FBC Mid-Year Review - Aug 22
Letter from DJ
Dear FBC Family,
It has been six months since FBC started out, which can feel like an eternity in Web3. Along the way, we have gone through many trials and tribulations, and are thankful for the Fearless Bulls Community for sticking with us on this journey. We survived an e-commerce pivot and a change in leadership, and from there built a core team borne out of the community, with a focused vision.
The long term vision of FBC is to build Solana’s largest community based NFT fund; to create equity in the fund, whilst delivering value back to the community, making $vBLSH a core part of the Solana Ecosystem.
We have seen a good amount of success in growing the Fearless Bulls Community and Team. We have and will continue to deliver interesting utilities for the $vBLSH token; facilitate countless Twitter spaces talking with industry thought leaders and Bullish projects. We have faced hardships along the way and made mistakes as well. Let us recap our journey thus far, and how we can learn from both our good and bad plays.
Mint Day
After selling 7,500 whitelist mints (out of our 10k collection) in 15 minutes, we faced our first test when the secondary market was launched on Magic Eden before the public allocation minted out. Despite being common today, 6 months ago it was unheard of (yes, we were ahead of our time) and the team faced criticism from holders, which resulted in the public mint taking longer than expected. However, due to healthy demand we were able to overcome and mint out the entire 10,000 NFT collection.
Pivoting
Our second test was when a web3 e-commerce platform, originally one of the core pillars in FBC, was not well received by the community, resulting in one of the founders leaving. The team regrouped and with the big brains in the community, pivoted quickly to shift the focus to building the Bullish Growth Fund (“BGF”) into the largest community based fund in Solana, with investments in NFTs as a core focus.
Bullish Growth Fund
Today, the BGF has a total value of 8,090 SOLs, holding over 70 collections. We are the 37th largest wallet by activity in the whole Solana NFT ecosystem, having realised over 2,500 SOL of NFT trading profits (March, April, May combined), returning holders over 500 SOL via raffles and auctions in Cattle Markets in exchange for $vBLSH earned through staking, while reinvesting the remaining profits back into the BGF.
Surviving the Bear Market
Solana NFT has experienced a bear market since late may, and the BGF has definitely felt some of its impact. YTD, the BFG has a net loss of ~5% (including distributions, we are actually slightly above water.)
There are many lessons to learn during this period, including.
Exiting marginal NFT positions faster to lock in profit / cut loss
Hedging liquid SOLs into USD more frequently
Diversifying more into “blue chip” projects which could survive an extended bear market
Investing more into projects that are well-placed to provide utilities to the ecosystem & to FBC
More structured investing methodology.
The team has started to structure some of the above mentioned points, while working tirelessly on the remaining, so as to ensure better profit and stability for the BGF.
Why Solana
We continue to be bullish on the Solana NFT ecosystem, currently in its infancy, valued at $865,246,746.
Experiments and learnings along the way
During the last 6 months, FBC has strived to innovate, with trading initiatives to attract and retain holders.
FBC Premier League (”FPL”)
First on the list was the FBC Premier League; a community-based contest where investments were made in projects that proved to have the strongest community based on votes, actions and FBC holdings. Notable investments from this tournament include Xin Dragons, SOLgods, Pawnshop Gnomies & Degenerate Ape Academy. The competition brought some controversy and hype to the discord along with new holders to FBC.
FBC Premier League 2 (Traders Competition Edition)
16 individual traders were funded by the BGF over a course of 3 months and several stages to outdo each other, with a goal of finding outstanding traders to trade for the BGF in the long run. The competition resulted in an overall loss of 120 SOL for the fund. From this contest, we demonstrated how tough it can be to flip in & out of positions in limited time frames, and that even the most seasoned traders have their down periods, in future we look towards a more well-defined investment approach, including having a committee that discusses investments made by the fund. The overall winner of FPL 2 (MGrogan) is nominated to be part of the committee.
Trippin’Ape Syndicate
The Trippin Ape Syndicate was a separate vehicle set up to invest solely on the much hyped Trippin’ Ape Tribe project. Over 1,000 SOL was raised from the community and team, investing alongside the BGF. As of today, Trippin’ Ape has underperformed, and the syndicate is down over 60% in unrealised value. Every investor has had opportunities to exit or add on at various stages of the syndicate, while we have been adding onto the position held by the BGF. Whilst TAT is less than 3 months old, it’s clearly a long route to break even, and as such we have taken a longer term view on the project than initially planned. Some key lessons from this include taking faster exits, having more active community involvement & voting on the buys & sells, and increased focus on gaining mint allocations. We were able to apply some of these lessons, albeit on a smaller scale, with the Rakkudos Syndicate for the Celestials Club.
Poker Tournaments
During the course of July & August during peak gambling meta, FBC sought out to provide additional value to its holders in other ways. On a weekly basis, we organised Solana’s largest poker tournaments, collaborating with over 100 DAOs, attracting over 1,000 players each week, with weekly prize pools worth over 50 SOL. The tournaments have brought more eyes & holders to FBC and its partners, and worked well as a marketing tool, and regular community event, along with providing additional utility for the $vBLSH token.
Next Steps
Moving forward, the team will put more focus on growing the BGF, with key steps as below:
More structured investing Tying back of fund profits directly to holders Focus a higher portion of NFT investments on Blue Chips & mint allocations Make full use of all utilities from the NFTs held in the fund Structured reduction of $vBLSH emissions Releasing the mechanism for minting the PFP collection Continue building a thriving network for our holders
The team will continue to learn and adapt when necessary. We plan to flip the current meta smarter and faster, while investing in the future of Solana. We will continue investing in a range of NFT assets that we believe will appreciate in value over time. Some of them will fail, some will succeed. Due to economies of scale and first mover advantage as the first community based NFT fund on Solana, being able to invest in and hold projects in the style of a VC, our goal is to ensure that losses from our outlier losers (eg. Zaysan Raptors) will be outperformed by the profits from outlier winners (eg. DAA Eggs)
We strive to be ahead of the curve. We have tons of surprises in store, which we will release in stages, starting with our PFP mint coming right up. We tried some shit, we pivoted and we will keep trying, until Fearless Bulls achieves its vision of being universally recognized as the largest community based NFT fund on Solana, playing a key role in the development of the ecosystem.
Yours truly, DJ Trix
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