Over the past couple of months, my friends and I have been consistently deploying capital, looking for new growth opportunities, especially in these bullish market conditions - but one sector (AI) caught my attention the most, which saw an immense growth, both in price and attention, between January and March, mimicking the huge success of web2 tech giant Nvidia.

As it would come to no surprise to you guys, you have probably heard of AI projects within the space, both onchain and some older ones. After spending some time researching various projects, some seemed more interesting in use case and attention than others, let me concise my thoughts here.

In this week’s newsletter feature, I want to discuss the AI narrative in crypto and some potential projects with heavy upside seeing that this sector is only going to grow. If you’re still deciding on where to place your AI bullets, read on and hopefully you find your bull run fighter.

The rise of AI within the crypto sector is of no surprise, with recent developments in tradfi such as OpenAI and Nvidia fundraising at extreme valuations, the crypto sector was bound to play catch-up. A huge part of this was the expected Nvidia returns as compared to actual, which always seemed to outperform the expected value.

The integration of AI into the crypto sector represents a significant revolution in how the markets will operate and there is huge potential upside in the sector with the market cap of the AI sector being only $23 billion as compared to memes, with more than $60 billion. One might argue that memes are more normie friendly, but let’s ask ourselves, what true benefit does this provide to crypto as a sector, especially with institutions coming into the markets this year - we have to look for projects focusing on improving how the market operates.

Let’s take a look briefly at the potential use-cases AI would have on the crypto sector before I dive into some projects I am keen on this coming cycle in AI.

As the space is continually evolving, it is no surprise that AI technology is making waves around the world of digital assets, that being said, crypto is the pinnacle of digital assets.

Various tokens in the AI sector are attracting alot of attention, each leveraging AI in various ways:

1. Enhancing security
2. Trading optimisation
3. Improved scalability

Understanding the various fundamentals of AI driven tokens and their differing techs can help provide conviction in holding and capitalising on this ever-evolving landscape of crypto.

AI mean many different things in the crypto ecosystem: machine learning, language processing, or even to enhance various aspects of the ecosystem. It can also be applied in areas such as trading, security and data analysis amongst other things. In recent developments, trading has become a large interest amongst crypto hodlers, in this specific sector on tradingview or in other words any charting indicator, AI algorithms can be used to analyse market data, identify trends, and automatically execute trades at certain conditions with speed and accuracy beyond our own capabilities - resulting in +EV results which can be also backtested efficiently and quickly. This is just one example, but overall the AI tech revolutionises our industry by improving efficiency, security and transparency - playing an important role in shaping the future of our ecosystem.

Before diving into the tokens, let’s take a look at factors to consider when investing in AI tokens:

1. Use case of the tech: We should first understand the tech behind the token and what its use case is - ideally we’d want to be looking for tokens who are solving actual real-world problems with strong tech foundation
2. Team: We also want to look at who is behind the project, sometimes age or duration in a specific space is not the best factor to look at in regards to experience - but the ideal candidates here would be teams with professional track-records in the relevant fields. Strong candidates generally increase the chances of success in fundraising and reliability.
3. Partnerships: Look for projects who have partnered with strong organisations - the most recent example would be the Nvidia conference, which saw some sort of partnership with Near protocol, having their CEO speaking at the conference. This increases the project’s credibility heavily - resulting in a surge of price for $NEAR bringing it to peak at almost $10 dollars prior to the conference.
4. Adoption rate: Have the ability to evaluate if the project’s community is supportive and if there are like minded individuals who believe in the adoption rate - this would lead to a healthy ecosystem.
5. Market demand: Assess the market for competition and differentiation strategies - does the product find good product market fit?

By considering the factors I have mentioned above, you would then be able to make more informed decisions when choosing which projects to invest into. Below are my top 5 picks.

Render Protocol ($RNDR)

Render Protocol is operating as a decentralised and permissionless marketplace for GPU rendering power - hence the name “Render”. It caters to the needs of creators who are in need of high-quality graphics, rendering the process of converting data fed into the system into completed graphics - which often demands substantial computing power. Depending on the complexity of the desired graphics, some rendering requests can require a significant amount of GPU power - as such Render Protocol addresses this challenge by offering its network of computers which contributes their GPU power, creating a large pool of GPU computing power accessible to anyone.

$RNDR has seen notable growth since the AI narrative has come around the end of 2023 til now - growing almost 600% from the middle of last year. AI projects are now able to utilise the GPU marketplace provided by $RNDR to do various things ie: graphics for deep-fake applications, and advanced AI-powered videos generated from text. Notably, OpenAI’s SORA can now execute rendering requests via $RNDR, paving the path for next-level graphics in the ever-expanding AI sector in crypto and beyond.

In recent developments, $RNDR has expanded into the Solana Network, which has also been an outperformer this cycle with growth of almost 1,500% from its lows after the FTX crash. $RNDR has been active throughout 2023/24 and the project has also collaborated with CT’s most renowned creators like Beeple - it ended the year as well as one of the top gainers, and seen a growth of more than 40% since the start of the year, this is something I recommend you guys look into, showing significant strength throughout the markets and potential for further growth.

Bittensor ($TAO)

Bittensor ($TAO) is a machine learning product which creates a decentralised platform serving as a marketplace for machine intelligence. The platform enables projects to collaborate on developments of machine learning models - which facilitates rapid expansion, knowledge sharing, and the creation of an ever-growing library of knowledge. $TAO is the pioneer in community-driven approach to machine learning which utilises strategies such as incentivisation to encourage active participation in the network. \
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Here are some important aspects of the $TAO network, firstly, members are able to assess each other’s knowledge creation rather than focusing on specific tasks, and the network incentivizes honesty and accuracy to maintain fairness. The token itself is used for rewards and accessing network resources, with safeguards against cheating. This secure validation system ensures trust and integrity in transactions.

$TAO is deployed on Solana as well, as mentioned above, a cycle outperformer - and $TAO is poised to be one of the most significant AI computing projects in the ecosystem. The value of the token $TAO has seen immense growth since 2023 - which started from $35 and currently sitting at $650 - this token remains a cryptocurrency to be watched during the bull run.

Singularity ($AGIX)

Singularity ($AGIX) experienced significant growth at the end of 2023 and beginning of this year. This project is primarily focused on the development of a framework for next-gen AI solutions via creating an ecosystem for projects that utilise AI to address challenges through a decentralised and permissionless method. In layman terms, $AGIX is a decentralised and permissionless AI platform and marketplace.

$AGIX acts as sort of an incubator for these projects, offering funding, tech support and guidance to ensure that these launches are successful and are delivering quality AI solutions to challenges. The various projects within the ecosystem are launched on this decentralised marketplace, which serves as a platform for solutions being at the centre of the AI revolution. $AGIX’s marketplace is built on Cardano ($ADA) which has specifically been chosen for decentralisation and speed. A notable partner of $AGIX is FetchAI ($FET) who has also seen significant growth in the same duration.

With the use case of $AGIX there is infinite room for growth, considering that the sector as a whole is comparatively small to its tradfi counterparts.

Filecoin

What is Filecoin? Filecoin is an open-source cloud storage marketplace, protocol, and incentive layer.

ELI5? — Filecoin allows anyone to store and receive data on the internet

Filecoin enables any user with excess data storage to trade available space to users needing storage space for a fee.

Elevator pitch = ‘Filecoin is a decentralized storage network designed to humanity’s most important information’ — This is how they brand themselves

Price is up about 3x since October 2023. Despite a massive price rise, Filecoins TVL is still up dramatically even when measured in FIL

It is the market leader with regard to long-term storage ( competition from Arweave )

$FIL grew A LOT in 2023 and they have a lot in store for this year with a focus on AI, DePIN, and continued Defi growth.

Arweave

Arweave is a permanent information storage application.

Users can store information permanently for a one-time fee. Arweave is more about long-term storage whereas FIL is about large-scale storage.

Price up 10x from September 2023

AR is also a modular blockchain — could fit in this modularity hype leading to an even bigger pump

Very bullish stats throughout 2023!

AIOZ Network

What is it? AIOZ Network is a comprehensive infrastructure solution for web3 storage, decentralized AI computation, live streaming, and video on demand (VOD), powered by people. ( AIOZ Network is a DePIN for Web3 AI, Storage, and Streaming.)

It strives to deliver content while removing barriers between creators and their supporters.

Elevator pitch = ‘Empowering a Fast, Secure and Decentralized Future.’

They have A LOT of partnerships: Qualcomm, Imperial College London, Uni of Liverpool.

Noticeably low TX fee as seen through their blockchain explorer.

Key benefits of AIOZ = Low latency, unlimited scalability, low costs, censorship resistance

Ocean Protocol

Ocean is a protocol that allows data to be monetized, bought, sold, and traded.

They allow people to run AI-powered prediction bots or trading bots on crypto price feeds. They also offer data farming and are looking to launch C2D springboard ( C2D allows for the selling of private data whilst preserving privacy, and can also be used for data sharing in science).

Elevator pitch ( how they brand themselves ) — ‘Leveling the playing field for AI and data’.

Volume for their Ocean Predictor product is in a great uptrend. It was only launched 6 months ago and has now done $700m volume over 30 days!

Price is up 800% since November 2022. It has even outperformed on its relative BTC pair which is impressive especially since BTC.D has been in an uptrend for a while now.

They offer 300k OCEAN in weekly rewards ( some of which you may be eligible for if you are a veOCEAN holder).

PEAQ Network

How they brand themselves — ‘ The blockchain for real-world applications’ ‘The layer one for DePIN’.

Peaq network is building a Layer 1 for DePINs, creating a home for real-world machines and applications to run decentralized and on-chain, right at the intersection of Web3 and AI.

If you want to understand Peaq more, check out this thread: https://twitter.com/sjdedic/status/1761036802951970888?s=20

Given the chain is built purposely for DePINs, it’s offering the best middleware and tooling for DePINs = convenience for developers.

Real-world adoption at the intersection of AI, working with some industry giants already such as Airbus, Bosch, and Continental.

Some of the ecosystem projects like Natix and Silencio have tons of users already, which will lead to millions of on-chain transactions right from the launch

The combined value of DePINs on Peaq is $500m! ( Let that sink in ).

25+ person team including Ex-CEO of Cisco:

Oh, and btw…their token launch is in 2024.

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I hope I gave you a little sneak peak into AI.

You can check out all AI coins here:

https://www.coingecko.com/en/categories/artificial-intelligence

That’s it for today!

Happy trading and good luck with buying all the dips in 2024!

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