Odaily Weekly Editor's Picks (0509–0515): NACHO, AI Investments, and DeFi Regulatory Shifts

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Odaily Weekly Editor’s Picks (0509–0515) covers DeFi exploit risks and AI + crypto news. The report highlights the NACHO trade, betting on a prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz. It also notes a shift in focus from political rhetoric to real data. Sun Yuchen shares long-term investment perspectives. Anthropic and OpenAI influence pre-market stock tokens. Capital flows into new public blockchains. The CLARITY Act impacts DeFi protocols. DeFi funds shift from LayerZero to Chainlink following the Kelp DAO attack.

The information flow moves too quickly, causing in-depth analytical articles to be drowned out by trending topics. The "Weekly Editor’s Picks" column rescues these valuable insights from the flood of news, helping you filter out the noise, retain meaningful perspectives, and gain inspiration.

Macro

"TACO" is outdated; Wall Street is embracing "NACHO" trading

NACHO, which stands for "Not A Chance Hormuz Opens," means the Strait of Hormuz has no chance of opening.

It is the opposite of TACO (Trump Always Chickens Out), which bets that people will back down—that Trump will retreat at a critical moment. NACHO bets that things will stall—that this time, Hormuz won’t be reopened with a single Truth Social post.

NACHO is not just talk—it’s the same real-money bet placed across three independent derivative markets: insurance, oil, and interest rate cuts.

The market is no longer trading Trump’s next Truth Social post and has shifted to trading the early June inventory data for the Strait of Hormuz.

Investment and Entrepreneurship

After 50x leverage, Sun Yuchen is always looking toward the next decade.

Short-term chip shortages, long-term energy shortages, never enough storage.

At the beginning of 2026, Sun Yuchen predicted: embodied intelligence, drones, spatial computing, and space exploration.

Anthropic and OpenAI have directly severed the logic behind pre-market crypto stocks.

Anthropic and OpenAI have both issued statements clearly stating that they do not recognize unauthorized stock transfers. The over-financialized "Russian doll" risks associated with SPVs are beginning to emerge. In the market, pre-market stock tokens have plunged sharply, while futures contracts have remained relatively stable.

The public disputes between Anthropic and OpenAI are, in a sense, redefining the boundaries of this rapidly growing new market. For speculators, this is a lesson in risk; but for the industry’s long-term development, the market may need such a moment of "de-bubbling."

Bitwise: Why Are Top Capital Firms Heavily Betting on New Blockchains?

The Arc, Canton, and Tempo blockchains are all specifically designed for stablecoin and asset tokenization use cases.

The key takeaway from this wave of concentrated fundraising is: capital always follows regulatory legislation; privacy protection may become a breakout core application.

Niche Perspective: Why HYPE Is Hard to Double Again

75% of the unvested token supply implies continued selling pressure in the future; the current FDV is already approaching or even exceeding the valuation range of some traditional exchanges; and at this price level, it remains unclear whether new marginal buyers will come from retail investors, traditional institutions, or crypto funds.

More importantly, HYPE faces not only valuation concerns but also risks such as regulatory scrutiny, cyberattacks, reliance on key individuals, and trader liquidity migration.

For an asset that has already garnered significant market attention and is heavily promoted by KOLs, the real question is no longer “Does it have a narrative?” but “Who will still buy at this price?” When a crypto asset transitions from alpha to consensus, investors must reassess not just how strong the project is, but whether the current price has already priced in future potential.

AI

The Semiconductor Century: Investment Roadmap Amid the 2026 AI Surge

High-value AI chips accounted for approximately half of the industry's revenue but made up less than 0.2% of total shipments. Semiconductors have evolved from consumer electronics components into strategic assets for giants with a combined market value exceeding $10 trillion.

The four key roles in the supply chain are: designer (architect), contract manufacturer, equipment supplier, and memory provider.

Key companies worth studying include: NVIDIA, TSMC, ASML, AMD, Broadcom (AVGO), and SK Hynix.

Semiconductor ETFs include: SMH — Invesco Semiconductor ETF, SOXX — iShares Semiconductor ETF, SOXQ — Invesco PHLX Semiconductor ETF.

Key catalysts to watch: the $1 trillion milestone, TSMC’s Arizona fab capacity ramp-up, NVIDIA’s Vera Rubin platform deployment, AMD’s market share progress, and memory pricing along with HBM4 supply.

Policies and Stablecoins

When Stablecoins No Longer Earn Interest: 7 DeFi Protocols That Benefit Under the CLARITY Act

Once the CLARITY Act is officially enacted, it will immediately trigger two major changes: institutional funds will remove barriers to entry.

BlackRock, Apollo, Deutsche Bank, pension funds, corporate treasury funds, and others had previously held back, as compliance teams were unable to determine whether these assets qualified as securities and thus dared not make large-scale allocations. Now, with the CFTC clearly asserting jurisdiction and DeFi establishing a safe harbor, institutions can finally enter the market with significant investments. Profit-seeking capital is withdrawing from idle stablecoin yield products. The previous model of earning approximately 5% annualized returns simply by holding USDC on exchanges will no longer exist. Hundreds of billions in capital seeking stable returns must now find new allocation outlets.

Therefore, two massive streams of capital—institutional investors finally entering the market and retail investors seeking yield—will converge on the same category of assets: compliant, real-world-use-case-driven, structured yield products.

Protocols tailored for this new regulatory landscape include: Pendle, the underlying yield infrastructure layer; Morpho, the on-chain prime broker; Sky (USDS/sUSDS); Maple Finance, the on-chain credit trading desk; Centrifuge, the RWA asset native issuance layer; and protocols tied to STRC assets (fixed income pathway).

Also recommended: “Financial Reports, Legislation, the Fed… Circle Faces Three Major Tests This Week” “The CLARITY Bill Is Out: Is Ethereum the Biggest Winner?” “A New Order for XRP and the Crypto Market Under the CLARITY Bill.”

CeFi & DeFi

Is Hook Summer really here? Sato, Lo0p, and FLOOD ignite the new narrative around Uniswap v4

Since ASTEROID, ecosystem tokens backed by the Uniswap v4 Hook protocol—such as sato, sat1, Lo0p, and FLOOD—have gradually become focal points of market attention, with market caps ranging from millions to tens of millions of dollars, bringing much-needed concentrated liquidity to a narrative-depleted crypto market.

The Hook mechanism token is driving the growth of the Uniswap ecosystem: UNI is bullish in the long term, but has limited short-term upside.

$3 billion DeFi funds shift: LayerZero stumbles, Chainlink thrives

Rescue efforts following the Kelp DAO attack have recently made substantial progress. However, compared to financial recovery, restoring market trust remains far more challenging.

At the center of this turmoil, the leading cross-chain protocol LayerZero is facing a wave of accelerated protocol departures and has been forced to drastically shift its stance within weeks—from initially deflecting blame to publicly apologizing and initiating reforms. Meanwhile, Chainlink has unexpectedly emerged as a beneficiary of this crisis, with its CCIP protocol absorbing significant liquidity migrations and showing clear growth in on-chain data.

Airdrop Opportunities and Interaction Guide

Popular Interaction Collection | The Beacon Season 1 Pre-Registration; GenLayer Latest Testnet Interaction (May 15)

Circle has released the Arc whitepaper—what early interaction opportunities are available?

Meme

From A9 Myth to Million-Dollar Debt: A 5-Year Journey of a Meme Trader

Ethereum and Scaling

Grayscale: Ethereum's staking model needs to change

Ethereum’s current staking reward model is facing two structural issues: L2 fragmentation has led to reduced token burns and increased net issuance; the staking threshold is approaching zero, potentially locking up nearly all ETH in staking.

The community is discussing implementing a staking reward cap curve, and Grayscale believes this would be beneficial for ETH’s long-term price. The Ethereum community is considering modifying the network’s staking reward model, with the core idea being to incentivize staking only up to a certain percentage, with no additional rewards provided beyond that threshold.

If implemented, stakers' nominal yields would decrease. However, Grayscale believes this is beneficial for ETH's long-term price for two reasons: first, it controls ETH inflation, and second, it strengthens the narrative of ETH as a store of value.

Weekly Hot Topics Crash Course

Policies and Macroeconomic Markets

Trump made a state visit to China, and the accompanying entrepreneurs drew attention;

Trump's Q1 "stock trading activities" exposed, sparking widespread debate;

The U.S. Senate voted to approve Kevin Warsh as Chair of the Federal Reserve;

The U.S. Senate Banking Committee passes the CLARITY Act (interpretation);

Some senators have submitted an "anti-DeFi" amendment that could weaken protective provisions related to the CLARITY Act;

Opinions and Voices

Arthur Hayes: The U.S.-China AI arms race, combined with war-driven inflation, makes BTC’s return to $126,000 inevitable; the AI bubble represents the greatest opportunity.

Wintermute: This round of BTC price increase is clearly driven by leverage, with open interest surging while spot trading remains weak;

CZ's new interview: Still dedicating 80% of my energy to blockchain; $10 million is enough for financial freedom;

Institutions, large corporations, and leading projects

Cerebras debuted on Nasdaq and triggered an upper circuit halt on its first day of trading.

The Solana Foundation partners with Google to launch Pay.sh (interpretation);

Data

ZEC surges 15-fold this year (analysis); TON continues to rise (analysis); L1 tokens gain momentum (analysis);

Circle's Q1 revenue reached $694 million, with on-chain USDC transaction volume increasing 263% year-over-year (earnings breakdown);

Gemini's first-quarter revenue increased 42%, and its stock surged as much as 30% after hours;

Long-term Bitcoin holders are accumulating in large volumes, with institutional buying driving a return above $80,000...

Access the "Weekly Editor's Picks" series here. See you next time!

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