Jake

the monster has been unleashed. the $RAIL valuation report is live. 40 pages, 40 minute read. messari.io/report/a-valua… it is an enterprise report, so only @MessariCrypto enterprise clients have access. HOWEVER, let's break down the key points: 1) what is RAILGUN? @RAILGUN_Project is onchain ZK privacy infra for EVM networks. it lets users transact on Ethereum, Arbitrum, Polygon, and BNB Chain without revealing wallet identity, balances, or transaction intent. the protocol charges a 0.25% fee when assets enter or exit the privacy set (shield/unshield). all fees accrue onchain to the DAO treasury. 2% of the treasury is distributed to $RAIL stakers every two weeks, creating a direct link between usage, treasury growth, and staker cash flows. 2) how does RAILGUN work? railgun lets users move assets from public ERC-20 balances into a shared private pool (shielding), then transact from that pool without revealing wallet identity, balances, or intent. assets inside the pool aren’t account balances. they’re represented as private notes, proven valid with ZK proofs instead of being publicly readable onchain. users keep their normal 0x address, but also generate a private railgun address (0zk…). private transactions are built in-wallet, proven locally, then executed onchain with no link back to the public wallet. railgun is infrastructure, not a consumer wallet. wallets and apps integrate the railgun contracts and SDK to support private balances and private smart contract execution. this design keeps users on Ethereum’s existing liquidity and apps, while adding privacy at the settlement layer. 3) what does railgun adoption and revenue look like? railgun processed $2b in combined shield/unshield volume in 2025. this generated the protocol $5M. importantly, this revenue is earned without emissions, liquidity incentives, or subsidized activity. users are paying real fees for privacy. railgun captures nearly 5% of its TVL as revenue, materially higher than most DeFi infra protocols, which typically capture around 0.3-3%. this reflects the transactional nature of privacy flows as railgun monetizes capital movement, not passive liquidity. 4) what is the Kohaku Wallet SDK and why does it matter for RAILGUN? kohaku is an open-source wallet privacy SDK being developed under the @ethereumfndn. its goal is to make privacy native at the wallet layer, not a separate opt-in tool. instead of users going out of their way to use a privacy protocol, wallets can integrate Kohaku and offer private balances and private transactions directly in normal wallet flows. railgun is already integrated into Kohaku. that means railgun becomes part of default wallet transaction flows. once Kohaku goes live and tier-1 wallets (like @MetaMask) start integrating it, railgun’s addressable market expands from users who actively seek privacy to a massive share of Ethereum’s wallet-reachable capital. that shift, from niche tooling to default wallet infra, is the core driver behind the upside scenarios in my valuation. 5) how exactly did I value $RAIL? i start with Ethereum’s capital base (ETH market cap + stablecoins), model how much of it migrates into RAILGUN’s privacy set over time, and translate that into revenue thru a declining capture rate. revenue minus operating expenses = operating cash flow. ~52% gets paid to stakers, the rest accumulates in the DAO treasury, and i value both pieces (cash flows + treasury) to arrive at intrinsic $RAIL per token. the base case intrinsic value provides a clean and defensible anchor for what $RAIL should be worth if adoption plays out as modeled. $RAIL's current price sits at a significant discount to that base case. 6) disclaimer: i hold $RAIL. this report is meant for informational purposes only. It is not meant to serve as investment advice. 7) railtardio. - railgun quant

@ahbeaudry @TokenRelations Congrats brother 🫡

I'm excited to announce that I’ve joined the team over at @TokenRelations as an Institutional Crypto Researcher! When I got laid off from Messari back in March, I was bummed not only because I was now unemployed, but because I really liked research. I had a passion for writing about developing markets, stablecoin and crypto adoption abroad, and learning how firms were using tokenization in their products. The team at Token Relations is incredible and feels very much like a young Messari; everyone is smart, driven, and hungry to make a name for themselves. I want to also give a shoutout to the new Commander in Chief @jacqmelinek for her tireless energy, clear vision on how to run a team, and constant support for new ideas and innovative research. If anyone is looking for top tier reporting or wants to partner on putting out commissioned research, my DM’s are always open :)

@Solofunk @serotonin_hq @Figure @maplefinance @Morpho @kamino @SteakhouseFi @SkyEcosystem @USDai_Official @Securitize @Rockaway_X 🔥

Over $300 billion in stablecoins have been starved of yield. Onchain credit introduces exogenous yields that fill the gap, with the asset class growing from $252.2M to $5.58B in 2025, a 22x increase. This is the State of Onchain Credit 🧵

@waleswoosh They have ~$60M in active loans with ~$320M in the total disclosed loan pipeline. They should be on track to have billions in loans in the next few years. x.com/immutablejacob…

Can anyone explain how exactly $CHIP, the token behind the USDai stablecoin (with basically no users), is trading at a $1B USD FDV? Is this some new kind of crime meta I haven't heard about yet? Or is it just because it has "AI" in the name? Appreciate any insights, kind regards

USD.AI’s $CHIP is now live, trading at ~$600M FDV. in my valuation report, my base case supported a ~$330M FDV. my bull case reached ~$1.7B, or roughly 3x from here. at current levels, the market is already pricing meaningful execution. the key question now is whether @USDai_Official can convert pipeline into funded originations at scale, while proving durable value routing to $CHIP holders.

Deal count in 2025 is down 38% YoY, but the total amount raised is up 60%. The number of unique investors decreased 28% YoY. Only 61 new funds launched in 2025, a 41% decrease YoY, but the capital committed to these new funds increased 15%. All signs point to a broader venture market shift toward established firms with proven track records and away from new entrants.

@AvgJoesCrypto @binji_x 👀👀👀

@binji_x .@immutablejacob when we following up the Railgun valuation report?

the things being built via the kohaku project are truly mind blowing and deserve a closer look from anyone who is seeking alpha in what the future holds for users on ethereum

Thinking of participating in a token sale? The sale valuation is what matters most. We analyzed 63 token sales and grouped them by valuation at the time of raise. Only the lowest valuation buckets (<$50M) showed positive returns. Above that, outcomes turn consistently negative, with some cohorts down as much as ~60%. In token sales, the only edge is not overpaying.

Just hard to overstate the scale of this $122B raise for OpenAI. - First $100B venture round in history - 3x larger than the 2nd largest ever which OpenAI did in 2025 - 6x larger than anything done before 2026 - Larger than the next 5 largest combined Silly amount of money.

@AvgJoesCrypto @coinbase I switched over to Kraken about 6 months ago. Their fees are one-half to one-third of coinbase’s. I weekly buy BTC and my effective cost went from 1.20% on Coinbase Advanced to 0.42% on Kraken Pro.

I have received three separate notifications about College Basketball from @coinbase in the past *hour* alone. It is absurd that, amidst arguably the worst collapse in trust in this industry’s history, the largest American CEX has completely pivoted to trying to get their customer base hooked on sports gambling, so that they can extract even more exorbitant fees. At this point, it is undeniable that Coinbase *is* part of the industry’s problem. I will be ending my Coinbase One subscription and moving my business to new a CEX, any recommendations?

@OnchainLu @mpp @x402Foundation 👀

Machine Payments Protocol has entered the chat since last week's launch: > 24.5k real txns > $5.3k in vol agents have choices now

@sjdedic x.com/immutablejacob…

Did you know the crypto industry did more M&A in 2025 than in the previous four years combined? It hit $37 billion in 2025, which is a 74% YoY growth and is projected to be even higher this year. 356 deals. 39 of them above $100 million. Coinbase bought Deribit for $2.9 billion. Kraken bought NinjaTrader for $1.5 billion. Ripple bought Hidden Road for $1.25 billion. Our industry is consolidating with a power law in the making. The strong are getting stronger, acquiring licenses, distribution and infrastructure that would otherwise take years to build internally. And with the GENIUS Act live and the CLARITY Act on the horizon, compliance-driven acquisitions will only accelerate in 2026 and beyond. If you're a founder who doesn't want to get eaten up or simply die, it's time to leave your 2021 playbook behind and adapt to the new era we're in. But one thing is for sure: The biggest players in this industry spending billions to strengthen their positioning for the next decade tells you everything you need to know about where we're actually going.

18 crypto projects raised $1.2 billion this week here are the top 5 👇 @Kalshi - $1B at a $22B valuation > Regulated exchange and prediction market > @coatuemgmt @bluesky - $100M > Decentralized social networking platform built on the AT Protocol > @BainCapCrypto, @alumniventures, & @trueventures Ironlight - $21M > Developing infrastructure for tokenized securities > @Sei_FND, Gregory Barca, & Laidlaw Private Equity @GENCY_AI - $20M > Building a sovereign advertising network powered by AI and blockchain consensus > @mhventures, @ark_stream, & @BasicsCapital @silhouette_ex - $8M > A shield exchange on Hyperliquid, enabling confidential onchain order execution > @polychain, @6thManVentures, & @Rockaway_X

@0xCryptoSam Pleasure working with you ser 🫡🫡

Unfortunately, my team got cut in the layoffs. A disappointing outcome to an otherwise fantastic experience. I’m very grateful to have been a Messari Research Analyst. What I can confidently say is that quality thought-leadership is presently the most undervalued resource in crypto. The mediocrity of AI-driven writing and reasoning has convinced many that it is a suitable replacement for a research analyst. I promise you - it isn’t. Frontier technologies today (crypto, AI, robotics, quantum) are hyper-ideological and incredibly contentious. We’re entering a new era that demands human judgement and debate. LLMs will tell you what’s consensus. Ask any LLM today if an intelligent person should pivot from crypto to AI; they all say yes. We need thought-leaders willing to play 4D chess in public and get a couple moves wrong before they win the match. Humanity is incredibly undervalued in the 21st century. Lastly, the talent density at Messari was unlike anything I’ve ever seen. Any crypto companies hiring should reach out to myself, Diran, or any of the Messari folks directly to get in contact if you’re looking to hire.

2025’s fundraising report covers 20+ pages of deep crypto funding alpha. Read the full Enterprise @MessariCrypto report here: messari.io/report/state-o…

The five largest newly launched funds collectively raised $2B, including: > @yzilabs Builder Fund ($1B) > @FoundationCap Fund II ($600M) > @50TFunds Fund V ($500M) > @RibbitCap Fund Y ($500M) > @EntreeCap Early-Stage Investments Fund ($300M)

Total crypto fundraising in 2025 increased 60% YoY to $28.6B. This is the highest annual fundraising total since 2022. Let’s take a deeper look at @MessariCrypto's State of Fundraising 2025 report 🧵👇