How I am setting up for 10–20X returns on my portfolio this cycle
In the 2020/2021 cycle I invested heavily in BTC and ETH options on the Canadian ETF’s back when BTC was just coming out of its bear market blues, and BTC was roughly $29,000. Those options paid off over 10X returns, even while having been bought 2X off the bottom. As importantly, they involved zero altcoin specific risk, minimum counterparty risk (regulated ETF’s) and no trading and constant position management .. AND could be bought in my retirement account or tax free savings account.
I bought, I held about 2 years, and I sold at 10–12X the price. Original article written in July 2023 below:
Best Bear Market Opportunity Yet
I managed those returns despite buying the BTC and ETH options after Bitcoin had doubled from its bear market Bottom in Oct of 2022. Now, we are roughly 35% off the bottom (which I think is very likely THE bottom), and the opportunity is on par with the previous cycle.
I am not ready to divulge all the specifics just yet, as my strategy is likely to evolve as we near the end of the bear market. That said, here is the gist of it:
I do believe Bitcoin will have a solid bull run, but also concede that dimishing returns are a mathematical reality.
BTC Targets:
ETH and SOL are more difficult to predict, particularly given the capital drain from AI stonks and Meme coins.
That said, I believe ETH has a shot at some redemption here as corporations and large entities gravitate towards L2 chain they can customize and control. I will refine these targets in the coming months as Robinhood chain and Solana play out their game of meme coin capture, and provide them by year-end in an update article.
To be frank, the real talent at this point is to ignore all the noise on crypto X, and make a plan and stick to it. If you are like me, this big move up caught you somewhat off guard, and perhaps more sidelined that you would like. I have had a battle with the FOMO demons for weeks now, and winning that battle is what will set the stage for huge gains.
The timeline is far too bullish, and my expectation at this point is that we take a bit of a breather and pull back into the low 70K, or high 60K range BTC, at which point I will not try to time my entries but will buy hard in expectation of a big 2027 and 2028. Then sit back, stomach the volatilty, and cash in in a couple years while 90% of crypto X is trying to predict the hourly charts and missing the 300–400% gains on spot BTC (and 1000%–1500% on call options)
Good luck out there, and see you on the next one!
Sovereign Crypto (aka RickyBobby)
I release regular altcoin and crypto updates, subscribe for more info and to keep up to date!
400% return on most recent trade 🔥…
Disclosures:
The Bull Run is Quietly Loading was originally published in Coinmonks on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
On August 23, 2026, an attacker used roughly half an ETH to acquire majority governance control over Term Labs Meta Vaults, then passed a routine-looking proposal that disabled the vault’s transaction delay and drained six vaults. No key was stolen and no core vault code was broken: with almost no one else voting, the attacker simply became the governance, extracting 2,841.74 WETH and 1,679,639 USDC, about $8.5 million, later swapped to DAI.
Term’s Strategy Vaults are ERC-4626 vaults built on Yearn V3 infrastructure, governed through Aragon TokenVoting. Voting power isn’t tied to vault deposits directly: to get it, a depositor has to wrap their vault shares into a separate governance token, an extra opt-in step almost nobody took. A Zodiac Delay module was meant to sit between an approved governance proposal and its execution, giving roughly a week’s cooldown before anything it authorized could actually run.
Term’s voting power came from wrapping vault shares into a separate governance token, and almost no one bothered. On the ETH Meta Vault the total wrapped supply was just 0.5352 tokens, across the USDC vaults it was similarly thin. A depositor putting in about 0.5 ETH and wrapping the resulting shares ended up holding 0.4852 of that ETH Meta Vault supply, about 90.7%, while a separate wallet held all of the active voting power across all seven USDC vault proposals it opened.
Because the minimum proposer voting power was set to zero, opening a proposal cost nothing beyond gas. The attacker filed a proposal titled Veto strategy vault parameter change, using the exact wording the curator used for routine parameter updates, so it read on the surface like an ordinary item up for a veto vote rather than an attack.
Underneath that title sat 17 actions. The first three reset the Zodiac Delay module’s roughly seven-day cooldown and expiration to zero and handed control of it to an attacker-controlled executor. The rest recalled capital from all four of the ETH Meta Vault’s real strategies, deployed a new strategy called Fixed Recipient WETH Exit Strategy, gave it a debt ceiling of uint256 max, and routed the vault's balance into it.
Six days later, with the voting window closed and almost nobody having voted against a majority the attacker already held, the proposal became executable. At about 06:25 UTC on August 23, the attacker called executeProposal(), recalling WETH from four strategies and pulling roughly 2,841.74 WETH out through the planted strategy contract.
Twenty-two minutes later, a second attacker wallet ran the identical playbook against five USDC vaults in a single transaction, where it held all of the voting power across every proposal it had opened on those vaults. That transaction drained approximately 1,679,639 USDC, which was later swapped into DAI.
This wasn’t a bug in Term’s core vault code. The root failure is that voting power depended on an opt-in wrapping step almost nobody took, so a deposit worth a few hundred dollars was enough to become the effective government of vaults holding millions, and that governance had the authority to disable its own safety delay.
The formal governance settings, a 50% support threshold, 5% minimum participation, and a roughly six-day voting window, weren’t reckless on their own, but they meant nothing once one wallet held almost all the active voting power. A zero minimum proposer-power requirement meant opening the proposal cost nothing, and the proposal’s own opening actions could reset the Zodiac Delay module’s cooldown and expiration to zero, removing the one control meant to slow exactly this kind of action before it executed.
Whether the delay module’s exposure to governance was an intentional design choice or a distinct authorization failure hasn’t been publicly explained.
Governance participation and concentration monitoring. A review should flag when a governance token’s actively-wrapped supply is thin enough that a small deposit can cross a majority threshold, and require a minimum active-participation floor before proposals gain force, not just a percentage-of-supply threshold.
Scope-limit what governance can touch. The Zodiac Delay module existed specifically to slow dangerous actions, but the same governance process could reset its own cooldown and expiration. A review would flag any proposal-executable action that can modify the safeguard meant to gate proposal-executable actions, and wall that off behind a separate, higher-friction control.
Title and content review for proposals, not just code review. A malicious proposal disguised as a routine curator veto item passed unnoticed for six days. Requiring a structured, machine-checkable diff of what a proposal actually changes, surfaced independently of its title, would have caught the delay-module reset regardless of what the proposal was called.
2,841.74 WETH and 1,679,639 USDC(swapped to DAI) drained from the vaults converged at a single address, 0xD5183d8BfC65a50863C62aF2538198A8288FFc13.
Stolen USDC was swapped into DAI and then transfer to another address 0x9210130f81c84d028DB83701fF379A79c9365135, and then swapped to ETH and deposited into tornado cash.
Since then, major ETH didn’t moved from attacher wallet, 300 of it moved out of the consolidation address to 0xC14007663A5bb9F13d4d2AEE8c6FE9075eF1d83e, and deposited to tornado cash.
Term Labs posts its first public acknowledgment, confirming a governance exploit hit its vaults, without giving a loss figure or technical explanation.
Term Labs follows up, confirming all Term Meta Vaults have been shut down and their DAO governance roles revoked, an irreversible step that blocks new deposits while leaving withdrawals open.
Attacker Wallets / EOAs
Key Transactions
No key was stolen and no line of core vault code was broken. Almost nobody wrapped their shares into Term’s governance token, so a deposit worth a few hundred dollars was enough to become the majority, and that majority had the authority to disable the one mechanism built to slow it down. The vault executed exactly what its governance authorized, the governance itself was the vulnerability. A safeguard that governance can switch off isn’t a safeguard, it’s a formality waiting for someone to notice nobody’s watching.
Originally Posted at Quillaudits
Term Labs $8.5M Governance Takeover Exploit (Explained) was originally published in Coinmonks on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
EigenLayer has crossed 5 million ETH in restaking deposits across operators, marking another major scale milestone for one of Ethereum’s most closely watched DeFi infrastructure protocols.
The figure includes native ETH and liquid staking token deposits, so it needs to be read carefully. Still, 5 million ETH is a huge number, and it shows how large the restaking market has become.
EigenLayer’s pitch has always been simple but ambitious: let staked ETH secure more than Ethereum alone.
That idea has pulled in capital quickly, but it also created a new set of risks that the market is still learning how to price.
For more details, visit the official Defillama platform.
Ethereum staking created a large pool of capital earning yield.
EigenLayer asks a natural next question: can that same economic security be reused to support other services? Those services, often called AVSs, can include data availability layers, oracle systems, middleware, rollup infrastructure, and other networks that need security.
For depositors, the attraction is extra yield.
For builders, the attraction is access to Ethereum-linked security without bootstrapping everything from zero.
That combination explains why restaking has grown so quickly.
Crossing 5 million ETH puts EigenLayer into a different scale category.
This is no longer a small experiment. It is a major concentration of staked assets being routed through a restaking system. That can strengthen Ethereum’s wider infrastructure economy, but it also means failures would matter.
The larger restaking gets, the more important risk controls become.
Slashing conditions, operator performance, AVS security, smart contract risk, and liquidity assumptions all need to be understood properly.
The deposit figure combines different kinds of exposure.
Native ETH restaking is not identical to restaking liquid staking tokens. LSTs already carry their own smart contract, liquidity, and staking-provider risks. Adding restaking on top can create a more layered risk profile.
That does not make the model bad.
It means users need to understand what they are depositing and what risks they are accepting.
A headline number is useful, but the composition behind it matters.
Deposits alone do not complete the story.
EigenLayer also needs Actively Validated Services that create real demand for restaked security. If AVSs grow and generate sustainable fees, the model becomes more compelling. If deposits grow faster than useful services, the market may start asking whether the yield is durable.
Protocol metrics point to 18 active security networks, which gives the milestone more context.
Restaking is not only attracting deposits. It is also building out the services that are meant to use those deposits.
Restaking has supporters and critics for good reason.
Supporters see it as a way to make Ethereum’s security more productive. Critics worry about correlated risk, complex slashing, leverage-like behavior, and contagion if restaking systems fail.
Both sides have a point.
EigenLayer’s 5 million ETH milestone shows the market wants the product. Now the harder work is making sure the risk is understood as clearly as the opportunity.
This article draws on EigenLayer restaking data from DeFiLlama and related protocol metrics.
This article was written by the News Desk and edited by Samuel Rae.
This report is based on information released by Defillama. at Defillama
Uniswap’s v4 hook library has expanded with automated liquidity management tools, giving developers more ways to customize how pools behave.
Hooks are one of the big ideas behind Uniswap v4. They let developers add custom logic around pools, including fee behavior, orders, liquidity management, and other actions that can happen before or after swaps.
That is powerful. It is also risky if handled badly.
So the expansion matters not just because it adds features, but because it pushes Uniswap deeper into a more modular DeFi design where developers can build specialized trading logic on top of the protocol.
For more details, visit the official Blog platform.
Uniswap became dominant by making decentralized trading simple.
At first, that meant basic liquidity pools. Then came concentrated liquidity. Now v4 is trying to make pools more programmable. Hooks are the mechanism for that.
Instead of every pool behaving in a fixed way, developers can add custom features.
That could mean dynamic fees that respond to volatility, automated liquidity adjustments, on-chain limit order behavior, or integrations with external risk tools. The idea is to let builders create more specialized markets without rebuilding an entire DEX from scratch.
That is a big shift.
Providing liquidity is not passive in the way many users first assume.
Markets move. Ranges go out of balance. Fees may not compensate for impermanent loss. Liquidity providers need tools to adjust positions, manage risk, and improve capital efficiency.
Automated liquidity tools can help.
They may make it easier for strategies to rebalance or respond to changing market conditions. That could attract more sophisticated liquidity providers, especially if the tools are reliable and transparent.
But automation does not eliminate risk. It changes where the risk sits.
The v4 hook model invites experimentation.
That is exciting, but users should not assume every hook is safe just because it touches Uniswap. Third-party implementations can carry independent smart contract risk, design flaws, audit gaps, or economic vulnerabilities.
That distinction is essential.
Uniswap Labs can publish libraries, directories, and templates. Developers can build on them. But users still need to understand which code they are interacting with and whether that code has been reviewed.
In DeFi, composability cuts both ways.
Uniswap v4 could make decentralized exchanges more flexible.
If hooks work well, pools can become more than simple swap venues. They can become customizable financial environments with built-in logic for pricing, liquidity, fees, and execution.
That could help Uniswap compete with other DEX designs and app-specific liquidity systems.
It could also make the protocol more attractive to developers who want control without leaving the Uniswap ecosystem.
The hook library expansion is a meaningful builder-side update.
It does not guarantee UNI price upside. It does not remove smart contract risk. It does not mean every future pool will be safer or more efficient.
But it does show Uniswap continuing to evolve from a single DEX model into a broader liquidity platform.
That is the interesting part. v4 is not just about swaps. It is about letting developers decide what a pool can do.
This article draws on Uniswap materials relating to its v4 hook library expansion.
This article was written by the News Desk and edited by Samuel Rae.
This report is based on information released by Blog. at Blog
Optimism’s Superchain interoperability upgrade has gone live on the Sepolia testnet, giving developers a new environment to test native cross-L2 messaging across OP Stack chains.
This is not mainnet yet, and that distinction is important.
But it is still a meaningful step. The whole Superchain idea depends on many OP Stack networks being able to communicate more smoothly with each other. Without interoperability, the ecosystem risks becoming a collection of separate chains that happen to use similar technology. With it, the Superchain can start behaving more like a connected network.
That is the real promise here.
For more details, visit the official Blog platform.
Optimism is not just one chain anymore.
The OP Stack is used by multiple networks, and the Superchain vision is about connecting those networks into a broader Ethereum scaling system. That only works if users, assets, and messages can move between chains without creating a terrible experience.
Nobody wants to feel like they are hopping between isolated islands.
Developers want apps that can work across the ecosystem. Users want smoother movement. Liquidity providers want markets that are not unnecessarily fragmented.
Interoperability is what makes that possible.
Testnet launches are easy to underestimate.
They are not production events, but they are where developers find bugs, test assumptions, and prepare the system for real usage. A cross-L2 messaging system needs that kind of testing because mistakes can become expensive once assets are involved.
Sepolia gives OP Labs and developers a safer place to test the upgrade before mainnet.
That includes messaging behavior, contract interactions, latency, edge cases, and how different OP Stack chains handle cross-chain actions.
The current story is the testnet deployment.
That matters because mainnet requires more confidence. The code needs testing, audits, documentation, developer feedback, and operational readiness. Cross-chain infrastructure is not the place to rush.
Optimism’s testnet milestone is encouraging, but it is not the finish line.
The bigger question is whether the system can move from controlled testing into reliable production use.
Most users do not care about infrastructure details until something breaks.
But interoperability affects the experience directly. It can reduce friction between apps, simplify movement across chains, and make the broader ecosystem feel less fragmented.
That matters if Ethereum scaling is going to reach normal users.
The more chains Ethereum has, the more important user experience becomes. If moving between them feels confusing or risky, adoption suffers. If it becomes seamless, the ecosystem gets stronger.
Optimism is betting that many connected chains can be more powerful than one isolated network.
The Sepolia deployment is a step toward proving that. It gives developers a live place to test how OP Stack chains can communicate and coordinate.
There is still work to do before mainnet.
But this is the kind of infrastructure update that can make the Superchain feel less like a slogan and more like a real technical roadmap.
This article draws on Optimism materials relating to the Superchain interoperability Sepolia deployment.
This article was written by the News Desk and edited by Samuel Rae.
This report is based on information released by Blog. at Blog
U.S. spot Ethereum ETFs recorded net positive inflows as September trading opened, giving ETH markets an early signal that institutional demand has not faded after a volatile end to August.
The inflows matter because Ethereum ETF products are still newer and more closely watched than their Bitcoin counterparts. Bitcoin ETFs have already become a major part of the market structure, while Ethereum funds are still building their identity with traditional investors.
A positive September opener does not settle that debate. But it does show that regulated ETH products remain active as the market enters a new trading month.
For more details, visit the official Farside platform.
ETF flows have become one of the clearest ways to track regulated crypto demand.
When spot funds attract money, traders often see that as a sign that institutional or advisory-channel investors are adding exposure. When funds lose assets, the market may read it as risk reduction or profit-taking.
Ethereum flows are especially important because the ETH investment case is less straightforward than Bitcoin’s.
Bitcoin is usually presented as a monetary asset. Ethereum is a network asset tied to smart contracts, decentralized finance, Layer 2 activity, stablecoins, and tokenization. That means traditional investors may need more time to understand what they are buying.
Positive inflows suggest that process is continuing.
Month openings can be useful sentiment markers.
Portfolio managers rebalance. Traders reset positioning. New macro data approaches. Fund flows can shift as investors decide whether to add risk, reduce exposure, or wait.
For Ethereum ETFs, a positive start to September helps offset concerns that late-August volatility would cool demand too sharply.
It does not guarantee a strong month ahead. But it means the first signal was not a retreat.
That matters for ETH sentiment.
Ethereum has several narratives competing for investor attention.
Some investors see ETH as exposure to DeFi. Others see it as tokenization infrastructure. Some view it as a settlement layer for stablecoins. Others look at staking economics, network fees, or Layer 2 growth.
The ETF wrapper makes access easier, but it does not automatically simplify the story.
That is why flows are so closely watched. They show whether investors are actually moving capital into ETH products rather than simply talking about Ethereum’s long-term role.
Ethereum ETF inflows should not be blended with Bitcoin ETF data.
The two markets are related, but they are not identical. Bitcoin and Ethereum attract different investor profiles, different narratives, and different risk assumptions. A positive ETH flow day does not automatically mean Bitcoin funds behaved the same way, and vice versa.
The cleaner view is to track each category separately.
Ethereum’s September opener gives ETH its own regulated-demand signal.
Ethereum ETFs began the month with a constructive flow print.
That is useful for traders watching whether ETH can maintain institutional attention. The next question is whether inflows continue across multiple sessions or whether this becomes a one-day rebound.
Daily ETF flows can turn quickly.
But after a choppy August, a positive September start gives Ethereum bulls something tangible to point to: regulated products are still drawing money.
This article draws on U.S. spot Ethereum ETF flow data from Farside Investors.
This article was written by the News Desk and edited by Samuel Rae.
This report is based on information released by Farside. at Farside
BitMine has added 53,501 ETH to its corporate treasury in a $131 million acquisition, giving the market another example of public-company balance sheets moving beyond Bitcoin-only treasury strategies.
The purchase was disclosed through a company filing, putting Ethereum back into the corporate treasury conversation at a time when investors are watching how listed firms use digital assets as reserve holdings. Bitcoin still dominates that category, but Ethereum has been gaining a clearer role as companies explore assets linked to staking, settlement, tokenization, and smart contract infrastructure.
For BitMine, the latest allocation is not just a headline number. It is a statement about how the company wants its balance sheet to be read.
For more details, visit the official Sec platform.
Corporate crypto treasuries were once almost entirely a Bitcoin story.
That made sense. Bitcoin had the clearest monetary narrative, the deepest institutional liquidity, and the simplest balance-sheet pitch: scarce digital reserve asset, fixed supply, global settlement, and no operating company behind it.
Ethereum is different.
ETH is not usually framed as digital gold. It is tied to a network that powers stablecoins, DeFi, tokenized assets, NFTs, Layer 2s, and smart contract activity. That gives it a broader technology and infrastructure narrative, but also a more complex investment case.
BitMine’s acquisition shows that some companies are now comfortable making that distinction.
They are not simply copying Bitcoin treasury playbooks. They are treating Ethereum as a separate kind of strategic digital asset.
The reported $131 million allocation is large enough to be material.
Smaller crypto purchases can be treated as experimentation. A nine-figure acquisition signals a much more deliberate treasury decision. It also places BitMine in a more visible group of public companies using digital assets as part of their corporate positioning.
That visibility can cut both ways.
If ETH performs well, the balance sheet can attract investor attention. If ETH weakens, treasury volatility can become a major part of the company’s equity story.
That is why these moves are not risk-free.
A corporate treasury allocation can strengthen a digital asset narrative, but it also exposes shareholders to market swings that may sit outside the company’s core operations.
The market should not read this as Ethereum replacing Bitcoin in corporate treasuries.
Bitcoin still has the strongest reserve-asset identity among digital assets. It remains the cleanest choice for companies that want crypto exposure without smart contract, staking, or protocol complexity.
Ethereum brings different trade-offs.
It may appeal to companies that want exposure to tokenization, network fees, stablecoin settlement, DeFi infrastructure, and programmable finance. But those advantages come with different risks, including protocol upgrades, regulatory interpretation, staking-market dynamics, and competition from other smart contract networks.
BitMine’s move is best understood as Ethereum entering more corporate treasury discussions, not as Bitcoin being pushed aside.
Investors will now want to see how BitMine manages the position.
The important questions are whether the company plans to hold ETH passively, whether it may stake any portion of the holdings, whether it will add more, and how it will communicate crypto-related balance-sheet risk to shareholders.
Treasury transparency matters.
Digital asset holdings can become a central part of how a listed company trades. That means investors need clear reporting around purchase size, custody, valuation, risk controls, and any future changes.
For now, the headline is straightforward: BitMine has added 53,501 ETH in a major corporate treasury acquisition.
The bigger story is that Ethereum is becoming harder for public-company treasury investors to ignore.
This article draws on BitMine’s SEC disclosure relating to the ETH acquisition.
This article was written by the News Desk and edited by Samuel Rae.
This report is based on information released by Sec. at Sec
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