Random Thoughts on Public Chains in 2026: 1. The playbook of "controlling inflation + high-interest deposit attraction + DeFi trifecta + founder's dog meme + having our own hyperliquid + aggressively OTC selling to liquid funds" is no longer viable. 2. This isn't just a problem for Monad and MegaETH to face; it's also an issue for Rise, Fogo, and even N1. As for older public chains, it depends on the situation. Sei and Polygon still seem to be struggling, while most have already given up. 3. The loyalty of projects incubated from a public chain's Day 1 remains questionable. The limited number of founders in the industry already have options like BNB Chain, Solana, and even Base. Most who deploy on a new chain are eyeing the public chain foundation's treasury. Once they secure funding through endorsement and capture the first wave of launch users from the public chain's community, founders are incentivized to: 1) build their own app chain to boost valuation, or 2) switch to other chains to compete. 4. This has led some founders to stop claiming they are part of the "xx ecosystem," instead saying xx chain is their "GTM Partner." 5. Therefore, ecosystem projects that are too weak are like the "unhelpable Adou," while those that are too strong become the "backstabbing Lü Bu" to their godfather. 6. The original laissez-faire, neutral model of public chain development has essentially ended. Valuation models based on MEV revenue need revision (shoutout to @LeePima). Today's public chains embody more controllability than possibility, engaging in fintech under the premise of a controllable economic system. 7. Future public chains will feature a centralized power structure, with top-down dev shops and CVCs. The main role of the treasury will be M&A—frantically pursuing vertical consolidation rather than nurturing an ecosystem. In other words, there won't be another kingmaker like Solana (cc. @mablejiang). 8. In this sense, BNB Chain, Tempo, and Monad are moving in the same direction; it's just a matter of "southern oranges vs. northern tangerines" and resource allocation. 9. The final question then becomes: what model should we use to estimate FDV and follow the hype at this point? And for roles like Growth Leads and Operations Leads, whose skill sets are entirely geared toward the token sale, fundraising, and fee-extraction economic model, the tickets from the old era may no longer board the ship of the new one.