A Castle Reflection on 2024

GM Kings — thank you for clocking in today.

I’m sitting with a large glass of red typing this up for you after a lovely couple of days away from the screen, enjoying time with family, eating far too much food, and over-indulging in various alcoholic pleasantries.

I hope you guys have also touched some grass and spent time with loved ones, it’s not often everyone gets together, so make sure to take advantage of it when you can — because this next year is going to get spicy.

2025 is no doubt going to be a wild ride. Bitcoin breaking $100k, a pro-crypto president, money printers back on, AI x crypto finally finding some PMF, and half the space made rich already by recent airdrops.

Not to mention new shiny verticals like DeSci, DePIN (and DeAI), as well as the impending DeFi Renaissance. All of that and we haven’t mentioned the launch of Hype EVM, Berachain, Monad, or MegaETH.

But enough about 2025.

Put simply, we’ve come a long way this year.

Both as an industry and as a business.

SECTOR PERFORMANCE

Almost all sectors have seen growth despite a turbulent year that included many months of chopping price action and several neglected verticals.

Memecoins were some of the best performers of the year. They acted as a safe haven from the high FDV, low float meta that VCs had laid before us. With memecoins, investors could simply bid on things that made them laugh and communities they vibed with at reasonable valuations and avoid being dumped on by VCs with huge unlocks.

Now, despite AI majors performing poorly this year, we recently saw HUGE growth across AI projects at accessible valuations due to the rise of AI agents. This new crypto x AI wave of fair launches looks to have changed the game, even taking a lot of liquidity out of memecoins.

These agents aren’t going anywhere. In fact I might even go as far to say they could well be the new shiny tech meta of the cycle (think NFTs in 2021).

ETFs

Although it feels like a lifetime ago, 2024 was the year we saw ETFs launched for both BTC and ETH. These have been a huge success, with BTC breaking ETF records for growth. ETH did take some time to get moving but has been looking promising lately.

STABLECOIN GROWTH

Stablecoin supply grew from $125b to $200b this year. A great metric to show industry growth. Expect to see much more explosive upward movement this next year.

ETHEREUM vs. SOLANA

The never-ending debate on Crypto Twitter. Ultimately, just don’t be a maxi. Make sure you have exposure in both places and always be happy!

Each ecosystem has lots to shout about this year but the TL;DR is:

• Ethereum = institutional/business adoption chain

• Solana = retail chain

The biggest thing to watch out for here IMO is chain abstraction and interoperability of L2s over the next year. This could hurt Solana, but Ethereum-based wallets/accounts have a long way to go still.

Solana still massively lags behind Ethereum in terms of TVL.

Solana is, however, catching up on the chain fees game, showing the chain is being very much utilised, as we can also see from the strong DEX volume growth below.

2024 wasn’t just great for crypto, it was great for Castle.

We successfully delivered our second full year in the newsletter game, breaking 3,000 subscribers.

We acted as advisors to over 70 protocols across 2024 in Arbitrum incentive programs, working directly with the teams to craft distribution mechanisms and monitor their impact. Teams included Compound, deBridge, Uniswap, Pyth, Lido, PancakeSwap, Pear Protocol, GammaSwap, Pendle, Balancer, Sanko, Frax, Solv, and Vertex.

We published 9 long-form research reports across a range of verticals, including timely dives into Eigenlayer, Hyperliquid, and Berachain.

We were one of 12 elected to sit on the Arbitrum Multisig Signer Service - the group responsible for managing the vast majority of DAO-related program funds and transactions.

We began collaborating with protocols to write long-form research about their sectors that our audience would find intriguing, bringing our accessible and educational touch to complex systems. Some examples include Azuro (Prediction Markets), Resolv (Stablecoins), and Ambire (Smart Accounts). We also secured grants from Arbitrum and Sei to write chain-specific educational content.

On the business/financial side — it has been even better.

We have always been an unfunded business. No capital was ever injected into Castle. Human capital was king for a long time. I’m incredibly pleased and proud to say this era is ending.

This year we not only officially incorporated as a registered business, but finally built enough of a treasury to pay out base salaries rather than fully relying on client revenue to pay contributors.

I cannot overstate how massive this is.

For a long time, we operated a fully-fledged research, media, and advisory business without anywhere near the funding of our competitors. Our determination and output were based on our comradery, trust, and shared belief that through perseverance we could make it sustainable.

We have now expanded the core team at Castle Labs (whose core priority is Castle) to 5. These chads lead and support verticals across the Newsletter, Twitter Content, Research Reports, DAO Governance, and Business Development before we even start talking about client services.

Despite all of the above, there was still one more cherry on the cake.

Earlier this month, after a hard and lengthy application process, we won the election for the Research seat of the Arbitrum Research and Development Committee (ARDC), along with our partners DefiLlama Research.

This essentially makes us the de facto research consultants to the DAO with the largest treasury in the world.

Our competition was Blockworks, Messari, The Block, Revelo Intel, and PYOR Research. All incredibly well-established and well-funded organisations.

There is still hope for the little guy.

So remember, you can achieve anything you put your mind to as long as you have the right focus, strong determination, and an aligned network around you who share your vision.

We could not be here today without all of the guys within the Castle, each on of them played a part role in shaping my experience and giving me the confidence to take each next step. From those steps, I now have an incredible core team around me that make me very proud.

Get ready because you’re going to see a shit load more of us in 2025.

That’s a promise.

Peace out and a happy new year kings.

Atomist

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.