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I ranked 16 revenue-generating crypto protocols using an index that puts equal weight on business performance and token economics
Pump comes out on top with 76 points. Hyperliquid has the strongest business of all 16 and comes in at #2
- Selection: $10M+ annualized revenue and a token above $150M market cap
- $PUMP is #1: $664M annualized revenue at 2.5x market cap / revenue, the lowest multiple of all 16
- $HYPE has the strongest business (79) and the most revenue ($871M), but trades at 80x FDV / revenue. My model uses 9% unlocks, based on what the team actually received in the last 12 months. Unlock trackers use 54%, which would drop it to #5
- $AERO is #3 at 6.7x. 99% of revenue went to lockers and stakers, but new supply (24% a year) more than offsets that payout (15% of market cap)
- $LIT has the third-best business (69) but the lowest token terms (41): unlocks over the next 12 months equal 61% of today's circulating supply
- $CAKE and $SKY are the opposite: token terms of 77 and 72 on a business score around 50
- $RAY (-40%), $CAKE (-35%), $MET (-32%), $JUP (-23%) and $UNI (-19%) earned less per day over the last 30 days than in the 90 days before. Their current run rate is below the revenue in the table
- Only 6 of 16 have a net holder yield clearly above zero, meaning burns, buybacks and staker payouts outweigh new supply: $RAY, $CAKE, $SKY, $JUP, $SYRUP and $PUMP
- $VVV (84x) and $AAVE (32x) are at the bottom. Most of Venice's revenue settles offchain, so the model only includes what reaches the token. If more of it flows onchain, VVV moves up. AAVE paused buybacks in April after the rsETH exploit. "Aavenomics 3.0" should bring them back, but it isn't live yet
Ranks 4 to 13 are only 8 points apart, so I wouldn't read much into #5 vs #9. Pump, Hyperliquid and Aerodrome stay in the top 5 in at least 95% of 5,000 random weightings
How the score works:
- Business (50%): revenue momentum (last 30 days vs the 90 days before), revenue trend (last 90 days vs the 90 before) and revenue size (the lower of the last 12 months and the annualized last 90 days, so one strong quarter doesn't inflate size)
- Token terms (50%): market cap / revenue, unlocks over the next 12 months, float and the share of revenue that goes to holders
Takeaways from the table:
- A strong business doesn't automatically reach the token. Only Pump scores 70+ on both sides. Without its unlocks LIT would be #4 instead of #13
- High payouts don't guarantee positive holder economics. HYPE, UNI, VVV, AERO and CRV all send 95%+ of revenue to holders, yet none has a net holder yield clearly above zero once new supply is factored in
- Cheap alone isn't enough. MET (3.4x) and LDO (7.0x) are among the four cheapest but only rank #8 and #7: MET has 15% unlocks, LDO returns nothing to holders on a recurring basis
The table is the data. The score is my own weighting on top of it and leaves out things like sentiment or regulation. Not investment advice. Full methodology and how each token was treated in the replies
Pump comes out on top with 76 points. Hyperliquid has the strongest business of all 16 and comes in at #2
- Selection: $10M+ annualized revenue and a token above $150M market cap
- $PUMP is #1: $664M annualized revenue at 2.5x market cap / revenue, the lowest multiple of all 16
- $HYPE has the strongest business (79) and the most revenue ($871M), but trades at 80x FDV / revenue. My model uses 9% unlocks, based on what the team actually received in the last 12 months. Unlock trackers use 54%, which would drop it to #5
- $AERO is #3 at 6.7x. 99% of revenue went to lockers and stakers, but new supply (24% a year) more than offsets that payout (15% of market cap)
- $LIT has the third-best business (69) but the lowest token terms (41): unlocks over the next 12 months equal 61% of today's circulating supply
- $CAKE and $SKY are the opposite: token terms of 77 and 72 on a business score around 50
- $RAY (-40%), $CAKE (-35%), $MET (-32%), $JUP (-23%) and $UNI (-19%) earned less per day over the last 30 days than in the 90 days before. Their current run rate is below the revenue in the table
- Only 6 of 16 have a net holder yield clearly above zero, meaning burns, buybacks and staker payouts outweigh new supply: $RAY, $CAKE, $SKY, $JUP, $SYRUP and $PUMP
- $VVV (84x) and $AAVE (32x) are at the bottom. Most of Venice's revenue settles offchain, so the model only includes what reaches the token. If more of it flows onchain, VVV moves up. AAVE paused buybacks in April after the rsETH exploit. "Aavenomics 3.0" should bring them back, but it isn't live yet
Ranks 4 to 13 are only 8 points apart, so I wouldn't read much into #5 vs #9. Pump, Hyperliquid and Aerodrome stay in the top 5 in at least 95% of 5,000 random weightings
How the score works:
- Business (50%): revenue momentum (last 30 days vs the 90 days before), revenue trend (last 90 days vs the 90 before) and revenue size (the lower of the last 12 months and the annualized last 90 days, so one strong quarter doesn't inflate size)
- Token terms (50%): market cap / revenue, unlocks over the next 12 months, float and the share of revenue that goes to holders
Takeaways from the table:
- A strong business doesn't automatically reach the token. Only Pump scores 70+ on both sides. Without its unlocks LIT would be #4 instead of #13
- High payouts don't guarantee positive holder economics. HYPE, UNI, VVV, AERO and CRV all send 95%+ of revenue to holders, yet none has a net holder yield clearly above zero once new supply is factored in
- Cheap alone isn't enough. MET (3.4x) and LDO (7.0x) are among the four cheapest but only rank #8 and #7: MET has 15% unlocks, LDO returns nothing to holders on a recurring basis
The table is the data. The score is my own weighting on top of it and leaves out things like sentiment or regulation. Not investment advice. Full methodology and how each token was treated in the replies
