Revealing the ecological mystery behind Aptos: the halo fades, ecological growth stalls

Author: Fairy, ChainCatcher

Edited by: TB, ChainCatcher

"The chain is fast, the heart hurts, and the money is very small." This jokey joke expresses the helplessness of many early Aptos supporters.

When Sui rides the wind, another "Move Gemini" falls into a completely different situation. At the beginning of Aptos, it entered the market with high TPS, Move language and strong capital support, but capital can ripen a public chain, but it cannot give it true vitality.

What kind of dilemma is Aptos in?

The halo fades, ecological growth stalls

Aptos was born in 2022, backed by the former Meta team, and was born as a star project under the halo of "next generation L1". With the support of institutions such as a16z, YZi Labs, Jump Crypto, etc., Aptos enjoyed the fanatical pursuit of the capital market in the early stage. However, as market sentiment cools down, its once proud technical narrative is gradually losing its appeal.

Dune data shows that Aptos currently has dropped to about 1 million daily active addresses, with daily transactions ranging from 3-4 million daily transactions. Sui, which is also based on the Move language, has exceeded 10 million daily transactions, and DEX transaction volume and application revenue are also far exceeding Aptos.

So, what is wrong with Aptos' ecological growth?

 Source: Defillama

The false prosperity of resource piles

Aptos' previous ecological expansion relied heavily on the "resource-driven" model rather than real market demand. Encrypto KOL @cryptobraveHQ pointed out that Aptos distributes a large amount of chips to partners, introduces well-known DeFi to enrich infrastructure, and uses OTC refinancing to bring leading institutions such as Binance and OKX into ecological construction. However, this "quick play" does not bring about real user migration, but is more like a "resource arbitrage game":

• After the top DeFi project was launched on Aptos, the real user growth was limited, and the chips were quickly sold after they were unlocked;
• TVL seems to have grown, but most of the funds may just be "presentation" for subsidies and have not formed real liquidity;
• Ecological resources are tilted towards "airborne" projects rather than supporting native developers, resulting in limited development of Aptos native projects and it is difficult for the ecology to form self-produce.

Aptos' "ecological support" is more formal than substance

In mid-March, Aptos launched the LFM program, aiming to help eco-projects prepare for TGE. However, Amnis Finance, the first LFM member who was highly supported by the community, "successfully" due to airdrops.

Community member @KuiGas pointed out that Amnis Finance's airdrop allocation is highly centralized: out of 440,000 addresses, only 10,000 people received airdrops, resulting in no gains from many real users. In this airdrop farce of "ecological support", Aptos' shortcomings in project review and community governance are exposed.

Aptos' "ecological support" is more like a nominal cooperation rather than a real ecological co-construction.

Aptos gives Amnis a lot of resource support, including token rewards, which also spends a year marketing and raffle draws. However, the whole process is more important than the substance, and ultimately it is not ecological growth, but a failed PR:

• There is no combination effect with the core ecology.
• There is no reasonable advice or community guidance on the airdrop logic before distribution.

@KuiGas said that Amnis Finance's airdrops were controversial, while Aptos still chose to leave silently, repeating a series of inactions in the past.

 Source: @KuiGas

Core executives resign in groups

Over the past year, Aptos' senior management has been in turmoil, with CEO Mo Shaikh, product design leader Jessica Anerella and product leader Cathy Sun leaving one after another, raising concerns about the chaos in its internal governance.

Encrypto KOL @cryptobraveHQ disclosed that last year Aptos conducted APT over-the-counter trading (OTC) at a much lower market price. At that time, the APT market price was in the range of US$10-13, but some investors were able to participate in OTC at a price of about 40% off. Coincidentally, shortly after this incident was exposed, co-founder and CEO Mo Shaikh and several employees with venture capital (VC) backgrounds left one after another.

It speculated that the direct cause of personnel changes may involve the transfer of OTC's interests, and the fundamental reason is that Aptos' overall performance after issuing coins did not meet expectations.

The community is "hateful but not strong", and Aptos is heading for

decline?

Aptos was once highly anticipated, but now it is deeply trapped in doubts and disappointments from the community. "Laboring market acumen, unclear strategic direction, internal corruption..." Many community members "hate the iron to make a difference" with their former highlights, and their former expectations are being wiped out step by step by step by reality.

Community member @yi_juanmao bluntly stated that Aptos and Sui's core team are from large factories, but their development trajectory is completely different. He criticized Aptos for not being on the Web3 route in terms of market sense, strategic layout, user maintenance and ecological co-construction. Instead, he is addicted to praising his high TPS and his style of doing things is becoming more and more like a rigid Web2 traditional enterprise. He also pointed out that the Aptos ecosystem is full of parasitic projects, over-reliance on funding blood transfusions, the entire system lacks vitality and is dead.

Community member @Cary_Zz reviewed the changes in the past year. He said: "Last year, the two Move heroes were still at the same starting line. At that time, the call for Aptos was even higher than that of SUI, and the entire community was ready to welcome the feast of the Aptos ecosystem with confidence. However, a year has passed, things have changed, and one of the Move heroes has become a hero and the other has become a bear. The price of SUI has been rising all the way, while the Aptos team is busy selling coins at low prices at OTC, internal corruption, and interest transfer. Finally, a mess has been left with the CEO's departure."

Community member @imsongshu pointed out that Aptos' internal employees are pedantic and extremely inefficient in their work. @cryptobraveHQ echoed that Aptos takes "compliance" as a shield and the process will be delayed for three months.

The halo of capital may bring temporary prosperity, but what really determines whether the public chain can gain a foothold in the long run is always user precipitation and ecological sustainable development.

The competition in the L1 track is still fierce. Whether Aptos can still break through can only give the answer.