Messari's Unqualified Opinions

Prediction markets may be the first real breakout product for consumer crypto—and they’re only getting started.In this episode of Messari’s 2026 Theses consumer series, we’re joined by Tulip King and Baba, two former Messari analysts, to unpack where consumer crypto actually goes next. The conversation spans prediction markets as base infrastructure, why memecoins and NFTs needed a reset, how wallets become the new distribution layer, and whether crypto social finally has a real unlock.We connect these themes directly to Messari’s newly published 2026 Crypto Theses, exploring what adoption looks like when users stop caring about rails and start caring about products—and why wallets, prediction markets, and AI copilots may define the next consumer cycle.1:47 Prediction Markets 14:49 Meme Coins & NFTs 22:35 Crypto Wallets 33:49 Social & Creator Crypto 46:40 Consumer Crypto 2026Hosted by Chris Davis of MessariSubscribe for more conversations at the intersection of crypto, DePIN, and real-world infra.Follow Messari on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MessariCryptoFollow Unqualified Opinions on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0uG5qpwFg67zTt0VQRTaZ7?si=13163cbebe01415eFollow Unqualified Opinions on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/messaris-unqualified-opinions/id1455666979____This episode and its contents do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Messari, Inc. Hosts and guests may hold cryptocurrencies discussed in this content. This content is meant for informational purposes only. It is not meant to serve as investment advice. You should conduct your own research, and consult an independent financial, tax, or legal advisor before making any investment decisions. Nothing contained in this content is a recommendation or suggestion, directly or indirectly, to buy, sell, make, or hold any investment, loan, commodity, or security, or to undertake any investment or trading strategy with respect to any investment, loan, commodity, security, or any issuer. This content should not be construed as an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any security or commodity. Messari does not guarantee the sequence, accuracy, completeness, or timeliness of any information provided in this content.

In this episode, Dylan, Sami and Seth break down why crypto + AI isn’t just a moral counterweight to Big Tech—it’s a faster innovation engine. They explain how BitTensor’s subnet model turns AI development into an open, incentive-driven competition (similar to how Bitcoin relentlessly optimized SHA-256), and why 2025’s biggest shifts—open-source catching up, reinforcement learning’s rise, and massive data center capex—set the stage for decentralized AI to find real product-market fit. The conversation also digs into value accrual, why buybacks can be a trap, and which crypto-AI sectors could surprise people in 2026 (agents, privacy, robotics, and GPU financing).📘 Read the full (free) Crypto Theses 2026 report: https://messari.io/report/the-crypto-theses-20260:00 AI & DePIN Trends10:28 Training Subnets14:07 Investing Approach20:25 Revenue Growth22:35 Token Strategy40:26 Compute & Infra41:59 Future OutlookHosted by Chris Davis of MessariSubscribe for more conversations at the intersection of crypto, DePIN, and real-world infra.Follow Messari on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MessariCryptoFollow Unqualified Opinions on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0uG5qpwFg67zTt0VQRTaZ7?si=13163cbebe01415eFollow Unqualified Opinions on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/messaris-unqualified-opinions/id1455666979____This episode and its contents do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Messari, Inc. Hosts and guests may hold cryptocurrencies discussed in this content. This content is meant for informational purposes only. It is not meant to serve as investment advice. You should conduct your own research, and consult an independent financial, tax, or legal advisor before making any investment decisions. Nothing contained in this content is a recommendation or suggestion, directly or indirectly, to buy, sell, make, or hold any investment, loan, commodity, or security, or to undertake any investment or trading strategy with respect to any investment, loan, commodity, security, or any issuer. This content should not be construed as an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any security or commodity. Messari does not guarantee the sequence, accuracy, completeness, or timeliness of any information provided in this content.

In this episode of the Messari Thesis Podcast, the Enterprise research team recaps the wild year that was 2025 and lays out their highest-conviction bets for 2026. We dig into why Bitcoin has clearly separated from the rest of the market, how Hyperliquid and a handful of standout apps stole the spotlight, and why long-tail L1s are running out of room. The team debates whether institutions really break the four-year cycle, how the stablecoin and yield meta evolves as rates fall, and where DeFi banks, RWAs, and prediction markets actually fit.We also get into L1 vs L2 dynamics, Solana’s on-chain market structure experiments, the rise of yield-generating stablecoins, and the explosion of on-chain derivatives from equity perps to exotic real-world assets. Finally, everyone shares one spicy prediction for 2026—from a G20 nation adding Bitcoin to its strategic reserves to a single meme coin rising from the ashes.00:00 2025 Winners & Losers07:00 L1, L2 & Multichain09:25 Institutions & Stablecoins13:55 Yield & DeFi Banks23:45 2026 Narratives28:55 Regulation & Tokens33:30 Equity Perps & TradFi40:10 2026 Market OutlookHosted by Matthew Nay of MessariSubscribe for more conversations at the intersection of crypto, DePIN, and real-world infra.Follow Messari on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MessariCryptoFollow Unqualified Opinions on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0uG5qpwFg67zTt0VQRTaZ7?si=13163cbebe01415eFollow Unqualified Opinions on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/messaris-unqualified-opinions/id1455666979____This episode and its contents do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Messari, Inc. Hosts and guests may hold cryptocurrencies discussed in this content. This content is meant for informational purposes only. It is not meant to serve as investment advice. You should conduct your own research, and consult an independent financial, tax, or legal advisor before making any investment decisions. Nothing contained in this content is a recommendation or suggestion, directly or indirectly, to buy, sell, make, or hold any investment, loan, commodity, or security, or to undertake any investment or trading strategy with respect to any investment, loan, commodity, security, or any issuer. This content should not be construed as an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any security or commodity. Messari does not guarantee the sequence, accuracy, completeness, or timeliness of any information provided in this content.

What if the smartest AI didn’t live in a hyperscale data center—but across millions of everyday devices?In this episode, Chris Davis sits down with Ivan Nikitin, co-founder of Fortytwo, an AI network built on crypto rails that turns idle consumer hardware into a global swarm of specialized models. After a decade in traditional AI—training agents, conversational systems, and even a spatial reasoning foundation model—Ivan hit the hard wall of AI scalability: not enough compute, endlessly bigger data centers, and no sustainable path forward.Fortytwo flips that script. Instead of one giant “god model,” it orchestrates small, specialized models into a swarm inference network. Each query is handled by a sub-swarm of experts that generate answers, peer-rank each other’s outputs, and aggregate the best result—creating a system that’s more robust to hallucinations, prompt injection, and noisy prompts (yes, including the “cat on the roof” test).Messari’s State of AI Report calls decentralized inference “one of the most important emerging architectures in AI,” and this conversation offers a firsthand look into how that future might unfold.Read the Full State of AI 2025 for FREE: https://messari.io/report/state-of-ai00:00 – Introductions03:05 – Crypto & Security10:16 – Models & Swarm Performance24:02 – Consumer Devices & Nodes38:02 – Custom Model Training43:16 – Demand & Pricing53:31 – Future, Token & Data Use59:00 – ConclusionHosted by Chris Davis of MessariSubscribe for more conversations at the intersection of crypto, DePIN, and real-world infra.Follow Messari on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MessariCryptoFollow Unqualified Opinions on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0uG5qpwFg67zTt0VQRTaZ7?si=13163cbebe01415eFollow Unqualified Opinions on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/messaris-unqualified-opinions/id1455666979____This episode and its contents do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Messari, Inc. Hosts and guests may hold cryptocurrencies discussed in this content. This content is meant for informational purposes only. It is not meant to serve as investment advice. You should conduct your own research, and consult an independent financial, tax, or legal advisor before making any investment decisions. Nothing contained in this content is a recommendation or suggestion, directly or indirectly, to buy, sell, make, or hold any investment, loan, commodity, or security, or to undertake any investment or trading strategy with respect to any investment, loan, commodity, security, or any issuer. This content should not be construed as an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any security or commodity. Messari does not guarantee the sequence, accuracy, completeness, or timeliness of any information provided in this content.

The public internet wasn’t built for high-performance blockchains.In this episode of Fully Diluted, Messari’s Dylan Bane and Matthew Nay sit down with Austin Federa, co-founder of DoubleZero, to unpack how a global mesh of privately contributed fiber links is becoming the low-latency “private internet” for Solana and other high-throughput chains.Austin explains why 20–30 hops over the public internet introduce jitter, slow block propagation, and widen trading spreads—and how DoubleZero’s 70+ fiber links, multicast, and future FPGA acceleration aim to fix it. They also get into the 2Z token, DZ SOL liquid staking, validator incentives, and what it will take to push Solana toward 100k+ TPS and eventually 1M+.You’ll learn:🔹 Why major financial firms and web2 giants don’t rely on the public internet—and why blockchains shouldn’t either🔹 How DoubleZero’s contributors (Jump, DRW/Cumberland, and others) provide fiber that validators can “plug into” alongside the public internet🔹 How jitter, least-cost routing, and bandwidth caps quietly limit DeFi and on-chain trading today🔹 The design of the 2Z token and DZ SOL stake pool, and how they align network costs and validator economics🔹 What multicast, edge filtration, and hardware acceleration could unlock for next-gen L1s and cross-chain apps🔹 DoubleZero’s 2026 roadmap, new geographies and tenants, and how non-crypto systems might eventually tap the network00:00 – Introductions01:17 – Double Zero Basics02:00 – How It Works04:09 – Chain & Solana Use07:03 – Network Flow32:06 – Token & Rewards39:44 – Solana Future48:06 – ConclusionHosted by Dylan Bane and Matthew Nay of MessariSubscribe for more conversations at the intersection of crypto, deepin, and real-world infra.Follow Messari on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MessariCryptoFollow Unqualified Opinions on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0uG5qpwFg67zTt0VQRTaZ7?si=13163cbebe01415eFollow Unqualified Opinions on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/messaris-unqualified-opinions/id1455666979____This episode and its contents do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Messari, Inc. Hosts and guests may hold cryptocurrencies discussed in this content. This content is meant for informational purposes only. It is not meant to serve as investment advice. You should conduct your own research, and consult an independent financial, tax, or legal advisor before making any investment decisions. Nothing contained in this content is a recommendation or suggestion, directly or indirectly, to buy, sell, make, or hold any investment, loan, commodity, or security, or to undertake any investment or trading strategy with respect to any investment, loan, commodity, security, or any issuer. This content should not be construed as an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any security or commodity. Messari does not guarantee the sequence, accuracy, completeness, or timeliness of any information provided in this content.

Messari CTO Diran Lee sits down with Karam Lakshman, CEO & co-founder of Dabba, to unpack how a DePIN marketplace, local cable operators, and crypto incentives could build a new Telco in the world’s toughest market—India. We cover broadband vs. mobile realities, Dabba’s business model and token system, the choice of Solana & BONK, incentives, and the growth roadmap.0:00 Introductions 1:33 Tech Journey 7:04 Internet in India 13:29 Business Model 21:17 Token System 24:46 Solana & BONK Choice 26:34 Incentives & Vision 31:12 Future Growth 32:07 ConclusionAbout the episode:Dabba helps India’s long-tail of local operators deliver affordable broadband by standardizing ops and crowdsourcing last-mile buildout through a tokenized incentive model—aiming to onboard the next hundred million (and beyond).Hosted by Diran Lee of MessariSubscribe for more conversations at the intersection of crypto, deepin, and real-world infra.Follow Messari on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MessariCryptoFollow Unqualified Opinions on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0uG5qpwFg67zTt0VQRTaZ7?si=13163cbebe01415eFollow Unqualified Opinions on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/messaris-unqualified-opinions/id1455666979____This episode and its contents do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Messari, Inc. Hosts and guests may hold cryptocurrencies discussed in this content. This content is meant for informational purposes only. It is not meant to serve as investment advice. You should conduct your own research, and consult an independent financial, tax, or legal advisor before making any investment decisions. Nothing contained in this content is a recommendation or suggestion, directly or indirectly, to buy, sell, make, or hold any investment, loan, commodity, or security, or to undertake any investment or trading strategy with respect to any investment, loan, commodity, security, or any issuer. This content should not be construed as an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any security or commodity. Messari does not guarantee the sequence, accuracy, completeness, or timeliness of any information provided in this content.

In this episode of Fully Diluted, Messari’s Dylan Bane and the Messari Research team sit down with Mert Mumtaz, Co-founder and CEO of Helius, to unpack the evolving privacy landscape in crypto. They dive deep into Zcash’s resurgence, Solana’s growing DeFi ecosystem, and the regulatory and technical hurdles shaping the next generation of privacy-preserving systems.Mert discusses why privacy is fundamental to crypto’s future, how advancements in ZK proofs, FHE, and MPC are transforming usability, and why regulation may finally be catching up to innovation. The group also explores Solana’s momentum in trading infrastructure, perps, and DeFi market structure—and what it means for a truly decentralized financial internet.00:41 – Introductions03:54 – Why Privacy Matters05:15 – Privacy Apps 11:58 – Zcash & Privacy Tech 17:58 – Zcash Updates 29:03 – Solana & Privacy 41:01 – Future & Learning42:55 – Conclusion Hosted by Dylan Bane of MessariFollow Messari on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MessariCryptFollow Unqualified Opinions on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0uG5qpwFg67zTt0VQRTaZ7?si=13163cbebe01415eFollow Unqualified Opinions on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/messaris-unqualified-opinions/id1455666979____This episode and its contents do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Messari, Inc. Hosts and guests may hold cryptocurrencies discussed in this content. This content is meant for informational purposes only. It is not meant to serve as investment advice. You should conduct your own research, and consult an independent financial, tax, or legal advisor before making any investment decisions. Nothing contained in this content is a recommendation or suggestion, directly or indirectly, to buy, sell, make, or hold any investment, loan, commodity, or security, or to undertake any investment or trading strategy with respect to any investment, loan, commodity, security, or any issuer. This content should not be construed as an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any security or commodity. Messari does not guarantee the sequence, accuracy, completeness, or timeliness of any information provided in this content.