, promoting the revolution of free currency.

He is a leading figure in China's blockchain technology and digital currency industry, committed to promoting the development of blockchain technology, having translated and written a large number of related materials, and authored works such as "Digital Currency" and "Blockchain - New Economic Blueprint," holding considerable influence in the domestic blockchain and digital currency industry. His courage is commendable!

• Shuai Chu
  Shuai Chu, founder and CEO of Quantum Chain, is now well-known and is one of the few big shots in the cryptocurrency world. "From a poor PhD to a controversial CEO with a net worth of 6 billion," reflects his complex life journey. The launch of the Quantum Chain project became a significant turning point in Shuai Chu's life. The "dark horse" Quantum Chain made Shuai Chu famous, and he used this to reach the top of the cryptocurrency food chain, embarking on a life of traveling to Europe and America, giving speeches, preaching, and endorsing, living a busy and glorious life.

Xue Manzi praised Quantum Chain and Shuai Chu on Weibo, saying, "I have seen dozens of blockchain companies at home and abroad, and Quantum Chain is one of the most outstanding innovative companies; and Shuai Chu, this young guy under thirty, is not only smart but also emotionally intelligent, with a great passion for achieving great things."

• He Yi
  He Yi, known as "Sister in the Cryptocurrency World," finally brings the first female figure to this list after so many men. She was a host on Travel TV and later joined OKCoin, one of the three major exchanges in China, where she led her team to help the company turn around during public relations crises multiple times. In August 2017, she joined Binance, a Bitcoin company, as a co-founder.

Starting anew before turning 30! Her strength, effort, and foresight have earned her the titles of "Sister in the Cryptocurrency World" or "Goddess of the Cryptocurrency World"; these are the names given to her by the public. "Chief Customer Service of Binance," is her WeChat signature; "The person who knows how to market the best in the cryptocurrency world," is the label given to her by industry practitioners. The reason for these titles is, of course, her passion for her career and tireless efforts. Behind it all is her dedication.

As the Sister in the Cryptocurrency World, He Yi is the center of attention wherever she appears. The community she belongs to is the most harmonious that Bi Du Jun has ever seen. Quoting Bi Du CEO Han Jiangxue, "In many big shots' groups, no one speaks, but once He Yi joins, it immediately becomes lively."

• Guo Hongcai
  Guo Hongcai, known as Bao Er Ye, is a senior figure in the industry, respected as "the pioneer and guide of Bitcoin!" He once owned the world's largest Bitcoin mining farm; a Bitcoin angel investor, his investments include Yihang Cloud Computing, Fuguo Fund, Yangyang Interviews, Bitcoin Fund, Btc123.com, Bw.com, Jua.com, BitPay Wallet, and bitbank.com. As the most publicly exposed big shot in the cryptocurrency world, Bao Er Ye's "boastful" videos often circulate among cryptocurrency enthusiasts, becoming a hot topic. Bao Er Ye has always been straightforward in the cryptocurrency world, saying whatever he thinks without holding back. He is the most down-to-earth big shot in the cryptocurrency world, frequently giving speeches and roadshows to share his digital currency experiences. Before the regulations arrived, he established the cryptocurrency "Huangpu Military Academy," incubating a batch of popular ICO projects at the time. After a few sessions, due to regulatory issues, it was suspended.

• Lao Mao
  Lao Mao, one of the old-timers in the cryptocurrency world, started investing in Bitcoin in 2013 and entered the industry in 2014, serving as COO of YUNBI, CEO of ICOINFO, partner at INM, and CEO of BIG. Lao Mao has published over 200 industry-related articles on his personal public account, making it one of the most followed and read self-media platforms in the cryptocurrency world. His investment philosophy and knowledge of blockchain have had a significant impact on the industry.

Lao Mao was an early discoverer and evangelist of ETH; he independently created the first self-media platform in the industry, "Cat Says"; established the largest community in the industry, "Cat Friends Circle"; released the "Listen to a Piece" series of blockchain introductory lectures; and was an early discoverer and evangelist of EOS, as well as an independent researcher in the global blockchain industry.

• Zhao Changpeng
  Zhao Changpeng, known as CZ, is the CEO of Binance and CEO of Bijie Technology; "A day in the cryptocurrency world is like ten years in the human world." This phrase reflects the density of time in this industry and the speed at which wealth accumulates in blockchain. CZ understands this well and is one of the best in this regard. He transformed from a "coder" into a billionaire in just 180 days by providing virtual currency asset trading platform services, accumulating $2 billion (approximately 12.5 billion RMB) in wealth, creating the fastest money-making myth in the cryptocurrency world.

He previously served as the technical director at Bloomberg; later founded FTX Information Technology Co., Ltd., where he was not only the founder but also the president of the China region. Zhao Changpeng also joined OKCoin as a co-founder, serving as CEO, managing OKCoin's technical team, and overseeing its international market team, quickly establishing OKCoin's international influence.

Guo Erbao's personality is very distinctive; he speaks plainly without any jargon. He never talks about feelings or morals and is unabashed about making money. He named himself Chandler Guo, humorously implying that he is happy when he makes money. Guo Erbao admits he is in the business of traffic, directly stating that he charges a 1% platform fee for each project. A quick search reveals that Guo has done many things that are still talked about in the cryptocurrency world, such as opening a mining farm in Inner Mongolia to earn his first bucket of gold; during the peak of ICO enthusiasm, he established the Huangpu Military Academy in the cryptocurrency world, with the first batch having 500 people sign up; he participated in the Bitcoin China tour to promote Bitcoin.

Guo Erbao's most famous quotes include: "I have no faith; today I made money due to various reasons and couldn't bear to sell. I never expected it to rise to today's price." "Now I feel I should reward myself; I deserve to live in a mansion and drive a Rolls Royce; I earned it myself." "I don't do VC; I generally just endorse; I don't invest money anymore; I just stand there and collect 1%." "Everyone in the industry knows that my upward gesture actually means one point; it later became a continuous rise." "My English name is Chandler, meaning I'm happy when I make money, like the character Chandler from Friends, the cheerful guy." "I really graduated from high school; I didn't get into college; I only scored 300 points on the college entrance exam, and no university wanted me. But I filled in Tsinghua as my first choice; since I didn't get into my first choice, I just lived in Tsinghua for three and a half years."

"I believe that reading thousands of books is not as good as traveling thousands of miles, and traveling thousands of miles is not as good as meeting countless people, and meeting countless people is not as good as 'sleeping' with countless people. Friendships in the cryptocurrency world are all formed through 'sleeping,' but I only sleep with men." "In fact, investing in the primary market and buying cheap coins in the secondary market is the same. I didn't participate in any private or public offerings for EOS, but when EOS dropped to $3, I bought it in the secondary market."

"As an investor, I actually have the least to worry about; I can return to my country anytime. I don't come back just to let the bullets fly for a while, to advertise; everyone discussing me is free advertising, which is great."

"He who wins the leeks wins the world. Anyone can add me on WeChat, so I have many friends everywhere. Xiaolai manages his time well, and I am always free. So I say, Xiaolai is a monk, and I am Maitreya Buddha; we do different things."

In March 2018, he purchased a luxurious mansion covering a hundred acres in Silicon Valley. On April 23, he officially hung a sign reading "Leek Manor" at the entrance. It is said that a corner of the manor indeed has some leeks planted. The past dirtiness is not worth boasting about; today, the indulgence seems endless. "The spring breeze is swift, and one day I can see all the flowers in Chang'an." The above lines are from Meng Jiao's "After the Exam," describing a turnaround in fortune, dedicated to Bao Er Ye.

[Rumor] As he himself said, Guo Hongcai's speeches lack technical content and are just plain talk. He has attracted countless followers with this "leek" quality, especially appealing to novice users.

Da Kong Yi
[Official News] Da Kong Yi, whose real name is Du Yitian, is a true post-90s individual. He first gained fame in the community under the name "Da Kong Yi." Da Kong Yi is the protagonist of the Japanese manga "Captain Tsubasa," who has loved football since childhood, and in real life, Du is also a football enthusiast, which may be the origin of his name.

Everyone says Da Kong Yi invested 100,000 in IOTA and became famous overnight, ultimately earning over ten thousand times in three years. IOTA is a non-blockchain cryptocurrency built on a new type of distributed ledger—Tangle—believed to be applicable in small payment scenarios in the Internet of Things. In the second half of 2015, IOTA opened crowdfunding, issuing IOTA tokens at about 0.001 RMB each. Da Kong Yi used the 100,000 he earned from trading coins to go all in, and at that time, there were not many participants from China, probably only seven or eight, but only two people held on: him and Jimmy, the head of the IOTA China community. And thus, the story began. From the end of 2015 to June 2017, IOTA remained cheap, but after the ICO boom began in June, IOTA skyrocketed, reaching about 36 RMB in early December 2017, a 36,000-fold increase from the issuance price, turning Da Kong Yi's 100,000 RMB into billions. In the eyes of friends, he is just an ordinary boy who loves listening to Jay Chou, enjoys traveling, and brews tea in his spare time. Da Kong Yi revealed in an interview with Hash Finance that he had done some small businesses since elementary school, borrowing money from classmates to rent out old comics that classmates had read and hiring classmates to manage them. In middle school, due to the dormitory's proximity to the street, he started a takeaway business and even monopolized the takeaway business for another class at the other end of the hallway. During college, he learned dessert-making in Guangzhou during the summer of his freshman year, planning to start a business in his hometown, but his father strongly opposed it.

In fact, Da Kong Yi had heard of BTC as early as 2010 while still in high school, but it wasn't until 2013 that he began investing in Bitcoin. At that time, he was still in his sophomore year, studying civil engineering. During the summer, he assembled his first mining machine; by then, GPU power could no longer mine Bitcoin, so he mined some lesser-known altcoins like Worldcoin and Feathercoin. By the end of summer, he had exchanged for about 80 Bitcoins. At that time, one Bitcoin was 4,000 RMB, and Da Kong Yi earned his first bucket of gold in the cryptocurrency world.

[Rumor] According to Du Yitian himself, the real situation is that he initially invested 60,000 and earned 600 million. Du himself is a rich second generation, so his vision, ambition, and composure in holding IOTA for three years are all supported by a solid economic foundation.

[Official News] Originally named Daniel Larimer, the rumored BM (Bytemaster) is currently the only person in the world to have successfully developed three decentralized systems based on blockchain technology: Bitshares, Steem, and EOS.

BM is most well-known among fans for his sharp exchanges with Satoshi Nakamoto on Bitcointalk. As early as July 2010, BM pointed out that compared to banks, Bitcoin's 10-minute transaction confirmation time was too long and needed to be as fast as credit card transactions, which could be achieved by changing the consensus mechanism. Satoshi Nakamoto famously replied, "If you don't understand, just forget it; I don't have time to convince you, sorry." BM did not continue the argument but began developing the decentralized exchange BitShares, creating the DPOS consensus mechanism to realize his ideas—comparable to traditional banks in transaction speed and experience. In 2014, BitShares launched with the slogan "Beyond Bitcoin." Although BitShares 1.0 creatively invented anchored currencies like BitUSD and BitCNY to solve Bitcoin's price volatility issues and achieved second-level transfer speeds, it was not a qualified product.

Shortly after leaving BTS, BM invested in his next project: Steemit, bringing even more imaginative ideas—a social and content platform based on blockchain technology. Steemit challenges media giants like Twitter and Facebook, incentivizing content production through rewards based on user evaluations. The content platform that can make money easily attracted various creators. The most famous example is an article published by TheAnarchast on Steemit, which easily earned $15,000.

After leaving Steemit, BM rushed to his next stop: EOS. EOS aims to be the operating system of the blockchain industry, providing developers with underlying functionalities, including parallel computing, databases, account systems, and more. EOS can be seen as BM's culmination of technology and thought; it uses the DPOS mechanism while introducing the concept of a constitution for community governance and the concept of arbitration, resembling a separation of powers. The EOS project garnered attention from the entire blockchain industry from the start, and its token sale was the largest to date, raising hundreds of millions of dollars in just five days. The official launch date for EOS has yet to be finalized. The EOS operating system will herald the arrival of the blockchain 3.0 era.

[Rumor] This technology genius in the cryptocurrency world is an 80s kid.

Han Jiangxue
[Official News] Han Jiangxue is the founder of the public account "Daily Coin Reading." Using "Daily Coin Reading" as a medium, combined with his precise investments, he has made a fortune and led a large group of friends to wealth. His motto is: "I hope my friends can quickly get rich with me, and we can continue to be friends at the same level."

Han Jiangxue, known as "Old Han," graduated with a master's degree in cryptography from Xi'an University of Electronic Science and Technology. He previously worked at ZTE Corporation and was the chairman of Shenzhen Super Date Cultural Communication Co., Ltd. He is the founder of the blockchain media "Daily Coin Reading," earning the reputation of "the Gao Xiaosong of the cryptocurrency world," with extensive experience in blockchain project evaluation and is the founder of the cryptocurrency poker card.

From 2009 to 2015, Han Jiangxue was engaged in training-related work, running special training camps, online courses on dating, and training classes for students from poor families, honing his humorous speaking style.

In May 2016, Han Jiangxue launched a professional blockchain public account called "Daily Coin Reading," with Zhang Pitiao as the editor, officially going all in on blockchain. From initially operating with just two people to now leading over twenty reliable young digital asset enthusiasts, he has established a subscription platform focused on blockchain news. "Daily Coin Reading" provides readers with the latest and most comprehensive blockchain news daily, aiming to create a world-class blockchain news platform.

Han Jiangxue often says one thing: "Invest more in bear markets." It seems like just five words, but to fully understand and truly act on it is indeed not easy. Investing in bear markets is contrary to human nature; shortsightedness is human nature. People only focus on immediate benefits and believe only in visible changes.

[Rumor] Han Jiangxue is known as "the Gao Xiaosong of the cryptocurrency world," and he has a knack for dating. He tells an inspirational story of starting from dating to reaching the pinnacle of life through trading coins.

[Official News] "A day in the cryptocurrency world is like a year in the human world." At this moment, it is the peak; the next moment, it could be the abyss. This phrase accurately reflects the ups and downs of the cryptocurrency market. In just five years, too many legendary stories have happened to Zhao Dong.

In 2009, coinciding with the rise of mobile internet, Zhao Dong and friends developed a wildly popular weather forecasting app called "Moji Weather." He cashed out and exited in just three years, accumulating initial capital. Later, Zhao Dong accidentally joined "Garage Coffee" as CTO. At Garage, he met the earliest batch of Bitcoin players, such as Wu Gang, Li Lin, Li Xiaolai, Bao Er Ye, Zhao Guofeng, Du Jun, and other current big shots in the cryptocurrency world, embarking on a legendary life journey from being worth over a hundred million to being in debt of 60 million in the "cryptocurrency world!"

In 2013, guided by Wu Gang, Zhao Dong entered the market with a speculative mindset, investing 10,000 RMB to buy 10 Bitcoins, doubling his money in two weeks and buying his first iPhone. After tasting success, Zhao Dong, after thorough research, invested 1 million RMB in March 2013 to buy about 2,000 Bitcoins. As Zhao Dong expected, Bitcoin showed a rapid upward trend throughout 2013, and the 2,000 Bitcoins he held surged over tenfold, turning 1 million into 10 million. At this point, Zhao Dong began to use leverage to trade coins.

However, what goes up must come down. In 2014, news of the Japanese Mt. Gox Bitcoin exchange (where 76% of the world's Bitcoins were traded) facing a run and potential collapse began to circulate, causing prices to plummet. Zhao Dong faced three liquidation events while trading in 2014, and mining costs exceeded income, resulting in a total loss of 150 million, leaving him with a debt of 60 million, struggling to pay for his son's elementary school tuition, hitting rock bottom in his life. However, Zhao Dong did not give up; he did not leave the cryptocurrency world. He began to transition to over-the-counter Bitcoin trading. Zhao Dong quickly built a large customer base and reputation in the community through "integrity," gradually paying off his debts and becoming one of the earliest practitioners of over-the-counter trading in China, as well as one of the top figures in European over-the-counter Bitcoin trading.

In 2017, Zhao Dong established the blockchain investment fund DFund, with the first phase project yielding a net return of 620% (2543% in USD). In his own words: "In the world of Bitcoin, the most important thing is not when to get in, but to never get out."

[Rumor] Zhao Dong is currently in Japan. Many of his former subordinates have accumulated vast wealth by engaging in quantitative trading, arbitrage, and arbitrage in the Bitcoin industry.

Sun Yuchen excels at hype and creating momentum.#

Figures in the U.S. Cryptocurrency World#

Top ten on the Crypto Briefing annual hero list.

Sandeep Nailwal
Sandeep Nailwal is the co-founder of Polygon, the most successful scaling solution for Ethereum to date. Polygon has had a fruitful year, attracting several DeFi blue chips like Aave and Curve, and its ecosystem now includes a library of ZK-Rollups, with MATIC being one of the best-performing tokens in the market.

This year, Nailwal has also made significant contributions outside of cryptocurrency. As the Delta variant of COVID-19 began to spread in April, he established the COVid-Crypto Relief Fund, raising funds to help those affected by the pandemic in India.

Nailwal's charitable efforts have not gone unnoticed, attracting donations from many prominent figures, including former Coinbase CTO and angel investor Balaji Srinivasan and former Australian cricketer Bret Lee. The largest donation came from Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, who donated 500 ETH and 50 trillion SHIB to the fund, valued at over $1.14 billion at the time.

The COVID-Crypto Relief Fund has been putting its raised funds to good use and still holds over $400 million in an Ethereum wallet. In recent months, it has signed an agreement with UNICEF India to provide 160 million syringes for the country's vaccination efforts and has partnered with several charities in India to provide ICU beds, CPR training, and supply packages to those in need.

Polygon is one of the pioneers in cryptocurrency in 2021, and Nailwal's successful establishment of the COVID-Crypto Relief Fund is truly remarkable.

Cobie & Ledger
Cobie and Ledger have never met, as they live on opposite sides of the Atlantic, but that hasn't stopped them from becoming one of the most beloved duos in cryptocurrency. They are known for co-hosting UpOnly, one of the most detailed and entertaining podcasts in the field. Since the beginning of this year, they have been inviting the best traders in the field as guests for in-depth discussions, with each episode packed with rich information to help listeners absorb successful experiences.

Their combination is beloved in part due to the stark contrast between the two: Ledger is a gentle boy, while Cobie is more of a typical tech bro (he likes LSD and saw the potential of Bitcoin earlier than most of us).

Cobie often mocks Ledger's trading mistakes, but in reality, they are more like a loving yet competitive duo, akin to Guo Degang and Yu Qian. Besides the laughter and insights brought by UpOnly, Cobie and Ledger made it onto our hero list this year due to their legendary Twitch raid meeting. The premise of the event was Cobie joining a live stream of an amateur musician and demanding to take over the hosting duties, then inviting his Twitter followers to flood the stream. At this point, he encouraged the streamer to download MetaMask, and any cryptocurrency locals watching would rush to donate. Meanwhile, Ledger was always there to help with any technical issues the musician might encounter.

In one of the most memorable meetings this year, 24-year-old Mela Bee received approximately $250,000 worth of ETH, REN, and other digital assets after playing covers of Radiohead and Blink-182 all night. Cobie also used his platform to help those battling illness, bringing them into the spotlight. This year, music fans and other skeptics around the world launched misguided attacks on NFTs and the broader cryptocurrency space, but Cobie and Ledger used their online activities to help some minority groups, proving the positive power of cryptocurrency and its community.

pplpleasr
Even if you've never heard of pplpleasr (real name Emily Yang), you've likely encountered her artwork. In 2021, she made history by getting several of the most prominent figures in cryptocurrency on the cover of Fortune magazine, but her starting point in this field was creating artwork for some top DeFi projects. Earlier this year, when she minted a promotional video for Uniswap V3 as an NFT, she donated the 310 ETH raised to charities supporting minority groups, valued at over $525,000 at the time.

However, she truly shone after appearing in Fortune magazine. "Just a year ago, I was unemployed and worried about my income," she wrote on Twitter in August, "I hope my story can inspire others; my gratitude to the cryptocurrency community is beyond words." Yang's personal story proves that NFTs have the power to change the lives of millions of creators and collectors around the world.

Bored Ape Yacht Club/Yuga Labs
There have been many winners in the NFT space this year, but one project stands out—Bored Ape Yacht Club. As a collection of 10,000 traceable apes living on Ethereum, Bored Ape Yacht Club has become a representative lifestyle brand, complete with its own merchandise line, event series, and collaborations with companies like Universal and Adidas. Yuga Labs, the creator of Bored Ape Yacht Club, has strengthened the brand by arranging profitable airdrops for NFT holders, and it is rumored that tokens and games will be launched in 2022. Indeed, Yuga Labs' success largely stems from the community of Bored Ape holders, which includes celebrities like Stephen Curry and Jimmy Fallon. However, this is primarily due to its strategy of first rewarding its community.

Another popular NFT avatar series, Larva Labs' CryptoPunks, also became mainstream this year, but its roadmap is less impressive. In May, Larva Labs earned $80 million from a collection called Meebits, which was largely uninspired, with a portion allocated to Punk holders. The two behind the project also signed a Hollywood deal allowing their NFTs to appear in films, television, and other media, but only to that extent. Since then, Larva Labs has been busy issuing copyright infringement notices to protect its flagship projects, while Yuga Labs has made it clear that the community is its top priority. As a result, Bored Ape Yacht Club has become the trendiest NFT series in less than a year since its launch. If Yuga Labs continues its success from 2021, it could soon surpass the value of Punks.

Sam Bankman-Fried
Since entering the cryptocurrency space in 2017, Sam Bankman-Fried has overseen one of the top trading firms in the field, Alameda Research, built FTX into a strong competitor to Coinbase and Binance, and become one of the wealthiest people under 30 globally. His ability to achieve all this is partly due to his machine-like flexibility, allowing him to transition from trading to podcasting to playing League of Legends in the blink of an eye. Equally important, Sam Bankman-Fried may be one of the hardest-working individuals in the industry. He enjoys sleeping directly in the office, seamlessly transitioning from rest to work mode, and FTX is always the first exchange to create markets for exotic derivatives, catering to the more adventurous traders in the cryptocurrency space.

As a staunch supporter of Solana, Bankman-Fried made a memorable tweet back in January when Solana was trading at $3, proposing to buy an entire Solana holding from another trader, inadvertently suggesting that Solana would rise. Since then, Solana has surged 6,500%. In addition to endorsing Solana early on, this year Bankman-Fried has also sought to grow the FTX brand by heavily marketing the exchange in the sports industry. However, rather than making himself more famous and wealthy, he seems more interested in bringing cryptocurrency to a billion users (notably, he plans to donate the majority of his $22 billion fortune through effective altruism). If FTX and Solana continue on their trajectory from 2021, Bankman-Fried is likely to achieve massive cryptocurrency adoption in his career.

Senators Ron Wyden, Pat Toomey, and Cynthia Lummis
"Regulation" has been a major theme in cryptocurrency this year, especially in the U.S. It can be said that the biggest progress this year focused on the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill, which included vague wording regarding cryptocurrency tax policies and the definition of "brokers" in cryptocurrency. This ambiguous definition means that proof-of-work miners, stake validators, and DeFi protocol developers could be subject to overly harsh tax rules.

While the Biden administration supported the initial draft, Senators Ron Wyden, Pat Toomey, and Cynthia Lummis insisted on a clearer definition of "brokers" in cryptocurrency, winning support from Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, Coin Center, and other key members of the cryptocurrency community.

The House ultimately passed a less cryptocurrency-friendly draft, which Biden signed into law, but Wyden, Toomey, and Lummis did not stop advocating for amendments favorable to cryptocurrency innovation. "Digital assets will always exist in our financial system, and the decisions we make now will have profound implications for the future. We need to promote innovation, not stifle it," Lummis and Wyden submitted a new bill that included amendments regarding cryptocurrency tax reporting requirements.

Vincent Van Dough
Like many other Ethereum whales turned JPEG enthusiasts, Vincent Van Dough has done a lot to promote the development of NFTs. They have built some of the best and most valuable JPEG collections in the field, and any new purchases they make are considered noteworthy. At the peak of NFTs, they even partnered with Three Arrows Capital to launch an NFT fund called Starry Night Capital.

However, what really caught our attention was their fierce debate about NFTs with a group of community artists this year. Many members of the community stood up against NFTs, asserting that they had no value due to vague boundary issues and claiming that individuals were stealing from artists by exchanging their works for ETH.

To challenge and confront this viewpoint, Vincent Van Dough responded by minting an NFT montage featuring the self-important Pepe the Frog using multiple "stolen" community artworks, titled "Legal Litigation Materials" and "Call: 1800-SUE-ME."

This NFT sparked outrage among community members, which was precisely Vincent's intention. They proposed to pay $5,000 to the artists whose works were used for the NFT. All Vincent had to do was mint their works on Ethereum and transfer the income to their wallets.

Vincent forced the critics to take action. If they accepted his proposal, they would acknowledge that their belief that NFTs are a scam was incorrect. If they refused, they would miss out on the $5,000, and their argument that NFTs have no value would lose its meaning. As of now, none of them have accepted this income, and Vincent continues to dominate the NFT space today.

samczsun
Real name Sam Sun, if you've ever used DeFi on Ethereum, samczsun may have saved you from a significant vulnerability in the past. Sun is the most prolific white-hat hacker in DeFi, to the point where his late-night messages asking, "Are you up?" have become a source of anxiety for every Solidity developer.

Sun has worked at Stripe, Wish, and Trail of Bits, and is currently a research partner at Paradigm, one of the top venture capital firms in the field. Throughout his years as an independent security researcher, Sun has saved the DeFi community hundreds of millions of dollars from potential losses due to smart contract vulnerabilities and security flaws.

In 2020 alone, he discovered and privately disclosed critical vulnerabilities in Curve, Synthetix, Kyber Network, Nexus Mutual, Ethereum Name Service, Yearn.Finance, and others. This year, he found a critical vulnerability on Sushi's Miso token launchpad, discovered a zero-day vulnerability on Etherscan, and identified a critical vulnerability in Ethereum's standalone CLI client Geth. Ethereum is fortunate because samczsun is using his talents for the public good. At least in Ethereum's dark forest, few are more deserving of the title "hero" than samczsun.

Caitlin Long
Caitlin Long is widely regarded as one of the most influential women in the blockchain space, known for her leadership role in drafting and conceptualizing pioneering blockchain legislation in Wyoming. She is a veteran with 22 years of experience on Wall Street and has been active in the cryptocurrency industry since 2012. While the current regulatory situation regarding cryptocurrency in the U.S. is far from perfect, Long is one of the industry's female spokespersons, pushing the entire industry in the right direction.

She has helped Wyoming pass 24 laws favorable to cryptocurrency, making it one of the most welcoming places for cryptocurrency businesses in the U.S. Wyoming is also the first state to authorize a new type of state-chartered deposit institution that can hold cryptocurrency assets and provide banking services to blockchain businesses.

In July, Wyoming became the first state in the U.S. to legally recognize DAOs, granting them the same rights as limited liability companies under Long's guidance. Beyond her tireless legislative work, Long frequently appears on podcasts and carefully curates columns on Twitter to help insiders and outsiders understand the current state of the entire industry.

Daniele Sestagalli
Daniele Sestagalli is the beloved leader of the legendary "Frog Nation," a secret grassroots movement that condemns anything it deems centralized in DeFi. This can include everything from venture capitalists and institutions to centralized stablecoins and the so-called decentralized protocols that rely on them. So, why does Sestagalli make it onto our top ten heroes list? Because he is widely popular and beloved. This is mainly due to his establishment of Abracadabra.Money, Popsicle Finance, and Wonderland.Money, all of which fall under the category of "DeFi 2.0." Sestagalli is also known for his statements on Twitter, which have recently turned unaware bystanders into frogs and helped his audience grow exponentially (at the time of the interview, he had over 221,000 followers, far exceeding the number from six months ago). Recently, after the project faced months of internal issues, Sestagalli stepped up, and whether he can save DeFi from "corrupt centralized powers" remains to be seen. Regardless, we believe he can be called a hero.

Newly Rich List in Cryptocurrency (ranked by assets):

1. Sam Bankman-Fried
   Net worth: $22.5 billion
   Sam Bankman-Fried founded the FTX exchange in 2019, with most of his assets being the FTX token FTT. FTX recently completed a Series B funding round of $900 million, valuing the exchange at $18 billion, and SBF's FTT assets have doubled.

   Additionally, SBF founded the quantitative fund Alameda Research, managing approximately $2.5 billion in assets. SBF is an altruist, aiming to make as much money as possible and then give back to society.

2. Brian Armstrong
   Net worth: $11.5 billion
   Brian Armstrong is the co-founder of the Coinbase exchange, which went public in April this year, becoming the first publicly listed cryptocurrency exchange, with a company valuation of $86 billion.
   Brian Armstrong holds about 19% of Coinbase's shares, with a net worth of approximately $11.5 billion.

3. Chris Larsen
   Net worth: $6 billion
   Chris Larsen is the co-founder and chairman of Ripple, and he was the only cryptocurrency billionaire on last year's Forbes list. Additionally, Chris Larsen is an entrepreneur and angel investor, having co-founded several companies in Silicon Valley, including a P2P lending company and the online mortgage lending institution E-Loan.

4 & 5. Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss
Net worth: $4.5 billion
The Winklevoss twins were involved in the founding of Facebook and established the Gemini exchange in 2015. According to CMC data, Gemini's 24-hour trading volume is $210 million.
Unlike other cryptocurrency billionaires, the Winklevoss twins' wealth does not solely come from their startups; after suing Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg for stealing their idea in 2013, they purchased $11 million worth of Bitcoin at around $120 per BTC, making them cryptocurrency whales, though they are reluctant to comment on their holdings.

6. Fred Ehrsam
   Net worth: $3.5 billion
   Fred Ehrsam is also a co-founder of Coinbase but left in 2017 to establish the cryptocurrency investment firm Paradigm, investing in numerous well-known crypto startups.
   His investments include the decentralized central bank MakerDAO, lending protocol Compound, decentralized exchange Uniswap, and competitive public chain Cosmos, with an estimated net worth of about $3.5 billion.

7. Jed McCaleb
   Net worth: $3 billion
   Jed McCaleb is the co-founder and former CTO of Ripple, who left Ripple in 2013 to establish the competing public chain Stellar. When he left Ripple, he still held 9 billion XRP.
   The two parties reached a settlement in February 2016, allowing McCaleb to sell an average of 1.5% of the daily trading volume of XRP over a week four years later (February 2020), which has become the basis for McCaleb's continuous large-scale sales of XRP.
   However, throughout September, Jed McCaleb did not sell any XRP.

• Founder of Blockchain (Bitcoin): Satoshi Nakamoto
  "If you don't understand what I mean, I don't have time to convince you." A classic line. Satoshi Nakamoto is a mystery; no one knows what he looks like, and every so often, someone claims to have discovered the real Satoshi. However, every verification results in making Satoshi even more mysterious.

  He left very little information behind. We only know that he was one of the members of the cypherpunk movement, possessing incredible knowledge of cryptography, computer science, mathematics, and economics. Many aspects of Bitcoin that were once considered redundant designs have later proven to be correct, such as the carefully chosen Koblitz curve, which avoided backdoors hidden by the NSA in cryptographic standards. For instance, hashing twice based on the elliptic curve digital signature algorithm is sufficient to counter the threat of quantum computers. Satoshi used PGP encryption and the Tor network for all communications. He even intentionally fabricated some identity information and personalized characteristics in his white paper and community speeches to mislead erroneous speculations, such as disguising his British spelling and Greenwich Mean Time routines. His meticulousness is astonishing. Satoshi's uniqueness lies not only in his genius. His Bitcoin wallet holds one million Bitcoins, worth hundreds of billions at today's prices. However, this astonishing wealth remains as still as a block of ice. Clearly, fame and wealth hold no allure for Satoshi. He appeared like a superhero, leaving behind a remarkable masterpiece before disappearing. Simply explaining his disappearance as a detachment from fame seems insufficient. Satoshi's last public appearance was in 2011, when he advised Assange not to use Bitcoin to sustain WikiLeaks. From this, it can be seen that Satoshi hoped Bitcoin would thrive. However, why did Satoshi not step forward to guide during the endless debates and forks surrounding Bitcoin in 2017? Many hold pessimistic views, believing Satoshi saw the selfishness of human nature in the debates and became thoroughly disappointed. Quoting Chang Jia, "Satoshi is a group of people; they are peace-loving whistleblowers who wish to challenge the old order and establish a fairer, more equal society, where education can be freely distributed to all, and privacy is a right rather than a privilege. In short, for those pursuing a fairer world: we are all Satoshi."