吴说专访 Murad：如何判断一个 memecoin 的好坏（英语）
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Hi Murat, people know you are, someone called you the new generation of the "me calling king", right? And actually you are very famous after the Singapore 2049. And so actually I have to say my English is not good and so I've tried to express my question.

So at first I want to ask, can you introduce your background or the experience? Yeah, for sure. So my name is Murad. I'm originally from Azerbaijan. I went to university in the United States of America. While I was there, I spent a year in China, actually in Beijing.

That was very lucky because that was late 2013 during a Bitcoin bubble when Bitcoin first hit $1,000. And I was lucky to have both Chinese and Western friends in Beijing who were early, early BTC community. And so that's how I got my first sort of exposure.

took a break but 2016 2017 onward uh got more and more involved with crypto uh worked in hong kong uh in chatfi worked in singapore as a commodities trader but 2017 onwards kind of been doing crypto full-time uh writing reading obviously investing trading and obviously analyzing the different sort of patterns trends that have been happening in the industry uh this time around uh

I'm building a DeFi protocol, but also on the personal side, I'm investing in meme coins, trading meme coins, analyzing meme coins. And so I think meme coins are my focus for this cycle. Cool. So I read your interview and some people will talk to you about your graduate from Princeton, one of the best universities in the US.

One of your character by the community, people think you analyze the Mimicoin about data, about maths, not just about the pump. So can you introduce to the community, how can you get into Princeton and what are you studying there? Yeah, for sure. So I was applying originally as an international student.

I think I was a little bit lucky because applying from Azerbaijan, I had a little bit less competition compared to some of my Chinese international student friends. Obviously, a lot more competition coming from that part of the world. But when I studied in Princeton,

I actually studied East Asian studies and finance. And that was sort of my focus there. I really enjoyed my time. I met a lot of great students, a lot of great professors, and really happy that I had that experience.

So what are you doing after the graduation and when did you join the crypto industry? I read your interview and you said you met some OKEx employees in Beijing. Is it related? Also, you said your previous fund had such like a failure in 2020. Can you also talk about it?

Yeah, so in 2013, OKEx was still called OKCoin. And back then, it was only four people on the team, three Chinese people and one foreigner person. And that foreigner person was my friend in Beijing. And so he kind of told me, you need to get into BTC, you need to study BTC. And that sort of was my first introduction.

And yeah, but in the next two, three years, I didn't do much crypto. I think 2016, 2017, I came back to crypto and I started doing crypto full time. Cool. Also, can you introduce at first when you joined the crypto industry, you don't get into any Mimicoin, you're doing some traditional trading, right?

Yeah. So actually, in 2017, I did have a little bit of Dogecoin, but I wasn't like a believer. I was more like a trader trading a little bit here, a little bit there. ICOs, altcoins. I was doing all of that in 2016, 2017. Actually, in 2018, I became a BTC Maxi.

So I was like a hardcore Bitcoiner. But a lot of people don't understand. But actually, a lot of Bitcoin reading and Bitcoin literature, it actually is a very good preparation for the current meme coin stuff. Why? Because the current meme coin...

sort of trend, the current meme coin market, it's actually all about building a community and it's all about building what we call a cult, almost like a building a new technological religion, right? And in that sense, BTC is the biggest cult

cult, biggest community and most successful one. And so in that sense, in the spiritual sense, my whole thesis is that the meme coins that succeed are going to be those that are similar to BTC and actually similar to Doge because they were like the early ones, the biggest ones, the most successful ones.

So my whole strategy is to try to find meme coins right now that are similar to BTC, similar to Doge. Right. So I did have to answer your question. I did have some Doge in 2017, but I sold it in 2018. Like it was just kind of here and there. But as of 2023, 2024 is when I became a more proper meme coin believer. Right. So you think Bitcoin is also a meme coin, right? And are you still a Bitcoin maxim?

So when it comes to money, right, when it comes to money, I'm still a Bitcoin maxi. I do think meme coins are not really money. I think there's something different. They're a different thing, a different asset class. Do I think BTC is a meme coin? The answer is, you know, BTC, it has certain like aspects to it, right? I think it is 80% store of value.

maybe 10% medium of exchange and 10% meme coin, right? You have different parts. With meme coins, it's the other way around. Meme coins is 90% meme and then maybe 10% currency, store value, something else, right? And so different asset class in crypto, they have different sort of components, different percentages.

Okay, looking back the past year, what do you think the reason for the popularity or the success of the MECOIN? Also, does it also represent the failure of the VC coins? Yep. So there's many reasons. I'm going to discuss some of them. So first of all,

You know, in 2017, when altcoins first became popular, the thing is, is that a lot of the early valuations, they were reasonable. If you remember, we could even buy BNB for, I think, 30 million. It's when it started, the ICO, right? LINK.

you could buy for, I think, 25 million in the ICO. Even Ethereum in 2015, you could buy, I think, for 35 million in the ICO. So the starting valuations were reasonable. And these were, this is very important. I'll explain why. Right now,

what a lot of VC coins are doing is all of these rounds, they're happening in private. So by the time the token launches liquid for the whole world to trade on Binance or wherever, they launch it like 10 billion, 15 billion. And when something launches a 10, 15 billion with no users, no revenue, incomplete software, that price is just going to keep going down, down, down. So really what VCs have been doing for the past five, six years

I call it global IQ arbitrage. They're essentially taking advantage. They're taking advantage of dumb people around the world. And I think the problem is that a lot of retail investors, they think of tokens as equity. They think of tokens as stocks, but that's obviously wrong because really there is the software and then there's some loosely attached token. And a lot of the times there's not even a good connection, right? So,

That's the problem. There's too many tokens. The valuations are too high. And all the new stuff that's launching a tier one centralized exchanges, it's been going down only. And altcoins are doing bad. There's too many unlocks. And there's actually in the next four years, there's going to be $160 billion of unlocks coming, right? So this is not a good investment for an average person.

And I think this cycle, a lot of people, a lot of young people especially, they're realizing that all of the tech altcoins

there have actually been meme coins all along. All these tokens, there have been meme coins. They're just meme coins with a technology flavor. You understand? And so people are realizing that if it's all just meme coins, why should we be buying tech VC meme coins for $20 billion when we can, similar to the ICO, similar to Link, ETH, BNB early on, when we can launch something early, have the community build up slowly, organically, bottom up,

honest, fair, and the whole adventure, the whole journey we can run in a proper way, right? Why? Because this situation, it allows poor people to get rich or middle class people to get rich. And that's how you get this large community that is very passionate, that's like a cult. And these people that have successfully became wealthy from a meme coin, they are going to quit their jobs. They're

They're going to quit everything they're going to be doing, contributing to the meme coin full time marketing, growth, everything. Right. And so this is how you this is how you become successful when you start early and it's all fair and people like poor people can become rich when poor people can become rich. That's how you have a strong community. And that's why altcoins are losing. And that's why meme coins are winning.

Yeah, but on the other side, you seem to be talking a lot about holding Mimicoin. Actually, some people feel confused about it because they seem just to do the short-term transaction about Mimicoin. Why do you think the Mimicoin can be hold and when do you think the time to sell?

Yeah. So my whole philosophy is stop trading and believe in something, which is essentially stop trading and huddle, right? Stop trading and hold. Why? Because I agree 99.999% of meme coins is just pump and dump. It's just up and down. It's just every day. It's nonsense, right? But my whole thesis is there's going to be 10 to 20 meme coins this cycle.

This is what we call cults, right? These communities, they're going to be like Doge, which was successful for multiple cycles. Doge was successful for three cycles. And we believe that this cycle, you're going to have three or five points that are also going to be multi-cycle. So they're going to make a high, then they're going to make a higher low next to 2027, whatever. And then they're going to make a new high in 2028, 2029. That's what we believe in. So dogecoin,

I'm not focused on trading. I'm not focused on gambling. I'm trying to find things that I can hold for a year or more, right? Now, when to sell? I think you have to, you can take some profit in Q4 2025 or Q1 2026, like one year from now. So that's why I'm encouraging everybody to find the best coins, the strongest coins and hold for one year.

Got it. I know you already chose some coins you think is the best, but for the community or for the people, what strategy do you suggest for them to choose the coin, to choose the meme coin?

Yeah. So the most important part is to understand this. When you're investing in a meme coin, you're actually not investing in the meme. You're actually investing in the people. So it's very important for you to study the community, to analyze the community, both the average size investor, but also the biggest investor in the community, who the leadership is, how active they are on social media, what kind of concept do they have. And my whole thesis is,

Like I said, there's going to be some which have a culture of holding. Right. Right. You want to and you can see this on chain, like you said, through data, through math. You can see it's not just about subjective, but you can objectively see which communities they have diamond hands. They have hodlers and they have that kind of culture. So that's the things that you want to invest in. Right.

In general, you want to find out meme coin concepts that can go to 10 billion, 20 billion, 50 billion realistically. And that's the ones you want to invest in. Because if the community believes they can go to 50 billion, a lot of them can hold. And instead of being a trader, you can now become an investor. Do you think the result of the US election will have some impact on Memecoin?

I don't think so. I do think Trump is a little bit better for crypto. But in general, I think the reason why crypto is popular and it's going to win, in my opinion, and the reason why meme coins are popular, it is not to do with the four-year cycle. It's not to do with the election. There's more long-term inflation and global money supply issues, which is pushing people into crypto and meme coins. Cool.

Also, does the disclosure of your wallet address affect you? But also some people said that your address is already open, right? Yeah. So a lot of people already knew my address, so a lot of them was open already.

I don't really have any problem because anybody can go check my wallet and see that I only ever buy, I never sell. And I said on many podcasts, many spaces that I'm going to take some profit in Q4 of 2025. And so people can see that I'm going to do exactly what I said. Yeah.

Also, what do you think about the role of the market maker about the Mimicoin? What do you think such like the Wintermute or DWF? But we have to say that the goblin just arrested by the US government is still also the market maker of the many Mimicoins, right? Yeah, so let's put it this way. Some market makers, I think they are clean.

And I think some market makers are not clean. So I'm not going to name names, but if you are a part of a Memecoin project, inevitably for T1 listing, etc., you will need a market maker. So I would suggest that to go with the clean one. Got it. Also, what do you think about the importance of the centralized exchanges to Memecoin, such like Binance, Bybin listing?

I think it's still important because there's a lot of people at centralized exchanges that don't use on-chain, that are just trading on centralized exchanges. And there's still hundreds of millions of people using those. So I think with each cycle, they're going to be a bit less important. But this cycle, they're still important. Yeah. Also,

Actually, in the Asia community, there are some discussions about Solana and Ethereum, which is better. But we have to say in this cycle, the price of Solana is somehow better than Ethereum, right? What do you think about why most of the Mimicoins are issued in Solana now? And does Ethereum still have a chance?

Yeah. So the reason meme coins are issued on Solana is because it's cheaper and faster. And, you know, young people like they're on TikTok all day, they're on Twitter all day. They want fast, fast, fast, fast, you know. And so that's why young people prefer Solana.

The majority of meme coins overall are going to be on Solana. 99% are going to be on Solana. But I actually think the best meme coins, they're going to be on both Solana and Ethereum and even others as well with bridges and with wormhole and with other pools. So I think in the future, the best meme coins, like the strongest meme coins,

They're going to be multi chain. So personally, I don't care about the exact chain. I care about that. We're actually on as many chains as possible because you can think of chains as like centralized exchanges almost and you get different distribution. So the more the better.

So will you also pay attention to some Bitcoin, Ordinance or Tom games? Do you think the Mimicoin will also appear in these like Bitcoin, L1 or Tom?

Yeah. So, TON, I don't really pay that much attention to. Bitcoin ecosystem, a little bit. I like Bitcoin puppets and I like pups. But most of my focus is actually on Ethereum and Solana just because those historically have a bigger meme coin culture. And for a retail investor, they're more retail friendly.

for new applications, infrastructure, onboarding, much more Ethereum and Solana friendly. So I think that's where most of the money will come this cycle. Also there is a point, the coin, also the famous coin now is still limited in the Western world, right? Does it have some coin in Asia or in the Eastern world?

Yeah, so we are starting to see this a little bit. I know obviously Pepe community is quite big in China. Some of the smaller cats, slightly smaller coins like PopCat are popular in Asia as well. So

I think that in the coming months and especially in like Q1 2025 onwards, I think you will see from what I'm seeing behind the scenes, I think you will see more Chinese, Korean, Japanese participants in the meme coin ecosystem as well. There is more Western participation right now, but I think this is going to become a global thing next year.

Cool. Also, you know, the AI coin supported by the A16D is very popular these days, but there seems no AI Meme coin supported by you, right? What do you consider about this AI Meme coin? Will you put some AI coin in your holding?

So I'm still researching the AI coins. My issue is that, so I do think AI themed meme coins are going to be a category just like dogs, cats and other things. I do think it's going to be a category. At the end of the day,

Meme coins, they are not a technological innovation. They are a social innovation, right? And so my thesis is that meme coins, they're actually about people and about community.

And in the because the coins are new, you you need a bit more time for the community to develop. You need more like price action. You need more sideways. You need more time for the community to develop. So I need one or two more months to see which coins have priced down, but community up. And that's what I usually look for.

I understand. Yeah, okay. I think that's the question I have. Actually, I have many friends around me, they are trading me coins because the most important reason is just as you said, the VC coin's valuation is very high. There is no opportunity for ordinary people, for poor people.

to get some profit, right? If they trade, if they buy the VZ coin, they just get lost, right? Such as like, you know, the Skrull or some other coin just listed by Binance, their price is down, down, down, down, down. Yeah. Yep. Yep, exactly. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Thank you for your time. Appreciate it. Appreciate it. Thank you, man. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Bye-bye. Thank you. Thank you. See you. Bye.