Lately, looking at the on-chain data has been a bit frustrating: you think you're "arbitrage hunting," but you might actually be just paying transaction fees for someone else's sandwich trade. To put it simply, that small spread you see is often others calculating that you'll chase the order, slip, or rush to execute, then passing the cost onto you.

Some people also interpret ETF capital flows and risk appetite in the US stock market as directly tied to the daily ups and downs of crypto... I'm not saying there's no connection, but when this narrative heats up, it’s easiest to ignite people's emotions, and a slight tremor can cause them to chase, which just feeds MEV.

My current "backup" strategy is: don’t go all-in with a single order, split your trades, set limit prices, tolerate missing out, and be willing to go slower; also keep some redundancy in your position so that during volatile market swings, you don’t get caught off guard. Running gamma too fast can cause a fall; once you've fallen, you understand why.