Risk Perception Mismatch: The Traps of the Three Major Crypto Routes【Surrenderers】【Resisters】【Integrators】

Before discussing these three major routes, let's revisit a classic disaster in traditional finance—the 2020 China Bank’s massive loss in the crude oil futures product, the “Oil Treasure,” which resulted in a margin call event.
What is the most deadly problem in investing? It’s the misalignment of risk perception.
Simply put, the Oil Treasure is an extremely high-risk futures derivative, but the Bank of China packaged it as a financial product with a risk level only rated R3 (expected extreme loss around 20%), and sold it to ordinary retail investors with no risk control awareness.
As a result, not only was the principal wiped out, but there was also an unprecedented margin call leading to huge debts.
The institution’s deliberate glossing over of risk led investors, unprepared, to suffer devastating blows.
With this dimension of risk perception in mind, re-examining the current crypto market reveals that only two extreme routes might truly survive in the future:
The grassroots extreme grassroots, and compliant absolute compliance.
First camp, the literal【Surrenderers】(Centralized FinTech)
These people have realized it and simply shed the Crypto disguise, fully aligning with traditional regulatory frameworks.
- They may embrace CRS in the future, or even connect with fiat brokerages; essentially, these are FinTech companies using blockchain technology, earning transparent fees.
- Risk perception: Low. For example, 1:1 redeemable stablecoin structures (like CRCL or WLFI’s USD1), and on-chain financial products backed by U.S. Treasuries.
Risk is visible and tangible—low risk corresponds to low returns, matching perception with reality.
Second camp, the extreme【Resisters】(Dark Forest)
Purely decentralized, or no KYC, with extreme gambling and manipulation. Though savage, the logic is consistent—playing a game of “bet and accept the outcome.”
- Risk perception: Extremely high. For example, cases like Humanity—where “hackers” directly rug pull the on-chain spot pool, then manipulate contract prices on exchanges, with no pretense.
Normal people’s risk perception of such projects is maxed out—they wouldn’t hold large positions.
Investing small amounts is for gambling—day losses of -90%, or a few days +500%.
This is classic casino logic: high risk, high reward with full transparency.
Currently, the most dangerous and most caution-worthy are the third camp: the【Fusion】trap wrapped in compliance or appearing low-risk.
Schrödinger’s compliance, with a flexible bottom line. When avoiding responsibility, they talk about decentralization and community governance; when touching user pain points (like withdrawals or rule enforcement), they pull out a bunch of unknown rules and regulations.
- The Fusion camp lacks the rigidity of traditional finance, and neither offers freedom nor transparency. They privatize profits, shift systemic risks onto users, and even law can’t regulate them—costs of rights protection are extremely high.
- There are countless examples... You can identify them yourself, such as recent prediction markets, past scams, or projects listed as “soft rug,” or those claiming “we got an IPO insurance amount from underwriters,” only to end up in chaos.
This is also why asset allocation in crypto increasingly leans toward a barbell strategy—mainly holding unleveraged spot BTC and stablecoin yield farming, with a small portion playing wild with altcoins.
Most of the current crypto space is dominated by the Fusion camp. The biggest problem is that they use false packaging to mask risk perception, causing people to overlook the actual dangers.
If something is obviously a scam—no pretense, just bait set by the market maker—most will just gamble a little, not go all-in. They might try to win the bait back with small bets, aiming for small wins.
But with the Fusion camp, it looks safe most of the time, yet at critical moments, they might drop the ball or even stab you in the back—cut the internet line and rug pull, leaving you defenseless.
So, although crypto still has things to play with, the current situation is full of asymmetric traps.
No matter the size of the funds, everyone must sound the alarm and do their best to manage risks.
Even the most optimistic should remain cautious and prudent—review every “opportunity” carefully in the future.