🌋 Token Launches in 2025: Emerging Trends and Market Shifts
posted 6 Jan 2025
Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly, predicts a significant evolution in how tokens will be distributed by new projects in 2025.
According to Qureshi, the days of widespread airdrops tied to point-based accumulation programs are fading. Instead, the industry is shifting toward a two-tiered token launch model tailored to the specific needs of individual projects.
These projects will likely adopt point systems for token distribution, positioning them as discounts or cashback incentives.
He also predicts that projects without clearly defined KPIs, such as Layer 1 (L1) and Layer 2 (L2) networks, will increasingly adopt crowdsales as their primary token distribution method.
While small-scale airdrops may still be used to reward social contributions, the majority of tokens are expected to be distributed through crowdfunding initiatives.
Instead, he notes a growing interest in tokens tied to “AI agents,” calling it a shift “from financial nihilism to financial over-optimism.”
This trend reflects evolving priorities among crypto users and increasing attention toward projects centered on artificial intelligence.
Haseeb Qureshi, Managing Partner at Dragonfly Source: haseebq.com
The first tier will be designed for projects with well-defined key performance indicators (KPIs), such as exchanges or lending protocols.
These projects will likely adopt point systems for token distribution, positioning them as discounts or cashback incentives.
They will not care if they are farmed or gamed—they are effectively distributing the token as a rebate/discount on the core KPI of the protocol, and the farmers are your actual users anyway,Qureshi explained.
He also predicts that projects without clearly defined KPIs, such as Layer 1 (L1) and Layer 2 (L2) networks, will increasingly adopt crowdsales as their primary token distribution method.
While small-scale airdrops may still be used to reward social contributions, the majority of tokens are expected to be distributed through crowdfunding initiatives.
Airdropping for vanity metrics is dead. Those aren't really going to users, they're going to industrialized farmers,Qureshi notes.
Qureshi also foresees a decline in the hype surrounding memecoins.
Instead, he notes a growing interest in tokens tied to “AI agents,” calling it a shift “from financial nihilism to financial over-optimism.”
This trend reflects evolving priorities among crypto users and increasing attention toward projects centered on artificial intelligence.
More breaking news
More breaking news
Breaking news
StarkWare Debuts SN Stack to Power Appchains on Starknet
