SUSHI: The Bull and Bear Case

With a recent activist investment from a large hedge fund, a new head chef, and upgraded tech in the pipeline, Sushi has never been in a better position to see a comeback in terms of adoption, volume, and token price. That being said, there are many barriers to the potential success of the protocol and token. The state of SUSHI is worth keeping a close eye on over the coming months and years.  

The Bull Case

Sushi is an early DeFi protocol and a well known decentralized exchange that launched at the end of 2020. The DEX is one of the first AMMs, forking Uniswap V2’s code and siphoning over a billion dollars from Uniswap (~50% of its TVL) in just a few days thanks to SUSHI token incentives for LPs. Many crypto influencers and noteworthy individuals participated in the initial yield farming, including support from Sam Bankman-Fried and Alameda who still hold the token (according to Nansen wallet labels).

The developers, team, and supporters of the protocol are stellar in terms of reputation and skillset.** **There has also been an increase in support and coverage as of late. Most notably, in early October, GoldenChain, the crypto division of GoldenTree, announced an investment of $5.3M into SUSHI and vowed to actively support the ecosystem’s growth and a new token design. GoldenTree has over $45B in AUM and a strong reputation globally. Additionally, Sushi developers, alumni, and holders include some of the most skilled builders in crypto. In an industry where developers and power users are at the core of any project’s success, having friends in 0xmaki, SBF and countless others is vital to the bull case. The exchange has been growing in narrative as of late thanks to crypto Twitter and media outlets. As a result of the recent activist investment, a new head chef, and multiple governance proposals to revamp tokenomics and the DAO, Sushi has done a great job at catching the market’s attention.

The team and DAO are constantly shipping updates and staying up with narratives, a crucial trait in an industry that moves a million miles a minute. In September 2021, when NFTs were well into their exponential rise but a ways away from the top, Sushi announced their decentralized NFT marketplace: Shoyu. Sushi has developers working on every aspect of DeFi including a concentrated liquidity AMM (Trident), IDOs (Miso), yield generating vaults (BentoBox), and lending (Kashi). There are a plethora of governance proposals discussing a token redesign and decentralizing the current multisig governance. The DAO also functions relatively efficiently when compared to other protocols, with active astute participation in their forum and Discord, led by community managers with immense knowledge of the protocol.