A review of 25 crypto projects with potential airdrop opportunities
Note: The original text is from bankless, written by William M. Peaster.
We published a token air drop guide back in January, when we said that as an early adopter of these crypto protocols, you stand a good chance of reaping great rewards.
We are right.
An example: Darren Lau deposited $100 into dYdX, and he got $50,000 in return.
We believe that such airdrops will happen again. In this new guide, we share 25 possible future airdrop opportunities. Obviously, we can't promise anything, but taking 10 minutes at every opportunity to learn will likely pay off in the future.
image description
Image via: Logan Craig
DeFi protocols are increasingly adopting "token airdrops" to decentralize governance and facilitate early user participation. Project parties often conduct "retroactive airdrops", which means they will interact with their protocols or systems based on your past How much to distribute rewards.
In this post, we will outline a few protocols that may have airdrops.
Goal: Identify protocols for unissued tokens to capture possible future airdrop opportunities.
Skills: Elementary
Effort: Moderate
1
Experience summary
Based on what we’ve seen over the past year, it’s reasonable to conclude that “airdrops” are becoming standard operating practice for young DeFi projects. From the project side's point of view, there is still some work to be done to optimize these airdrops (such as making them resistant to Sybil attacks).
The crux of the matter is? Most don’t have tons of time and unlimited resources to spread activity across every DeFi project that might eventually launch a token.
So the focus is on efficiency: determining which projects to focus on (e.g. is there a very small chance a given protocol will launch a token in 6-12 months?) and scale (i.e. how much to deposit to balance risk and potential reward) .
As far as the first point goes, with a little research you can usually find the team/community's token initiative to guide your efforts. For example, ParaSwap recently announced that it has no plans for an airdrop. Instead, the MetaMask team recently revealed that it is open to the idea of eventually releasing a native token.
So, as an example, you might want to start performing some crypto asset trades through MetaMask. Of course, we can't guarantee that the token airdrop will definitely come, but at least now we know that it is possible.
Next, how many times (or amount) do you need to interact with the protocol of these unissued tokens in order to qualify for the air investment?
This will vary by project, but the golden rule in the early days of DeFi was “never deposit more cryptoassets than you can afford.”
What is the good news? As The Daily Ape founder Darren Lau pointed out last month, even a little money/activity is enough to qualify you for an airdrop.
2
25 Crypto Projects That Might Have an Airdrop
Below is a list of crypto projects included in our V2 airdrop guide that have the potential to launch their own tokens and conduct retroactive airdrops in the near future.
Disclaimer: I'm not sure if they will be airdropped or not, this is purely based on my experience (as an active crypto user and researcher).
1、Element Finance
Description: Element Finance is an "open-source protocol for fixed- and variable-yield markets."
Resources: Website|Documentation|Twitter|Discord
Rationale: Element Finance has created a governance model that suggests the project will necessarily issue a native token.
Airdrop Strategy: Element Finance’s flagship products are its Earn app and Save app, using either of these products may qualify you for future airdrops.
2、Hop Protocol
Description: Hop Protocol is a token bridge protocol, which is used to easily send ETH and ERC-20 tokens between the blockchain and the rollup layer 2 network. It currently supports cross-Ethereum, Arbitrium, Optimism, Polygon and xDai these chains.
Resources: Website | Documentation | Twitter | Discord
Rationale: Regarding potential Hop tokens, the project team has previously stated that "any official announcements about the protocol will be made directly by the Hop team on the official Hop channel."
If Hop has no plans to release tokens, they may make an official announcement like ParaSwap did.
Airdrop Strategy: Visit hop.exchange and either (1) use the send dashboard to cross assets from one chain to another, or (2) become a Liquidity Provider (LP) for the Hop pool.
3、DeFi Saver
Description: DeFi Saver is "a one-stop dashboard for creating, managing, and tracking your DeFi positions."
Resources: Website | Documentation | Twitter | Discord
Rationale: So far, DeFi Saver has been using a native token, but this is a curation token that holders can use to vote and prioritize new protocol integrations.
Airdrop Strategies: Try DeFi Saver's Portfolio System or Recipe Creator.
4、Ondo Finance
Description: Ondo Finance is a protocol that supports "decentralized financial risk markets".
Resources: Website | Documentation | Twitter | Discord
Rationale: The Ondo team has said before that "Ondo currently has no tokens", note that they did not have one at the time.
Airdrop Strategy: Join one of Ondo's venture markets (note that they have a specific "open window" during which you can join).
5、Saddle Finance
Description: Saddle is a decentralized exchange optimized for anchored encrypted assets such as stablecoins and encapsulated BTC.
Resources: Website | Documentation | Twitter | Discord
Rationale: Saddle is an adaptation of Curve's system, and even though it's written in Solidity rather than Vyper, it's not hard to imagine Saddle eventually having its own token, given Curve's launch of CRV.
Airdrop strategy: conduct token swaps through the exchange, or act as a liquidity provider (LP).
6、Charm
Description: Charm Protocol provides a set of DeFi products, including Alpha Vaults, Cube Token, etc.
Resources: Website | Documentation | Twitter | Discord
Rationale: From day one, the stated goal of the Charm team has been that "anyone can research, build, and govern protocols in Charm". The reference to a "governance protocol" seems to imply that they will be issuing a token.
Airdrop Strategy: Deposit into one of Charm's initial products, such as Alpha Vaults.
7、Slingshot
Description: Slingshot is a Web3 transaction platform currently running on Polygon, and it will support Arbitrum in the future.
Sources: Website | Twitter | Discord
Rationale: Slingshot seems likely to follow the path of other DEXs and eventually launch its own token.
Airdrop Strategy: Connect to the Polygon network and make some transactions on the Slingshot app.
8、TokenSets
Description: TokenSets is a DeFi asset management platform built on the Set protocol.
Resources: Website|Docs|Twitter|Discord
Rationale: The project appears to be aiming for fully decentralized governance, which may require issuing a native token.
Airdrop strategy: buy/sell Set tokens or create your own Set tokens.
9、Gro Protocol
Description: Gro Protocol is a yield aggregator protocol catering to stablecoins.
Resources: Website|Docs|Twitter|Discord
Rationale: The Gro team plans to make the project "fully decentralized in the near future" and plans to involve early backers in governance.
Airdrop Strategy: Use Gro Protocol's Vault or PWRD products.
10、Cowswap
Description: Cowswap is a MEV-resistant DEX aggregator built on top of the v2 version of the Gnosis protocol.
Resources: Website | Docs | Twitter | Discord
Reason: Cowswap plans to build a DAO on the road of complete decentralization, which means it will have a token.
Airdrop Strategy: Make some trades through this exchange.
11、Cozy Finance
Description: Cozy Finance is a protocol (i.e. insurance protocol) that creates a trust-minimized protection market for DeFi.
Resources: Website|Docs|Twitter|Discord
Rationale: Most DeFi insurance projects to date have launched their own tokens, so we may end up seeing the same with Cozy.
Airdrop Strategy: Borrow/give assets on Cozy, or, more advanced users can create their own protected marketplaces.
12、Zapper
Description: Zapper is a Web3 wallet management dashboard for DeFi and NFT users.
Source: Website | Twitter | Discord
Rationale: Zapper has not “eliminated” the possibility of issuing tokens, which means we still have a chance.
Airdrop strategy: Try Zapper's native Exchange, Pool, Save and other products.
13、Zerion
Description: Zerion is another Web3 wallet management dashboard for DeFi and NFT users.
Source: Website|Twitter|Discord
Rationale: Like Zapper, we may see Zerion launch a native token at some point in the future to facilitate community governance.
Airdrop strategy: Try Zerion’s Invest, Exchange, Pool products, etc.
14、 Kwenta & Lyra
Description: These are two different protocols, but what they have in common is that both are derivative projects built on Synthetix and deployed on Optimism L2.
Source: Kwenta Twitter | Lyra Twitter
Rationale: These two projects have publicly confirmed that they will conduct retrospective airdrops.
Airdrop Strategy: Put SNX on Optimism, then use any of the protocols.
15、 Mirror
Description: Mirror is a decentralized content publishing platform
Source: Website|Twitter|Discord
Rationale: While Mirror already has WRITE tokens, the distribution of the tokens is limited, and perhaps Mirror could airdrop more tokens to its early users.
Airdrop strategy: Take advantage of Mirror’s various tools, such as posting blog posts through the platform.
16. Ethereum Name Service (ENS)
Description: ENS is a Web3 domain name and provisioning system.
Resources: Website|Docs|Twitter|Discord
Rationale: ENS is evolving into a full-fledged decentralized identity system. In the future, decentralized governance driven by token holders may oversee the system.
Airdrop strategy: register/renew ENS domain name.
17、Optimism
Description: Optimism is a Layer 2 Optimistic Rollup network that can help Ethereum achieve capacity expansion.
Resources: Website|Docs|Twitter|Discord
Reason: It seems that the rollup layer 2 network will launch its own tokens to guide liquidity and compete for users. And Optimism is a big project to watch.
Airdrop strategy: transfer funds from Ethereum to Optimism, and use some application, such as Uniswap or Synthetix.
18、Arbitrum
Description: Like Optimism, Arbitrum is also an optimistic rollup second-tier project, and its recent development momentum is very good.
Resources: Website|Docs|Twitter|Discord
Rationale: Again, as a rollup layer 2 project, Arbitrum seems likely to eventually launch its own token to bootstrap liquidity and compete for users.
Airdrop strategy: transfer funds from the Ethereum mainnet to Arbitrum, and use applications such as Balancer.
19、zkSync
Description: zkSync is a L2 expansion network using zk rollup technology.
Resources: Website|Docs|Twitter|Discord
Rationale: Matter Labs, creators of zkSync, have confirmed that they will be releasing tokens to incentivize early adopters.
Airdrop Strategy: Open zkSync wallet and test this L2 network.
20、PartyBid
Description: PartyBid is a dapp for "collective bidding on NFT". The project makes it easy for a group of friends or even a group of strangers to bid for NFT together.
Source: Website|Twitter|Discord
Airdrop strategy: Initiate a PartyBid for any NFT you want to participate in, or contribute ETH to an activated PartyBid (if the bid fails, you can get your ETH back).
21、Foundation
Description: Foundation is an NFT minting and marketplace platform for the creator economy.
Source: Website|Twitter
Rationale: After SuperRare rolled out its community-owned governance model with RARE, it seems likely that similar platforms like Foundation will opt for a similar approach.
Airdrop Strategy: Bid/collect NFTs on Foundation, remember, don't buy NFTs you don't like for purely speculative reasons.
22、Zora
Description: Zora is an NFT minting and marketplace protocol.
Resources: Website|Docs|Twitter|Discord
Rationale: Community management and governance is the future of many NFT platforms, so I wouldn't be surprised if Zora ends up issuing its own token.
Airdrop Strategy: Minting and collecting NFTs on Zora.
23、 Fractional
Description: Fractional is an NFT fragmentation platform, for example, you can split a rare 1/1 NFT into 1,000 fragments.
Resources: Website|[Docs](https://docs.fractional.art/fractional/#:~:text=Fractional is a decentralized protocol, the NFT that they own.)|[Twitter](https://twitter. com/fractional_art)|[Discord](https://discord.com/invite/fractional)
Rationale: If I remember correctly, the Fractional team expressed openness to the possibility of issuing a native token in the future.
Airdrop strategy: Collect NFT fragments on the platform, or split NFT yourself.
24、 Sudoswap
Description: Sudoswap is a trading platform for trading NFT and ERC20 tokens.
Source: Website|Twitter|Discord
Rationale: The Sudoswap team is innovative and imaginative, and it seems likely that they will at some point conduct a well-thought-out, unprecedented airdrop.
Airdrop Strategy: Some NFT trades via the Sudoswap app.
25、OpenSea
Description: OpenSea is currently the world's leading NFT marketplace.
Resources: Website|Docs|Twitter|Discord
Rationale: As large new players such as Coinbase and Reddit continue to enter the NFT space, OpenSea may launch its own token to incentivize users to stay on OpenSea.
Airdrop Strategy: Minting and collecting NFTs via OpenSea.
3
Other projects that may be airdropped
in conclusion
Art Blocks
Artion
Fuji Finance
Goldfinch
Hashflow
Horizon Finance
MetaMask
Opyn
Rabbithole
Risk Harbor
Rubicon
Sablier
Shell Protocol
Sherlock
Superfluid
Teller
in conclusion
It’s important to remember that there can be risks with young DeFi and NFT projects, which are experimental in nature.
Therefore, you need to do more research before exploring these protocols in depth. If you do test any of these, make sure to proceed with caution and only use funds that you can afford to lose.
That said, as Darren Lau mentioned in a previous tweet, even modest participation can net you handsome airdrop rewards.
Finally, keep in mind that we may end up seeing rollup projects like Arbitrum and Optimism launch their own native tokens.
This article comes from Tao of Yuan Universe, reproduced with authorization.
This article comes from Tao of Yuan Universe, reproduced with authorization.
