Report: Crypto Moonshots on the Polygon Ecosystem

The search for undervalued and undiscovered cryptocurrencies

As the market was plummeting over the last few weeks there was one stand out performer — Polygon. Its price entered the market dip at around $0.81 and increased to a high of $2.62. Whilst Bitcoin was suffering at the hands of the likes of Elon Musk’s attention seeking utterances Polygon was on the receiving end of praise from the likes of Mark Cuban who announced he had bought into the project and was a big supporter.

MATIC is the cryptocurrency that powers the Polygon network which provides a framework for building and connecting blockchains that are supported by Ethereum technology. It aims to provide a cheaper, more secure and streamlined solution for transactions conducted on the Ethereum blockchain. The network provides a side chain to the main Ethereum blockchain.

According to their website, ‘Polygon solves pain points associated with blockchain, like high gas fees and slow speeds without sacrificing security.’

They must be doing something right because the number of apps built on Polygon between January and May has increased eight fold to almost 400.

Projects have been flocking to Polygon’s because it allows them to benefit from the distinct advantages and leadership Ethereum has in the blockchain world whilst allowing them to overcome the weaknesses which Ethereum has been slow to rectify, namely high gas fees and slow processing times.

This article is the penultimate in the series of Crypto Moonshots from various ecosystems from Binance Smart Chain to our current stop, Polygon. View the other articles in the series here.

Last week we launched our spin off podcast Moonshot Monday Q&A. This is a follow up with projects that appeared on our weekly podcast asking them probing questions posed by our community. Listen to the founder of Candela Coin going through his paces here.

Polygon (formerly Matic) was founded in 2017 by three Indian gentlemen to provide a scaling solution and framework for Ethereum compatible blockchain networks.

There is approximately $6.5 billion locked within smart contracts on Polygon.

Ethereum has been a victim of its own success. It’s the most used decentralized application blockchain, with the largest developer community. But the project can’t scale in its current form. That is where Polygon comes in. According to the team at Polygon;

“We believe that Ethereum is going to be the ultimate, fundamental settlement layer of this Web3 internet. So instead of providing one type of scaling solution on top of Ethereum, we should provide a suite of scalability solutions for developers to choose what they really want.”

There are nearly 400 projects that have been built on Polygon. What is noticeable about this flurry of activity is the high quality of projects both building and migrating to Polygon, many of which have real world uses. Although it is also noticeable that many projects suffer from what appears to be an endemic problem right now, unrealistic valuations, meaning that investors are being asked to pay today for tomorrow’s value. That problem made it easier for us to whittle down the number of projects which met our selection criteria.

In order for a project to meet our criteria it must be:

  • Realistically priced
  • Have a reasonable chance of success.

Below we have selected 20 projects which look interesting and are worth further investigation. From these we have selected 4 moonshots which we believe are worth even closer attention.

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Overview

Chain Games is an evolution in Web 3.0 blockchain gaming combining smart contract based contests with state of the art gameplay. Their multiplayer competitive platform brings eSports tournaments and cash and crypto prizes to players.

Our Opinion

Chain Games is a relatively new platform launching its first product back in August 2020. Since then it has amassed over 10,000 players. The project is backed by an impressive management team which has already inked noteworthy deals including one with Atari. Blockchain based gaming is going to be huge, at some point, and Chain Games has a realistic chance of being one of the leaders in this space. With a fully diluted market value of $77 million Chain Games is a project worth adding to your own watch list.

Overview

PoolTogether is based on the proven concept known as “No Loss Lotteries” or “Prize Linked Savings Accounts”. These products have been shown to divert money from traditional lotteries and increase savings. PoolTogether brought this to the blockchain for the first time. They recently moved to Polygon which has increased speed and reduced transaction costs. Prizes do not have to be claimed; they are simply added to a player’s account.

Our Opinion

We tipped PoolTogether a few months ago on our Moonshot Monday podcast. We still feel this is a great project with massive potential. It is generating over $200,000 in weekly prizes and has $230 million in TVL both of which are respectable numbers. POOL has a full diluted market value of $252 million which does limit its upside somewhat but we believe this is potentially a $1 billion plus protocol.

Overview

PLOT is a prediction market platform that enables users to earn rewards on high-yield prediction markets.

Dubbed as the Uniswap of Prediction Markets, PlotX uses an Automated Market Making algorithm to create, settle markets and distribute rewards without any counterparty risk. Markets are focused on crypto-pairs like BTC, ETH, YFI, etc, and are automatically created in intervals of 4 hours, 1 day, and 1 week.

Our Opinion

We have been longtime supporters of PLOT and the project has only become stronger with time. PLOT has seen its fully diluted market cap tumble from $61 million to $25 million despite PLOT launching its new platform on Polygon and attracting an influx of business with 10,000 predictions in only its first 10 days. Valued at under 20% of its nearest competitor Augur we believe now is a prime opportunity to buy into PLOT.

It has been described as one of the most invaluable resources in the world of altcoin investing. We couldn’t agree more. Download your free micro cap watch list from our website here and receive it in your inbox every Friday.

Overview

OpenPredict is developing a suite of products that will provide a venue for anyone to engage in any type of prediction event. Their flagship product, OpenMarket, is currently in the final stages of internal beta testing. From price prediction of a particular asset to politics and football game results, users can choose to either become a market creator to enjoy trading fees or participate in an existing prediction market.

Our Opinion

Prediction markets were one of the first applications that commentators believed were perfectly suited to the blockchain with many predicting rapid mainstream adoption. Those forecasts were wildly optimistic with the pioneer Augur making very little progress since its formation back in 2014. Prediction markets still hold much promise however as yet there has been little volume flowing to these apps. Augur for example only has a TVL of $3.2 million which compares to a market cap of $163 million. The protocol that does crack this market is going to reap fabulous rewards however it is too early to say if OpenPredict will be the one that finally fulfills the potential. With a fully diluted market cap of $10 million it is certainly one to watch.

The four projects which we outlined above are only a selection of some of the projects which we thought were worthy of closer attention. Others which are worth researching include QuickSwap, Alpaca Finance, Sylo, Big Data Protocol, DxSale and Swirge.

As we continue our moonshot search we must remember that the market dip has made this a buyers market. With an abundance of cryptocurrencies to choose from we don’t have to invest in the first project we stumble across and we definitely don’t have to accept the crazy valuations inherent in the tokenomics of many a cryptocurrency. Project teams who have structured their tokenomics as liberally as a drunk counting money will receive their comeuppance, just make sure you are not holding their tokens when that time comes.

 

Not Financial Advice

This article does not constitute financial advice or a recommendation to buy in any way. Always do your own research and never invest more than you can afford to lose. Investing in cryptocurrencies is high risk, and you could lose 100% of your investment. The article should be treated as supplementary information to add to your existing knowledge.

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