I recently look at whether the project team is actually doing serious work. Anyway, I won’t look at the PPT first—I’ll see how the treasury is spending the money. When the money is used on “slow” but solid work like audits, infrastructure, and developer support, and milestones are delivered little by little on a monthly or quarterly basis, even if it’s not explosive, I feel more at ease. In contrast, when a large portion of the spending goes to marketing, sponsorships, and everywhere co-branding, and the milestones are always “going live next week,” I’ll push my position lower.

On-chain, it’s actually pretty similar to a weather map: a rapid drop in the treasury balance isn’t necessarily a bad thing—the key is what it exchanges for, namely sustainable cash flow and user retention. Recently, everyone has been complaining about validator revenue, MEV, and ordering fairness. In plain terms, these issues really test whether the project team is willing to spend money to tackle hard problems—rather than just issuing announcements to placate people.

I’ve now lowered my expectations: I don’t count on every release to change the world. As long as the spending is transparent and the milestones match the ledger, I can hold my position a bit more confidently, and my mindset is also lighter.