Plasma’s $10B Launch, ASTER Trade Ideas, DAT Insider Crackdown & Jonah's META Thesis
Speakers
Avi Felman
— Principal, GoldenTree Asset Management
Jonah Van Bourg
— Head of Trading, Cumberland / ex-Vitol
Summary
The hosts review the strong Plasma token launch and debate the Aster trade, including short-Aster and long-HYPE/short-Aster ideas. They discuss Tether's reported raise, stablecoin/tokenization infrastructure, the DAT insider-trading crackdown, and broader altcoin risks. The episode closes with views on Bitcoin, gold/silver miners, and Avi's Meta thesis.
- Plasma launched with strong incentives, partnerships, and a $10B valuation; both hosts remain bullish.
- The Aster trade focuses on shorting an inferior, incentive-driven perp DEX token, with CZ manipulation risk noted.
- Hyperliquid is framed as the likely dominant on-chain perp DEX; BNB is the preferred CZ-linked expression.
- Tether's $20B raise is seen as strategic alliance-building for a stablecoin/new banking system.
- SEC/FINRA probes into altcoin DAT trading create downside risk for altcoin DATs and correlated altcoins.
- Bitcoin is viewed as strong in a 108–120 range; the four-year cycle is considered over.
- Avi remains long gold/silver/miners and pitched Meta as a multi-year AI/AR winner.
Ideas
Plasma launch underpriced; could reach $30B.
Plasma executed a competent launch with aligned incentives, $6B deposits, and a novel stablecoin-platform positioning; the token was massively underpriced and is now a $10B protocol. Avi remains a holder and thinks Plasma could become a $20–30B protocol over the next year if the team keeps executing.
Avoid large-cap alts; prefer Bitcoin.
Avi remains cautious on large-cap alts like Solana and Ethereum and basically everything outside BTC: if BTC ranges or trades down, alts get hammered, as happened when BTC fell to 108 and SOL/ETH sold off much harder. He prefers BTC in this range regime.
S-tier stablecoin chain with huge upside.
Plasma is anointed to succeed because of an S-tier team and Tether/Bitfinex/Binance/Thiel backing; ETH is too slow/expensive for stablecoins and L2s are not working, so Tether backers want their own chain. If Plasma becomes a free Tether-transfer chain backed by Tether/Binance, it could become a major banking system with upside similar to Ripple’s ~$300B market cap; tokenized-asset and on-chain lending growth also help.
ETH, L2s losing stablecoin workload.
The rise of Tron for Tether transfers shows Ethereum is too slow and expensive for stablecoins, and Ethereum L2s are not getting the job done. This makes ETH/L2s structurally vulnerable as stablecoin and tokenization activity migrates to purpose-built chains like Plasma.
Syrup benefits from tokenized on-chain lending.
The world is moving toward tokenized assets and frictionless on-chain borrowing against portfolios; Syrup has pulled back from highs but is leveraged to that new financial system, so Jonah is super bullish.
Short Aster; topped out near $2.
Avi’s trade idea is that Aster topped out around $2; one can deposit collateral on Aster, short the token with leverage, cover lower, and farm points. He thinks it is a good trade but lacks enough conviction to put on serious size.
Aster inferior, incentive-driven, can fall 40%.
Jonah agrees shorting Aster is a good trade: its product is inferior to Hyperliquid, attention left after Plasma, it has only pseudo-CZ backing, no real usage/community, and activity is incentive-driven. He thinks ASTER can go 40% lower, though he avoids outright shorting because CZ/Binance could manipulate or squeeze it.
Long HYPE, short Aster relative trade.
Rather than outright shorting Aster and risking CZ manipulation, Jonah suggests a relative trade: long HYPE, short Aster. HYPE is the superior perp DEX with a top team and loyal community, while Aster lacks real usage and community and faces fading incentives/competition.
BNB is best CZ-linked long.
If the thesis is that CZ is good for a token, the best way to express that is BNB, not Aster, because BNB is the coin CZ is most aligned with. He suggests sizing it up.
Nakamoto discount widened; still holding.
Avi bought Nakamoto at only a 15–20% discount to BTC holdings and is down 20–25%, but the discount has widened to ~35%, which is now attractive. He still holds half the position after sizing down and would only invalidate the trade if the discount stays below 30% for a month.
Buy Bitcoin DATs at 30–40% discount.
Buying Bitcoin treasury companies at a discount to their BTC holdings is attractive when the discount is 30–40%; Nakamoto is currently near that level. However, rising supply of discounted DATs makes any single instance less special, and a month below a 30% discount would invalidate the trade.
Altcoin DATs risk forced unwind.
SEC/FINRA are investigating leaks and unusual trading before crypto treasury announcements. Altcoin DATs are most at risk because they are newly spun-up, have no revenue, rely on retail paying above NAV, and may be forced to sell tokens or unwind if legal pressure arrives. This could trigger an altcoin DAT apocalypse.
Short ENA on DAT investigation risk.
Ethena (ENA) is one of the tokens that suspiciously rose before a DAT announcement and is now exposed to the SEC/FINRA insider-trading investigation. Avi says he regrets not shorting ENA and that altcoin DAT-related legal pressure could force token sales.
Altcoin DAT failures could spark broad selloff.
A few altcoin DATs blowing up or being forced to unwind could cause a broader altcoin selloff because correlation is high and when money is lost in alts, everybody in alts loses. Avi thinks this is a broad risk for the altcoin market.
Long gold, silver, miners.
Avi says he is still very long gold, silver, and miners; these hard-asset and mining themes have been ripping, and he remains positioned for continued strength.
Bitcoin strength; buy back in range.
Bitcoin bounced immediately after dropping from 113 to 108, a sign of strength; he sees BTC in a 108–120 range and thinks if the market rallies, Bitcoin will lead. He plans to buy back some BTC.
Four-year cycle over; Bitcoin grinds higher.
The four-year Bitcoin cycle is over; on a weekly log chart Bitcoin has been grinding higher in a straight line since November 2022, not in parabolic cycle fashion. This is a steady multi-year bull trend and investors should not stop out just because the old cycle timing says the cycle is done.
Meta can 2-3x on AI, AR.
Avi is long META and thinks it can 2–3x over 2–3 years. Meta can catch up in AI because compute-to-quality is logarithmic, then use the world's biggest distribution funnel to improve ad targeting; optional AR/smart glasses could become the next computing platform. The market penalizes AI/AR R&D and underestimates Zuckerberg's founder-mode leadership.
Up Next
This 1000x Podcast video, published September 29, 2025, features Avi Felman, Jonah Van Bourg discussing XPL, ETH, SOL, Ethereum L2s, SYRUP, ASTER, HYPE, BNB, NAKA, Bitcoin DATs, Altcoin DATs, ENA, ALTCOINS, GLD, SILVER, GDX, BTC, META. 18 trade ideas extracted by AI with direction and confidence scoring.
Speakers: Avi Felman, Jonah Van Bourg · Tickers: XPL, ETH, SOL, Ethereum L2s, SYRUP, ASTER, HYPE, BNB, NAKA, Bitcoin DATs, Altcoin DATs, ENA, ALTCOINS, GLD, SILVER, GDX, BTC, META