Katherine Ross

This is a segment from the Empire newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



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Could we get an alt season after all?



Monarq Asset Management’s Shiliang Tang told <a href="https://blockworks.co/podcast/empire">Empire co-host Jason Yanowitz</a> that there’s a possibility that the popularity of crypto treasury companies sparks an alt season that we haven’t seen before. This one would be focused on tokens deemed “ fundamentally valuable enough for traditional public money and capital” to get involved with.



It’s an interesting take, and one that I haven’t heard before. Especially because there’s a lot of criticism around these vehicles, some of which is warranted due to the entities’ structure.&nbsp;



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<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">In this morning&#39;s spaces that we had I was banging the drum about how I was concerned that these treasury acquisition vehicle companies were fleecing equity holders by being higher up the capital structure and using retail as exit liquidity to dilute and sell into. Here we are. <a href="https://t.co/X0pgBx1FoO">https://t.co/X0pgBx1FoO</a>&mdash; fejau (@fejau_inc) <a href="https://twitter.com/fejau_inc/status/1933274896924356750?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 12, 2025</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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Meanwhile, FalconX’s Josh Lim said that the rise of these treasury companies puts crypto — if we’re recycling what we talked about on Friday — in the “early to mid” innings of crypto’s adoption.&nbsp;



 ”There&#8217;s a pretty healthy pipeline of large deals. Like, we think there&#8217;s only going to be a handful of really credible teams like operators and the bankers [and investors]” that participate in these deals, he said.&nbsp;



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He noted that there’s generally a “chosen one” in each category, and those are the winners. Take, for example, <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/microstrategy">Strategy</a> or perhaps SharpLink Gaming. Strategy’s pretty much set itself as the gold standard, and SharpLink <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/bitcoin-treasury-strategies-sharplink-eth">could apply</a> the Strategy playbook to ETH.



Lim noted that he thinks there’ll be four or five “big ones” and then “lots of small ones.” His exact estimate was 50 or so.&nbsp;



But while there’s an appetite now, Lim noted that there are still risks.&nbsp;



 ”The downside risks are basically there could be sort of…fatigue for these like public equity deals and crypto — let&#8217;s say flat lines — and all these things trade at a small discount to NAV,” he noted.&nbsp;



If the risks play out, then Lim says that the market needs to stabilize and wait for “more capital to come in.” He added that there’s precedent for it.&nbsp;



But Yanowitz thinks there’s a different risk on the horizon. He believes that these companies need a good financial engineer and a marketer. And for him, a lot of the smaller ones making the pivot don’t have either.



Look, it’s clear that the treasury companies are here to stay. But the battles for the best is still underway.&nbsp;



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