Investors should prioritize exposure to Hyperliquid (HYPE), as it has emerged as the dominant infrastructure layer for high-volume consumer trading apps like FOMO. For retail traders seeking transparency, the FOMO app offers a "social discovery" model that allows you to verify a trader’s actual on-chain performance and entry points before manually following their strategy. Consider shifting focus from traditional equities to Crypto-based Pre-IPO Perps, which currently provide the only viable price discovery and access to high-growth private companies like SpaceX. Monitor the "Crypto Consumer" sector for apps that use blockchain as invisible background rails, as these platforms are positioned to disrupt high-fee incumbents like Robinhood by offering lower trading costs (5-50 bps). Over a three-year horizon, favor Crypto assets over Stocks, as the former is viewed at a growth "local minimum" while equities face potential over-leverage risks from AI expectations.

FOMO (Social Trading App)

FOMO is a consumer-facing trading application built on crypto rails, recently valued at $550 million following a $75 million funding round. The platform integrates a social layer with multi-chain trading, aiming to be the "social network for finance."

• Core Philosophy: The founders describe the app as a mix of Instagram (UX), Twitter (information/theses), and Robinhood (trading).
• User Base: Approximately 700,000 lifetime users, with roughly 30% (210,000) having funded accounts.
• Asset Access: Unlike Robinhood (which has ~150 crypto assets), FOMO offers access to tens of millions of long-tail assets across chains like Solana, Base, BNB, and Ethereum.
• Infrastructure:
  • Non-Custodial: Users maintain full custody of their wallets (utilizing Privy for embedded wallets).
  • Perpetuals (Perps): Recently launched via an integration with Hyperliquid.
  • Gasless Experience: The app sponsors gas fees and priority fees to simplify the "normie" experience.
• Revenue Model:
  • Long-tail Spot: 50 basis points (bps).
  • Majors (BTC, ETH, SOL): 5 bps (significantly lower than Robinhood Crypto's ~85 bps).
  • Perps: 5 bps.

Takeaways

• Social-First Alpha: The platform’s value proposition is "transparency." Unlike traditional social media where traders can hide losses, FOMO's on-chain integration allows users to see a trader's actual performance, average hold times, and specific entry points.
• The "Anti-Copy Trade" Stance: Actionable for users to note: FOMO intentionally avoids automatic copy trading to prevent market manipulation and "dumping" on followers. Instead, it focuses on "social discovery" where users manually follow the theses of top traders.
• Expansion into Traditional Assets: The founders anticipate that as equities and real-world assets (RWAs) become tokenized, FOMO will serve as a primary gateway for retail to trade them on-chain.

Hyperliquid (HYPE)

Mentioned as the primary infrastructure provider for FOMO’s perpetual trading features.

• Performance: FOMO is currently one of the top "builders" on Hyperliquid, often ranking between #2 and #6 in terms of volume/revenue generation for the protocol.
• Integration: The founders praised the ease of building on Hyperliquid, noting the entire integration took only two and a half weeks.

Takeaways

• Infrastructure Dominance: Hyperliquid is emerging as a preferred backend for consumer-facing trading apps, suggesting a strong "moat" in the decentralized perpetual exchange (DEX) space.

Investment Themes & Sectors

Consumer Crypto vs. Crypto Consumer

• The founders argue that "Consumer Crypto" (apps built only for the existing ~100k crypto natives) is too small.
• Insight: The real opportunity lies in "Crypto Consumer"—apps that use crypto as invisible background infrastructure (rails) to provide better financial services to the general public.

The "Media-to-Product" Pipeline

• FOMO is aggressively building an internal media arm (sponsoring 8-9 content creators/podcasts).
• Insight: In the future, successful financial apps will likely own their distribution. By owning the media, they lower their Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) and build a "moat" through a proprietary social graph that centralized exchanges (CEXs) like Coinbase or Binance cannot easily replicate.

Tokenized Equities & Pre-IPO Perps

• The discussion highlighted a shift where companies (like SpaceX) stay private longer.
• Insight: Crypto-based "Pre-IPO Perps" are becoming the only way for retail investors to access price discovery for high-growth private companies before they hit the public markets.

Crypto vs. Stocks (3-Year Outlook)

• Sentiment: Bullish on Crypto over Stocks.
• Reasoning: Stocks are perceived as potentially over-leveraged on AI expectations, while crypto is seen as being at a "local minimum" with significant room for growth as financial rails move on-chain.

Risk Factors

• Cyclicality: Trading apps are highly dependent on market volatility. The founders raised $75M specifically to survive potential multi-year bear markets.
• Regulatory Uncertainty: While the app is currently non-custodial to mitigate risk, future features like "FOMO Gold" or yield products will require navigating evolving US and global regulations.
• Execution Risk: Building a "ranked feed" (similar to TikTok/Twitter) for financial data is technically difficult and essential for the app's long-term retention.