Global Macro Investor and Real Vision founder and CEO Raoul Pal said investors should assess whether blockchains can attract and retain users, capital and developers rather than focus on short-term token price movements. He compared the industry with the internet-company market of the early 2000s, when excessive investment in infrastructure and businesses without sustainable models preceded a broad collapse, while the largest technology companies later grew on that infrastructure.

Most blockchains may not survive

Pal noted that, according to CoinGecko estimates, more than 13 million tokens had stopped trading by the end of 2025. He said a significant share of blockchains also lacked the competitive advantages needed for long-term survival.

In his view, most projects will disappear, while a small number of networks could become the foundation of a global tokenized economy. He identified four categories of projects that may preserve long-term value.

Pal placed Ethereum, Solana and Sui among general-purpose L1 blockchains that could underpin such an economy because of their throughput, application composability and mature developer communities. He identified Hyperliquid as an example of a specialized network built around exchange activity, saying such projects could be strong in their niches but that their potential was limited by the scale of their specialization.

He said some L2 networks, which operate on top of base blockchains and use their security, could become successful businesses but would not necessarily accrue value in the same way as base networks. Pal also described BNB as part of a centralized ecosystem whose long-term value depended largely on Binance’s business rather than solely on the characteristics of a decentralized blockchain.

Projects without a broad economy, a clear specialization or another durable competitive advantage risk losing demand after the market cycle ends, according to Pal.

Token supply and capital velocity

Pal also pointed to token launches with low initial supply and high fully diluted valuations. He said such assets could rise sharply in a bull market when limited supply met strong demand, but future token unlocks could add downward price pressure during a downturn.

For blockchains without a durable competitive advantage, initial attention might not produce sustained network use, he said. Pal argued that investors should focus on real technology adoption rather than speculative token appreciation.

Pal said he studied 12 blockchains by comparing their metrics at the January 2025 market peak with their performance over the following 13 months. According to him, fee revenue, total value locked and the ratio of TVL to fully diluted valuation did not reliably predict which networks would retain value.

He identified capital velocity as the strongest indicator in his analysis. Pal said networks with the highest velocity subsequently recorded the worst performance, while blockchains where capital remained in place longer produced better results.

He attributed the difference to speculative activity versus a sustainable economy. Capital that continually changes hands may not leave lasting value, he said, while funds used in lending, staking and interconnected applications can support a stronger ecosystem.

Signals of long-term potential

Pal named three signals he uses to assess blockchain networks: the resilience of economic activity per user, growth in stablecoin supply and developer inflows.

For activity per user, he said the key question was whether capital and activity remained among users who stayed on a network during a downturn. An increase in dollar-denominated stablecoin assets while a network’s token price was falling could indicate continued demand for the ecosystem itself, he added.

Pal described developer inflows as particularly important because developers commit time and specialized expertise to a network, making their choice a potential sign of confidence in its long-term prospects.

Among the L1 networks he examined, Pal said only Ethereum, Solana and Sui maintained economic density during the market downturn. Pal sits on the board of the Sui Foundation, a position relevant when assessing his conclusions about the network.

Competition for economic activity

Pal said competition between blockchains would gradually reduce transaction costs, favoring networks that attracted substantial numbers of users and large amounts of capital while supporting efficient application performance.

He also said artificial-intelligence agents could select blockchains according to transaction speed, cost and efficiency rather than loyalty to a particular brand. In his view, that could intensify competition and leave a small number of blockchains controlling most economic activity while other networks lose a significant share of demand.

Source: Incrypted