Investment Banking Transition to Web3? Entering the Space in 2017, Discovering Airdrop Opportunities During "DeFi Summer" in 2020, and Achieving Multiple Million-Level Results After Four Years of "Yield Farming"?

How did "Airdrop Master" Feng Mi @KuiGas achieve this? If you are also a "yield farmer," this article "The Secret to Yield Farming" is a must-read------

Feng Mi believes that the core secret to yield farming lies in "losing Gas," that is, where is the Gas consumed? Breaking it down, it comes down to two points: 1. Does the consumed Gas increase weight? 2. Does the consumed Gas enhance the on-chain profile?

This is part of the "Friends of OKX" interview series, aimed at providing new users with insights through the stories, industry thoughts, and lessons learned from KOLs with different backgrounds. This issue features interviewer Mercy Mei Xi @Mercy_okx, welcome everyone to follow～

Article Overview:

Chapter 1: Entry Experience: How I Came to Yield Farming and Became an Expert

Chapter 2: Core Strategies of Yield Farming: How to Filter Quality Airdrop Projects

Chapter 3: The Future of Airdrops

Chapter 4: Advice for Newcomers: How to Start Yield Farming from Scratch

Chapter 5: Suggestions for OKX

Chapter 1: Entry Experience: How I Came to Yield Farming and Became an Expert

1. What prompted you to enter the space? Why is "yield farming" a "gold mine"?

I have a background in finance, specializing in securities investment and management. I worked in traditional finance doing hedge trading and investment banking. I entered the cryptocurrency space in 2017 and discovered the yield farming airdrop track during the "DeFi Summer" in 2020.

In fact, I learned about BTC back in 2009 when it was worthless. I even mined it with a laptop when it first came out, but I didn't understand the technology well and had a low level of awareness, so I missed out. I really started participating seriously during the 2017 bull market, drawn in by the explosive growth. My pure motivation back then was to make big money. Gradually, from 2018 to 2019, I got into DeFi projects like MakerDAO, Compound, and Uniswap.

During the "DeFi Summer" of 2020, I realized that DeFi mining and yield farming could be combined, and the compound interest effect was very obvious!

The moment I truly recognized that "yield farming" was a viable strategy was during the launch of UNI and SUSHI tokens. I found many protocols that I was optimistic about, including ENS and Paraswap. From that time on, I heavily invested in multiple accounts, and later, ENS and Paraswap launched airdrops. The ENS airdrop alone had rewards exceeding 100,000 RMB per account, and the PSP airdrop started at 10,000 USD per account. This was my first big win in this track, validating that making money through airdrops was feasible, like discovering a gold mine.

2. Why did you want to create and initiate 33DAO? What was the initial motivation? What impact has it had on you since its establishment?

33DAO is a co-creation, co-building, and sharing DAO organization, and I am one of the initiators. It has been running for four years now, with 35 members distributed globally. We must hold meetings every week, and all members must participate. I roughly calculated that 33DAO has held no less than 200 weekly meetings over the past four years.

The initial motivation was simple—hoping to gather a group of capable and thoughtful individuals together to form a community that can truly provide value through regular communication, in-depth discussions, and the collision of ideas. At the same time, we continuously output to the outside world, such as tutorials, market insights, and Space discussions, helping partners in yield farming to get started faster and better understand Web3.

Regarding the impact of the establishment on myself, I feel there are three points: First, I think the most direct impact is that I have met a group of amazing people, and everyone has achieved significant results through this. These members encourage and influence each other, enhancing their understanding and ultimately monetizing it. I think this is a very good process.

For example, during the recent New Year period, when the Trump token came out, within just a few minutes, a member shared the CA. Initially, everyone thought it was hacked, but through members cross-referencing data, they confirmed the information was real. Then everyone quickly positioned themselves, and I remember the price was around 0.5-1 USD at that time. Within two days, it roughly increased by 100x. In the end, many people achieved extremely significant results. Unfortunately, I was abroad and bought too little, which was a big regret! At the same time, I deeply understood the importance of small circles and the significance of communicating with the right people.

Secondly, the existence of 33DAO forces me to continuously output. It means I need to keep researching and sharing insights; many understandings are not innate but evolve through continuous learning, deep thinking, and discussions with community members. This mechanism of forcing oneself to grow has a significant impact on me. For example, we used to focus on ARB, STRK, and many other projects, where everyone encouraged each other during the bear market, ultimately achieving very good results.

Lastly, the accumulation of resources and connections. 33DAO gives us the opportunity to have direct conversations with top overseas projects. Many projects are discovered through the power of the community in real-time. Through many project interactions, we gain broader perspectives, and the interactions between members strengthen the connections, allowing the underdogs to truly integrate into the Web3 ecosystem.

Chapter 2: Core Strategies of Yield Farming: How to Filter Quality Airdrop Projects

1. How do you filter quality airdrop projects? What indicators do you pay the most attention to? (e.g., team background, token economic model, community activity, etc.)

The indicators I focus on for quality projects include: track, financing background, ecological layout, team background, on-chain data, technical innovations, and of course, market capabilities, operational capabilities, and organizational abilities. When filtering and analyzing projects, I personally focus on the odds and probabilities, as well as costs. I believe this is a very complex process, and each step is a practical methodology I have summarized over the years.

1. Categorize tracks and focus on mainstream: There are only a few major categories of tracks, and after seeing many, you can naturally distinguish them. First, go through the mainstream tracks to form a basic understanding, such as L1/L2, ZK DeFi, LSD, Restaking, BTCFi, Move language, etc. I generally rank ecological projects and then analyze their odds and probabilities separately.

2. Look for highlights and protocol technical innovations: After reviewing a lot of content, I focus on what the core advantages of the project are. What differentiates it from competitors in the same track? If time allows, you can read the white paper and official documents, but initially, I suggest forming an understanding of the track so that you can quickly judge what a project does before diving deeper. I was particularly impressed by Mavrick, which had high APR on ZKSync and discovered a huge opportunity.

3. Pay attention to institutions and investors and adopt a multi-dimensional perspective: Projects backed by institutions have higher credibility, especially star-level institutions that are less likely to run away and can more easily get listed on major exchanges, with a higher ceiling. Institutional financing + investors, VC perspectives. Institutions have already filtered out ordinary projects, effectively increasing the win rate. I personally prefer to keep an eye on institutions I like, such as Hack VC.

Core idea: First look at the track, quickly judge the positioning, then look at the project highlights, and finally check institutional investments to find the project's alpha. Analyze the project's market activity strategies, especially from the perspective of the project party. Explore from multiple angles and dimensions.

I treat this process like a self-introduction in a real-life dating scenario: what do you do, what does your family do, do you have money, do you have a house, do you have a car, do you have a job, etc. In short, I need to be very clear about why I want to yield farm this project.

2. Project parties usually use technical means to identify "witch attacks." How do you reasonably use multi-account strategies without being recognized as a "witch attack"?

This is a good question, and I will try to cover it as comprehensively as possible given the time constraints.

1. First, what is a witch attack: It refers to an individual or team creating a large number of accounts to manipulate the network and falsely allocate protocol resources, typically involving bulk operations, programmatic operations, and bot operations.

2. What project parties think and do: Project parties and ecosystems hope that real users participate in the network, and they want to reward real users. They will use on-chain data analysis, address association, behavior pattern detection, and other technical means to identify these attacks, with Nansen's AI clustering analysis being a typical example.

3. The essence of a witch: It is not that using multiple accounts automatically makes one a witch; rather, it is the mass generation of unproductive garbage accounts that abuse the rules to obtain airdrops that constitutes a witch attack. The core of project parties checking for witches is "de-scripting and de-bulk."

4. To answer your question: How to reasonably use multi-account strategies? My view is to create "premium accounts," meaning each account should be "independent + real." Recently, there were many classic cases like Pengu and TIA, where a single address could range from 500 to 2000 USD. A premium account means a high-quality account, with each account having real user on-chain records, independent behavior, and reasonable on-chain asset distribution. Multi-accounting itself is also a principle of risk diversification; multiple accounts ≠ witch. Using multi-account strategies is merely a statistical rule, a broad coverage principle. The yield from one account may not be as high as the odds from multiple accounts.

Specific practices:

Account Creation Phase - Basic Principles:

1. Ensure reasonable fund flow and try to achieve differentiation from the start of account creation, including the source of funds.

2. Ensure reasonable fund flow to avoid concentrated inflows and outflows.

3. Randomize interaction times and amounts to avoid mechanical operations.

4. Multi-chain layout, leaving real user traces to make accounts appear more natural.

Account Nurturing and Interaction Phase:

1. Avoid bulk operations; each account should have independent behavior.

2. Randomize interaction times and avoid assembly line-style operations, such as randomizing amounts during interactions, transaction order, and combining multiple protocols.

3. Multi-chain layout to make accounts appear more natural, with interaction paths as independent as possible.

4. Create high-quality user profiles and behaviors, holding different assets to increase account weight.

5. Participate in real activities to increase account weight, such as DAO voting, NFT minting, and DeFi staking.

6. Combine interactions and embedded interactions, integrating DeFi strategies, ensuring Gas consumption is focused.

3. How do you understand "premium accounts"?

A premium account means a high-quality account, with each account having real user on-chain records, independent behavior, and reasonable on-chain asset distribution. Of course, everyone has different interpretations of premium accounts. Project parties distributing rewards also hope that the addresses are real and of high quality. Some are for equity-type NFTs of their own projects, while others focus on on-chain interaction profiles. The points of focus often include funds, activity levels, diversity, on-chain identity, loyalty, mainnet data (Gas consumption, time, transactions, active time), and NFT holdings. The more real, the better.

Summary of Focus Points: Wallet history, interaction behavior, fund flow, asset holdings (tokens, NFTs), balance retention, multi-chain activity, and some social bindings…

4. How do you control the cost of yield farming? What optimization strategies do you have for interactions on high Gas fee chains (like Ethereum)?

1. I personally do not use many of the programmatic tools like IPs, ADS, etc., mainly because I don't know how. I focus more on the on-chain profile formed by the Gas losses of the accounts.

2. The costs of my interacting accounts are: capital costs and Gas costs.

3. Therefore, the core points I care about are where the Gas is consumed, either to increase weight or enhance the on-chain profile. These two points are the most critical for targeting the project party's airdrop perspective.

4. In terms of specific strategies, I try to maximize interactions through DeFi, arbitrage, trading, minting, or high-weight transactions. I aim to recover the Gas costs incurred while improving the account profile. This has a significant reflexivity; you must first learn to lose money and lose Gas.

5. Regarding high Gas fee chains (like Ethereum), what optimization strategies do you have for interactions? This depends on the situation. In the past few years, only the first year had high Gas fees; afterward, they have been relatively low. For example, currently, with Gas at 1, it is a good time to refine new accounts. You can combine specific projects to interact with mainnet data.

5. Different projects have different interaction requirements. How do you adjust your strategies based on the characteristics of the project?

Different projects have varying requirements for airdrop interactions. Blindly following tutorials is not very meaningful at this stage. Everyone hopes to achieve precise interactions + minimal costs + maximum returns, which is extremely challenging. This uncertainty and reflexivity require long-term practice and tracking. This is also the most challenging aspect of this track.

1. My strategy has always been premium accounts + weighted interactions + calculating high input-output ratios + controlling risks. Using high-quality accounts to target high-quality protocols is my strategy for combining trading protocols. Different projects have different airdrop distribution logic; you cannot apply a one-size-fits-all approach but must layout strategically. My experience is that yield farming is not simply about "winning by quantity," but about finding the correct interaction strategy that aligns with the project's expectations and suits your personality.

2. For example, in L1/L2, you need to consider TVL, authenticity, and prioritize native DApps with diverse combinations. Play the ecosystem from a real perspective.

• For DeFi protocols, the project party's perspective is to prioritize deep users, rewarding those who provide liquidity and trade over the long term, such as deposit frequency, amounts, LPs, etc. Analyze based on the on-chain data of each specific protocol.

• For cross-chain bridges and staking types, it also depends on the protocol background. Staking types may focus on the TGE timing, security, track position, and input-output ratios.

Additionally, interactions can also enhance account quality and weight. Here, I can elaborate on my logic for participating in Wormhole, where I achieved over 10,000 USD in returns per account. If everyone wants to hear it, I can share it here… but I prefer not to write it down.

Community projects: Encourage contributions, and if the project has NFT-related gameplay, focus on ecological NFTs and holding equity-type OG NFTs.

"Yielding smart" is more important than "yielding more," especially as the current market increasingly values real users. Therefore, precise interactions, reasonable fund allocation, and long-term account nurturing are key. In the current airdrop track, it's not about the number of wallets but about researching the project, understanding the rules, and executing effectively!

6. After many projects' airdrops, people often choose to sell the tokens they received. How do you judge the timing for selling?

I haven't done well in this regard; I currently hold a lot of altcoins. I'm a typical example of someone who can yield farm but not sell. I think there are many reasons for this. On one hand, the market has changed; in the previous cycle, holders became wealthy, but this round, holding leads to losses. I held OP and ARB for over a year. Some projects I staked after receiving tokens dropped by 90%, turning big gains into small ones. For some airdrops, I genuinely haven't sold, like EigenLayer. If I encounter a project that drops significantly, I just wait it out, treating the initial price as my cost basis and recognizing the loss. I have never pursued absolute values but rather a relative value mindset.

After suffering many losses, based on my personal situation, I currently sell about 1/3 of the tokens I receive from airdrops, and later I judge based on the project's and market's conditions. Most of the projects I yield farm are VC tokens. I mainly focus on the project's last round valuation, market capitalization at launch, unlocking conditions, and most importantly, market conditions. We can't serve as a reference; the core reason for not wanting to sell is that we develop feelings for the airdropped tokens!

Chapter 3: The Future of Airdrops

1. What are your thoughts on the emergence of platforms like Pump for meme launches? How will this impact yield farming?

Platforms like Pump.fun have lowered the barrier for token issuance, allowing anyone to issue tokens in seconds using a one-click issuance model and automatically create LPs. This is essentially an evolution of a new, extremely free asset issuance model. Its emergence represents a shift from early ICO and IEO models to airdrop models, evolving into the current self-issuance model. It lowers the barriers for issuing tokens while also changing the mindset and strategies of Web3 participants (especially yield farmers).

1. Impact on project token distribution: This free asset issuance model reduces the barriers for token issuance. One-click issuance + automatic LP creation requires no technology or financing, allowing direct market entry. This new model not only affects the meme track but also changes the way traditional Web3 projects distribute tokens. Many projects may choose not to list on exchanges initially but to launch directly on DEXs. Project parties no longer need to rely on traditional financing or token lock-ups but let the market determine the token's value.

2. Impact on yield farmers:

• Impact 1 - Mindset: The yield farming cycle has been drastically shortened, posing a huge test of human nature. Speculative mindsets have intensified. In the past, yield farmers were accustomed to 3-24 months of interactions, waiting long-term for TGE. Now, with Pump's meme coins, one can see a hundredfold increase in minutes, but they can also drop to zero in minutes. In contrast, the time for yield farming has uncertain returns, and the characteristics of counter-yield farming make it feel less rewarding compared to memes.

• Impact 2 - Interests: The "belief system" of yield farmers has collapsed, and speculative gameplay has been infinitely magnified. In the past, yield farming emphasized interaction depth, on-chain contributions, technical characteristics, and value, with yield farmers hoping for long-term project development. Under the meme model, the core driving force of tokens is "emotion + narrative + funding FOMO." Many yield farmers no longer yield farm but shift to memes, caring less about the project itself and more about short-term fluctuations because it feels more exciting, faster, and has a wealth effect. Everyone hopes to be the next big thing.

• Impact 3 - Gambling mentality: Yield farmers' mindsets have become more FOMO, easily falling into gambling tendencies. Traditional yield farming emphasized steady progress, but the meme ecosystem has pushed the market into an extreme speculative mode, increasing the gambling mentality.

2. What is the future trend of yield farming? Is there still an opportunity for multi-account Gas loss?

I believe there is. Multi-accounting will never lead to wealth or excessive returns. However, it is necessary to balance personal funds and account fund flows and distributions. Multi-account Gas loss is possible, but don't burn Gas. There is a distinction here; the future of yield farming's core is "premium accounts." Real interactions + natural fund flows + long-term activity are the optimal strategies. Yield farming is no longer just about "piling quantity," but rather tests "strategy + execution + information asymmetry"! Those with strong execution can still pile premium accounts and create more of them.

3. For some projects that require both Gas expenditure and social accounts for tasks, how should one handle this?

Some projects design activities with a dual screening mechanism, requiring both on-chain interactions (Kui Gas) and social interactions (Twitter, Discord, Galxe tasks, etc.). This model places higher demands on yield farmers. If not handled well, it may lead to excessive costs and time investment, ultimately resulting in mismatched returns. My advice and strategy are:

1. First, determine if the project is worth "both Kui Gas and social." Before that, you should have your own logical judgment and thinking, and also see if the project aligns with your personality to formulate differentiated interaction strategies.

2. Distinguish between studios and individuals; the strategies here should be different. As a super individual, I personally maintain a set of three accounts, all registered individually with early overseas phones, which have been nurtured over the long term. Within my personal capacity, I maintain these accounts on different computers. Here, nurturing three accounts requires occasional differentiated activity. The three accounts will also check for associations, activity levels, and account quality. Due to time constraints, I won't elaborate further, but this is foundational work that is necessary but doesn't require excessive demand.

3. Correspondingly, one premium account can be paired with three accounts, doing as many accounts as one can manage. For example, 100 accounts.

4. Focus more on on-chain profiles and high-quality transactions, abandoning a large number of ineffective Web3 interaction tasks. Judging the activities designed by project parties is a key point.

4. Will TX be useful? What role does trading volume play in yield farming, and is it still effective?

As project parties' screening standards and anti-witch mechanisms continue to upgrade, this simple and crude accounting method is no longer the best strategy. Yield farming now emphasizes "interaction quality + transaction authenticity." However, TX and trading volume need to be combined with "interaction depth." To put it in an inappropriate analogy, if you used to visit the bank multiple times, the bank manager might recognize you and occasionally invite you for coffee. At this stage, merely depositing may not be useful; you need to be a VIP, a long-term customer purchasing their financial products.

5. What innovative airdrop designs can lead to a win-win situation for the community, project parties, and the entire ecosystem?

This topic is a bit broad. How to distribute airdrops is an art for project parties. If done poorly, it can lead to disaster. To summarize my understanding:

1. Airdrops have been proven to be an important way for Web3 projects to achieve early growth and user acquisition. However, traditional airdrop models have significant issues, leading projects to distribute large amounts of tokens without attracting long-term users, resulting in a high proportion of low-quality users and damaging the token economic model.

2. Good airdrops are designed to attract new users, reward early users, and retain more users while driving growth around the project's and ecosystem's economic flywheel. More innovative, fair, and sustainable airdrop designs should achieve a "triple win" for project parties, community users, and the ecosystem.

Future airdrop models and methods must adhere to the following core principles:

1. Long-term incentive mechanisms (to avoid short-term selling, encourage users to continue interacting, and contribute long-term).

2. Combine on-chain data and off-chain community contributions to filter real users and genuinely contributing users.

3. Alignment of interests among three parties (user growth = ecosystem growth).

4. Transparency (clearly explain each rule and its rationale), avoid insider trading.

There are various specific methods. For example, a "gradual release" mechanism, referring to OP's airdrop, involves multiple rounds of airdrops, providing broad and continuous rewards for long-term contributions. On this basis, more elements can be added, and the airdrop strategy and design can be further refined. There is no perfect solution; we can only try to accommodate small and medium retail investors and more real users.

Chapter 4: Advice for Newcomers

1. How to start yield farming from scratch? For newcomers with a capital of a few hundred U, how should they get started?

Yield farming is a low-cost path and strategy to enter Web3 and earn some profits, but it is not a simple free money game. It should be a combination of awareness, strategy, and execution capability. Different people have different interaction strategies and approaches at different stages, and there are distinctions between those with technical backgrounds and those without. For newcomers who are just starting and lack technical skills, my advice is:

1. Philosophical Aspect (Conceptual Level): Correct Awareness

• Learning: Understand some ways to make money in the industry, the models of airdrops, and explore ecosystems and protocols. Initially, look for points that suit your projects. The principle is to have your own project judgment and clarify that not all projects are worth pursuing. The essence of yield farming is "low-cost investment," where time, Gas fees, and opportunity costs are your "investments." Don't FOMO.

• Direction: Choose the right track; direction is more important than effort. Yield farming should select tracks with strong future certainty, large capital, and potential long-term incentives.

• Investment Research: Build a project library, learn to evaluate projects, follow projects, calculate ROI, and identify risk points, odds, and weight points.

1. Technical Aspect (Execution Level): Specific Methods

• Learn to Interact Correctly: For example, how to swap, bridge funds, find tokens, and complete project tasks using three accounts. The core is to improve interaction skills.

• Increase Account Weight: Learn to engage deeply and become an active, real, high-quality user of ecological protocols.

• Control Costs: There are many ways to yield farm, not just through Kui Gas; staking and many high-quality testnet projects are also available.

• Participate from Multiple Angles: For example, from a user perspective, deeply engage with the ecosystem; from a creator perspective, help projects write content, etc.

Summary: Slow to fast, small to large.

2. Common Misunderstandings?

Feng Mi: Learning from losses is a blessing; some pitfalls must be experienced personally. Self-reflection is the most useful. Teaching someone else won't work; teaching through experience will.

3. How should newcomers obtain quality information sources? Do you have any recommended channels or tools?

A simple way is to follow quality KOLs on Twitter, YouTube, etc. You can find projects from Rootdata @RootDataCrypto, along with corresponding X accounts and team members, as well as financing situations.

For learning, OKX's Web3 wallet @OKXWeb3_CN also has many basic project tasks that can serve as practice.

Chapter 5: Suggestions for OKX

1. What role and influence has OKX played in the development of various ecosystems?

The OKX wallet supports a wide range of ecosystems and chains, currently supporting 127 chains as far as I know. Personally, I use OKX as my regular wallet in interactions, generally sharing the same mnemonic phrase with MetaMask.

Features: Safe, timely, smooth—too many to list, but it works well. The Movement ecosystem greatly benefited from the support of the OKX Web3 wallet. At that time, Movement needed to download another wallet, but it was not user-friendly. After I reported this issue to Haiteng @Haiteng_okx, he quickly connected me with the relevant colleagues, and they promptly supported Movement, which made things much easier for us without needing to migrate assets back and forth.

2. In future developments, what ecosystems would you like to see OKX collaborate with? In what form? What kind of collaborations does the community want to see?

The ecosystem and coverage are very comprehensive. As far as I know, the OKX wallet team is very capable, and their BD expansion is strong, with rapid support and timely bug fixes. I think there may be areas for optimization in airdrop interactions. OKX @okxchinese has done well in breadth, but depth is lacking. Many users utilize OKX, so there could be valuable growth systems built around users' wallet situations. This system could collaborate with many ecosystems to help both sides drive traffic or provide more data enhancements and rewards for OKX wallet users.

The tools already in place are excellent, such as the recent support for real-time K-lines and one-click token trading on X. In terms of airdrops, OKX could develop an airdrop detector, allowing users to check their wallets for any unclaimed airdrops.

Conclusion:

Feng Mi: My experiences over the past five years have strengthened my belief that true value lies not in what you know but in what you can connect and execute.

In this ever-changing market, the strongest competitive edge is a continuously evolving understanding, forward-looking layouts, and exceptional execution capabilities. Time is tight, so please correct me if I misspeak!

Mercy: The first time I heard about Feng Mi, he seemed like a legendary figure. Some even said that Feng spends 365 days a year sitting in a temple farming airdrops… After actually interacting with him, I found that both his sincere and humble demeanor and his focused and dedicated work ethic are worthy of my learning and respect.

In this dialogue about airdrops between OKX friends, I gained three core points:

1. Outstanding judgment is essential—"yielding smart" is more important than "yielding more";

2. A high sense of responsibility—take every deal seriously;

3. Strong execution ability is needed—both newcomers and veterans.

I hope everyone can gain something from this. Finally, thanks again to Feng Mi @Kui_gas for sharing, and welcome everyone to continue following the "Friends of OKX" dialogue series.

Risk Warning and Disclaimer

This article is for reference only. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not represent the position of OKX. This article does not intend to provide (i) investment advice or recommendations; (ii) offers or solicitations to buy, sell, or hold digital assets; (iii) financial, accounting, legal, or tax advice. We do not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of such information. Holding digital assets (including stablecoins and NFTs) involves high risks and may fluctuate significantly. You should carefully consider whether trading or holding digital assets is suitable for you based on your financial situation. Please consult your legal/tax/investment professionals regarding your specific circumstances. You are responsible for understanding and complying with applicable local laws and regulations.