In this episode of Empire, Jason and Santi are joined by special guest Kyle Samani to dive deep into valuing L1 and L2 crypto assets. The conversation covers the importance of MEV as the primary value accrual mechanism rather than transaction fees, the challenges in standardizing valuations across different blockchain architectures, and the evolving fee market designs. They also discuss the true costs and benefits of token airdrops for bootstrapping ecosystems. Thanks for tuning in!

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Resources
https://youtu.be/aCHY9iPS8sI?feature=shared
https://x.com/kylesamani/status/1721964311008956809
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Follow Kyle: https://twitter.com/KyleSamani
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Sei Labs believes the EVM is here to stay.

By providing the fastest time to finality of any chain, thousands of transactions per second and full backwards compatibility with the EVM, Ethereum developers can try out a brand new design space for their applications.

Try out sei v2 devnet - visit the new sei.io to find out more.
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Mantle Network is an Ethereum Layer 2 that aims to bring super-scalability to Ethereum by taking a modular approach that offers low fees and high security.

Mantle recently launched their airdrop program "Rewards Station" to holders of its native token, $MNT. The Rewards Station program distributes pre-sale token allocations or listed token to $MNT holders who stake their $MNT.
Check out the rewards station: https://www.mantle.xyz/rewards-station
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Monad is a fully EVM compatible Layer 1 blockchain that can support 10,000 real transactions per second. Monad aims to open up the design space for the EVM to support high fidelity defi, consumer facing applications, and more generally allow crypto to scale to the masses.

If you are interested in participating in Monad's journey, follow: https://twitter.com/monad_xyz and join: https://discord.gg/monad
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Marinade is the leading Solana staking service that spreads your stake across 100+ top validators, distributes MEV rewards, and provides automatic downside protection with new Protected Staking Rewards.

Choose to liquid stake for mSOL for use in DeFi, or delegate your stake through Marinade Native, which gives you full custody of your SOL and no smart contract risk.

Max performance for you, max performance for Solana.
https://blckwrks.co/Marinade
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Timestamps:
(00:00) Introduction
(02:43) Crypto as Commodities
(08:50) MEV Fee Stream for Networks
(18:53) L1 Token Valuation
(21:31) Updated Solana Thesis
(33:160 SEI Ad
(34:14) Monad Ad
(35:12) Marinade Ad
(36:17) Mantle Ad
(37:14) Fee Markets & Performant Infra Valuations
(42:40) Income Statements of L1s & L2s
(58:10) Cost of Airdrops
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Disclaimer: Nothing said on Empire is a recommendation to buy or sell securities or tokens. This podcast is for informational purposes only, and any views expressed by anyone on the show are solely our opinions, not financial advice. Santiago, Jason, and our guests may hold positions in the companies, funds, or projects discussed.