Recently, when analyzing data on Dune, I suddenly realized: you think you're "watching real-time on the chain," but in reality, you're often looking at a "delayed version of reality" pieced together from a bunch of nodes/RPCs/indexers. When an RPC stalls, a node falls behind by a few blocks, or an indexer hasn't finished syncing, the transaction data, positions, and liquidation lines you see might be a half-step behind, and then you start doubting everything... To put it simply, it's not that the chain isn't functioning; it's that you don't have just one entry point.

By the way, this also helps explain why these days everyone is talking about rate cut expectations, the US dollar index, and risk assets acting up together: when emotions run high, on-chain data acts more like a magnifying glass, but since the magnifying glass also has some delay, it's easier to scare yourself.

What I fear most isn't losing money, but losing control — doing everything by the rules, yet due to unsynchronized or erroneous data sources, not knowing exactly what is happening in your hands, that’s the most annoying. Anyway, when I encounter anomalies now, I first switch RPCs, check the raw transactions in the browser, then trust the dashboard... for now, that's how I do it.