The Castle Chronicle: Is it finally BTC's time?
PLUS: What's your privacy worth to you?
Welcome to Edition 141 of The Castle Chronicle!
Now that everyone is sufficiently exhausted from their convention hopping, you can take a nice, long break, digesting this week’s issue! Lock in ladies and gentlemen, it’s time for some good reads.
Gm all, Here’s what we have for you today:
🔍 Market Watch - BTC finally moves! Is ZEC next up?
🕵️♂️ What Have You Got To Hide?
🐱 Are Hypurrs saving OpenSea?
📖 Recommended Reads - The best reads from the best researchers on CT
🔍 Market Watch
Gm frens! It’s an exciting week as BTC reaches a new ATH (All-time-high)! And as we know, when BTC moves, the rest moves with it. Let’s check out the charts!
Price Action
After 10 weeks of sideways, BTC is once again moving higher. The uptrend is very much intact and the expectation is continuation towards new highs.
That being said, technically price is still inside a range and there is a chance that this move higher is just for distribution purposes, so I will be paying attention to how price interacts with the resistance. But given the overall alignment, we should definitely be bullish here. Just a word of caution.
Top Performers
We got a huge green wave this week with more than 10 coins gaining over 20%! By far the biggest winner is ZEC with a crazy 117% pump, wow! Let’s take a closer look.
ZEC has been going sideways for quite some time and has just broken out of an accumulation range with HUGE momentum. This is exactly what we want to see on the HTF. These are the types of moves we want to follow.
However, it’s important to consider overextension on the lower timeframe, because we don’t want to chase a pump. For that purpose let’s check a lower timeframe on which we can see the waves nicely and formulate a plan.
The 4H chart paints a nice picture of this impulse. The ideal scenario would be a nice re-accumulation. Price failing to go higher, dipping lower and finding some demand/supply equilibrium. Chop around for a while and then break out higher. At that point I will stalking ZEC like a hawk!
Narrative Performance
The green wave is very obvious on the narrative performance chart. Most narratives are up over 10%, with Prediction Markets leading the charge up +32%, mostly thanks to AZUR. Privacy coins are doing well too carried by before mentioned ZEC.
We are once again in very good crypto context and it makes sense to look for relatively stronger outperformers. Generally I’m looking for:
1W chart to be clearly bullish
1D chart to be trending and not over-extended
New coins that come out during good BTC context (MYX, XPL, ASTER, etc.)
Risk responsibly, and I’ll see y’all next time!
Courtesy of 0x_Vlad - trend-based trader and MentFX student
Not following what I’m talking about? Check out my quick cheatsheet to understand how I approach a chart.
🕵️♂️ What Have You Got To Hide?
“I have nothing to hide”.
A short phrase uttered in a clandestine location by someone in shackles, arrested for operating in the shadows.
Imagine this as a scene in a book, where an oppressive state has silenced its civilians in an attempt at compliance. In response, these citizens take action in the dark, seeking to fight this oppression.
“I have nothing to hide” is the last attempt at defiance, openly endorsing their actions against the government.
This is an excellent line and hits hard every time. But this isn’t just a story.
It’s real life, and in real life, we absolutely have things to hide.
This article is about Privacy, as a human right and a necessary one.
Privacy isn’t about secret matters: it’s about choosing only to reveal things to the world when you want to. The world, the government, and whoever else are not entitled to every thought you think, every action you take, and every word you write.
Privacy has become a dirty word, but only by the powers that be, in their attempt to twist its meaning into something different, or pervert it into a meaning that it never had. As a consequence, in recent years, privacy has been eroded under the guise of “protection”.
For those in power, the act of keeping something private means something outside of their control. The boundaries pushed by governments and world leaders have only accelerated in recent years, perhaps in an attempt to see what they can get away with.
Turns out, they can get away with a lot!
There were liberties taken with the COVID-19 debacle, where businesses were shuttered, employees were fired for refusing to take a shot, and people were ostracised for simply speaking their mind.
While the above don’t necessarily correlate with privacy, they showcase government and company overreach. There was a narrative to control and a population to bring to heel, and that was all the permission that was needed.
Here are a few examples of ways that governments and companies have helped erode privacy:
The PATRIOT Act allowed warrantless wire-tapping of both phone calls and internet traffic under the justification of “if you have nothing to hide, then you have nothing to fear”.
Social media apps are constantly collecting and building a behavioural profile based on your personal data.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, governments implemented contact tracing apps, movement tracking via telecom data, and mandatory check-ins.
Even now, the EU is working towards the CSAR proposal (also known as Chat Control by critics), which requires the scanning of private communications, such as chats and text messages. While the premise of stopping child sex abuse is honourable, the methods that the EU proposes move into slippery slope territory.
This proposal would bring about indiscriminate mass surveillance, undermine end-to-end encryption, and violate fundamental rights. People may resort to self-censorship and be hesitant to post or express their true thoughts. Again, a very slippery slope.
Even Oracle’s Larry Ellison talks about “constantly recording”, saying that citizens will “be on their best behaviour”.
These types of overreach and encroachment get you closer to the famous plot of 1984 by George Orwell. What’s to stop governments/world leaders from monitoring how you talk about them and punishing you based on these comments?
What’s to stop them from freezing bank accounts because you posted a dissenting opinion? The temptation (and incentives) is there for those in power to maintain control, and privacy encroachment is a convenient means for them to pursue it.
Now, regardless of how this all sounds, I’m not anti-government. But I am very pro-freedom.
Without freedom, we’re just a cog in a broken machine.
So you might be asking yourself: “Schizo, why are you talking about all this, man? You’re a crypto guy, not a philosopher.” And you know what, you’re right. However, I believe that crypto plays a significant role in preserving our freedoms and our right to privacy.
We’ve been incredibly fortunate in the crypto world to have both hard money in Bitcoin and private money in the form of Zcash, Monero, and others.
To be honest, both options are essential in today’s world.
We have rampant inflation and a degradation of dollar assets, a rising worldwide debt that countries are trying to grow their way out of, and governments pushing the limits on what privacy actually means. There’s more anger and division in the world than ever before, and these emotions will be used against us.
People will be gaslit into accepting new norms and policies that they shouldn’t for the “good of the people”. Maybe I’m overreacting and nothing will happen, but it sure feels like we’re edging closer and closer to a precipice.
It feels more important than ever to secure a future that you’d be comfortable in, and if we can’t do that, then we need to secure assets and means to ensure our freedom. That means hard money and private money.
We’re forever in a fight for balance, where people can enjoy privacy, and security can be employed for the good of the people, without being in direct conflict. This is a tricky tightrope to walk, and I don’t envy those who are making decisions on either side here.
However, I will do my best to preserve my self-agency and privacy. This means utilising crypto rails to purchase more Bitcoin, acquiring privacy tokens like Zcash, and making myself and my money unstoppable.
We’re in a unique position with crypto, where you can pay bills, buy groceries, and still have options to preserve your privacy. Governments fear things they cannot control, and that’s why privacy tokens have been singled out in recent years.
Various governments have targeted Monero and Zcash, among others, and have delisted them from some major exchanges due to pressure from regulators and leaders.
Unfortunately, this is a potential way to hinder the adoption of Monero/Zcash. Imagine you have a paradise where nothing bad ever happens, but there’s only one bridge to it. If that bridge gets burned by someone jealous of that utopia, then no one else can get to it.
Thankfully, in our scenario, there are still some exchanges and protocols that allow users to purchase these tokens!
Hopefully, with this new wave of privacy in our space, we can continue to champion builders in innovating and creating more protocols with privacy applications.
So if you’re interested in the intersection of privacy in crypto, these are some accounts and protocols that you should check out:
(I’m sure there are plenty of protocols I’m missing, so if anyone knows more protocols/accounts, please tag them below!)
I don’t want to live in a world where we can’t have autonomy over our finances, and I definitely don’t want to live in a world like Orwell’s 1984. However, I genuinely believe in crypto’s ability to help in this regard..
So remember this: Freedom, along with time, is the ultimate asset.
If we can’t have that, then maybe you’d truly have nothing to hide.
Schizo out!
🐱 Are the Hypurr NFTs saving Opensea?
(The Hypurr NFT were everywhere at the Hyperliquid event on Sentosa Island during Token 2049)
l’m pretty sure that you guys heard about the Hypurr NFT that the Hyperliquid team airdropped to some of their OG users on September 28.
Back in the days, the biggest & earliest HL users were given three choices.
1) Receive $HYPE tokens
2) Receive Hypurr NFT
or
3) Receive both the $HYPE & the NFT
I remember some frens that were offered the choice & were scared to select the NFT, thinking they could be losing their expected airdrop if they selected an option with the NFT.
It turned out that the chads that selected the option 3), won BIG.
They got a massive $hype airdrop & almost 1 year later, a NFT worth at minimum 50-70k USD.
With a floor of 1299 $Hype on Opensea, the cheapest Hypurr possible to buy today is now worth 59k USD. A good amount of monei for most people.
But the most interesting is that this NFT airdrop has been a real money maker for Opensea. A platform that more than one has called dead in the last few years.
I was not able to confirm with onchain data that OpenSea really did more than 1,27 millions USD in $HYPE as Luke Cannon claimed above. But looking on HyperEvmScan, you can see that their known fees wallet accumulated on the EVM more than 9700 $HYPE token since the launch of this collection.
In the last 30 days, the Hypurr NFT have been the most traded collection on OpenSea, generating the most fees for the application for a while. Even surpassing the OG CryptoPunks.
If we don’t know yet the utility of this collection in the Hyperliquid ecosystem, we can expect that Jeff & all the chads at the Hyperliquid foundation will cook something big. I personally think that some great utility will be attached to this collection at some point. HL is just starting.
I wish you all a great week and to close this smol article.
LETS ALL THANK JEFF
From CL, with love
x0x0x0
📖 Recommended Reads
A great article from @0xTulipKing on how to be good at crypto!
A look at how crypto is intersecting with robotics by @Tiger_Research_
@nic__carter did an excellent article here about the end of the stablecoin duopoly
That’s it for today’s issue, we hope you enjoyed it.
You can check out our X for new research reports and weekly gigabrain content.
See you in the next issue,
The Castle Team
In our newsletter, we may discuss projects or tokens in which we hold positions. While we aim to provide informative content, our views are not financial advice. Please conduct your research and consult professionals before making investment decisions. Crypto markets are volatile, and past performance doesn't guarantee future results. Invest responsibly, and be aware of the risks. Your capital is at risk, and we do not accept liability for any losses.