June 15, 2023: Moby Dick 🔱🐳
What would happen if hunters manage to harpoon the great whale?
These days, the line separating the “wisdom of the crowds” from the “madness of the mob” is thinner than a politician’s promise.
Crypto Twitter remains a collection of several extraordinarily smart people, yet in aggregate they keep re-enacting the exact same farce.
In case you haven’t heard this one before…
Untethered
Oh no, is Tether OK? Part one million
The TL/DR:
If you weren’t early to this particular party, you should be following Dan Smith, who detected some very slight ripples a few days before it developed into a flood.
At the time, we recalled the Fiddy indicator, and sure enough it would presage a big dump in $ETH price.
Over the past 24 hours, the Tether imbalance has evolved into yet another full-scale panic. With onchain liquidity drier than ever, this phenomenon can repeat itself quicker and quicker each cycle. As of publication, Tether now sits at 70% of the 3pool.
So, the thing is, we write this exact same article like every month. It’s like a cover band where the audience keeps yelling out Freebird. Don’t you people ever want to listen to something new?
OK, whatever, we’ll say the line. Curve remains a FUD —> $$$ engine. Or nowadays, FUD —> mansion? Somehow on one day crypto Twitter will FUD Curve’s 3pool to extreme imbalances and massive trading volumes, and then the next day they’ll wonder at how Mich can afford to keep adding onto his mansion. C’mon people…
In all likelihood, the story plays out the same way yet again. Not financial advice of course, because maybe this will be the time it all collapses. But in all likelihood, all we’ll see happen is Tether processing redemptions like clockwork, and Curve printing monster fees on the FUD.
If crypto markets were more rational, one might almost expect $CRV token would benefit from the predictably elevated cash flows. Except, that’s its own funny story…
$CRV
The Tether dustup happens to again coincide with another doomed whale hunt. For the gazillionth time this week, everybody freaked out over a $CRV lending strategy Mich has been doing forever.
We see hordes of jealous degens stuck in unreasonably small houses acting big jealous over Mich’s abode, and the mob took to furiously hunting down his ample $CRV stash on Aave.
He’s acting unconcerned as always. We already reviewed why he’s unperturbed. He’s well aware of the numbers and knows that based on available liquidity it would be really tough to nail him, and never works out particularly well for the hunters.
We’re furiously taking notes about which particular commentators and thread000rs are gullible enough to suddenly get concerned about this today, as opposed to every other day since 0xchad saw fit to maximize his alpha.
Turns out it’s actually a precise annual phenomenon. Check the date on this timeless classic.
As a post, it held up pretty well, as has the author. Apparently June 14 is $CRV FUD day. Set your calendars for next year.
It got us wondering though. What if the whale hunters, against all odds, actually got him? What if they harpooned Mich’s position on Aave and spilled blood across the markets. What if they rewrote Moby Dick to capture the whale in the end?
Some people like to claim such an event would be the end of Curve, and possibly even all of DeFi. Well… perhaps maybe? The only real way to know for sure is if the short brigade actually succeeded.
Our bet is that after a cataclysmic $CRV collapse, Curve would just carry on its business as usual. Here’s the calculus behind our guesswork…