Crypto veteran Arthur Hayes says he looks for two main features when considering what digital asset protocols to invest in.

The BitMEX founder notes in a new interview with The Rollup that he specifically looks for protocols that have a track record of users spending their own money for the project’s services.

“They’re not spending token emissions, they’re spending their own stables or other crypto to use as a product or service.” 

In terms of a good example of that, Hayes cites Hyperliquid (HYPE), a layer-1 protocol with a decentralized exchange (DEX) that has witnessed significant user and volume growth in its less than two years of existence.

The crypto veteran also says he looks for protocols that provide ways to enrich their token holders.

“I want to see how I’m getting paid. Is it a token buyback, is it an emission, what’s the scheme? There are all different flavors depending on how you want to incentivize behavior, but at the end of the day, I buy a token, I want some sort of APY, and then I can take that APY and run some sort of financial analysis.” 

He criticizes the decentralized exchange (DEX) Uniswap (UNI), which he says is an expertly created protocol that doesn’t do anything to reward its users.

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