Deep Dive With DeFi Princess

Hi! Thank you for agreeing to share some insight with the crypto community. For the benefit of those who aren’t familiar with the brand, briefly tell us about how DeFi Princess started out.

DeFi Princess started out as a challenge to myself to see if I could write as well as I thought I could, and partly because I was mainly based on WhatsApp and I saw that most of my mentors were moving to Twitter.

I’d created a Twitter account two years ago, but because I couldn’t understand the app, I didn’t use it until March last year. That’s when it started looking simpler to understand.

What are the most basic things a beginner in the world of DeFi must absolutely learn before making that first trade?

A beginner shouldn’t want to learn anything. A beginner should know who to copy first.

Someone whose life is public enough and who posts enough about how to make it on Twitter and DeFi should be the quota. If you want to fly, you need to watch those who use their wings.

A lot of people associate DeFi with pump-and-dump schemes. How would you lay this stereotype to rest in the mind of a skeptic?

Oh, I love pump-and-dump schemes! It’s fair only when you know how to play the game. It’s a game of “eat or be eaten.” To eat, you need to be in the right circles.

I believe everything is a pump and dump until proven otherwise. While catalysts, utilities, and tokenomics might be a good “North Star,” I strongly recommend thinking of everything as a pump and dump.

In my first week of trading alts, I hit a 9x and gave the profits back to the market immediately. 😂 I bought the top twice and fell for a honeypot. Can you share some tips on navigating the space safely and profitably?

If you want it safe, you have 2 options: You have a lot of money, or you don’t have a lot of money. One is beautiful, and the other isn’t.

The first option means that you need safe options, so staking stables with a low percentage is your best bet as a newbie. When you get more experience, you can invest in protocols like Curve that have bribery mechanisms that favour large holders.

The other option isn’t so beautiful because, obviously, you don’t have much. This leads to the conclusion that experience has taught me to come to: only invest what you’re willing to forget. Not money you're willing to lose—that's difficult. How are you supposed to make that choice without an attachment?

There’s a certain magic about coins that have a strong narrative. You often talk about something called a “catalyst” that helps you identify successful trades. What does that mean?

A catalyst is an event that has demonstrated its ability to increase the value of a token from a few percent to 100x. These are a few examples:

1. Listings on exchanges.

2. Staking.

3. Launch on mainnet.

4. Burning.

5. Updates.

6. New whitepaper.

7. Increasing volume.

8. Increasing number of holders.

Different traders have different styles. Some find more success with scalping short-term plays, while others stick to spot trades. How did you figure out your unique style of trading?

To be honest, I don’t have a unique style of trading. As soon as I have liquidity on that chain, I go all in. Then I wait until I have more liquidity. Liquidity is king.

This one’s a bit controversial. Many established traders use their platforms to sell trading signals. Very often, these calls are hit-or-miss, but the callers stand to make lots of money from their community. What do you think about this phenomenon?

For this phenomenon, it’s a bit tricky. If you’re a follower of this type of influencer, you need to take note of their past calls and their win rate. Ask yourself, “Is this something they usually do?” or “Do they have an audience for this?”

You want to make money; you don’t want to point fingers. So you need to get the facts straight. I adore this phenomenon and encourage everyone to participate, especially my students.

Now, if you’re an influencer or an aspiring influencer... You find alpha? Share it! Even if you have a small audience or a large audience, and everyone thinks you’re using them for exit liquidity (I feel it’s all in your gut),

If you have the guts to use people for exit liquidity, own it and make sure you’re making a sh*t ton of money from it. If you don’t have the guts, just come clean and say “DYOR” or “NFA.”

But at the end of the day, I can’t tell you what to do or not do. I can only give you a nudge or influence you a bit. I simply encourage it because crypto is about sentiments. The more people see a particular project being talked about, the more prominently it stays on their mind.

The choice is up to you — do what makes YOU feel good, and makes money.

You have a pretty big audience on Twitter. Why did you choose to focus on DeFi education instead of selling trading signals like almost everyone else?

I sell trading signals too. Threads are a kind of sell or buy signal. I’m just not BLATANT about it.

With threads, you read → you get educated → you take action. With signals, you read → you take action → you get rekt → you blame me, or worse, you don’t take my signals anymore.

As for trading signals, I give them to my paid community or communities where I work as an alpha caller.

You've established yourself as a successful trader as well as a participant in the creator economy. What were some of the challenges you faced on the come up, and how did you manage to build successfully so far?

The creator economy. Woah! I don’t feel like I’ve found my feet. Although 52k followers may tell you it’s a lie, I actually haven’t. I still fumble.

I have bad days when I don’t want to open Twitter. I have days when I see people surpass me and I feel like I’m not doing enough.

I just always need to go back to what I know works for me. If it’s DeFi education threads, I’m going to do it until I die, amongst other protocol threads and sly savage jabs 😂😂

My biggest fear is being irrelevant and forgotten, so I follow who’s upcoming and if I like them, I engage. Twitter is game of “who scratches my back best.” You scratch my back, I scratch yours. You engage with my content, I engage yours. But first you need to be relevant.

Here’s how I stayed relevant:

1. Content distribution: WhatsApp and Facebook groups, Discord groups, newsletters, friends that curate threads, etc. Find a way to get your threads to as many eyeballs as you can.

2. Build your circle, or join a circle, or steal a circle.

Build: You find people who engage with your content. Build them up to your standard (teach and help them or give them advice).

Join: You will come across people who always tag each other at the end of their threads. Engage with them enough so that they start tagging you too.

Steal: You’ve seen a big content creator that you want to be like. They don’t answer all the questions in the comments. Explore that loophole by tagging your threads to help answer their questions.

Pro hack: Write out the questions word-for-word in these comments, then write a thread on it using those words

Thanks again for making the effort to do this interview. In parting, would you mind sharing some must-have tools that help with your research and trading workflow?

Must-have tools... hmm. It's similar to armor—don't overdo it. Make it flow.

For instance, you want to start with wallet-watching?

Find a 2–10x token: Coingecko → DefiLlama → Blockpour, Etherscan, or Nansen (if you have the money).

You want to degen?

Find a booking ecosystem or blockchain like Arbitrum or Optimism using the DefiLlama 7-day percentage increase filter. Then go from Dex Screener → Twitter Explore for research on upcoming events or catalysts. See what small-time influencers are saying about it. Don’t forget the comments sections and search for the ticket, e.g., $ABC.

DISCLAIMER: None of this is financial advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Please be careful and do your own research.