Bear Market Medicine
Introducing Arasaka's thesis on the opportunity for distressed asset investing and acquisition in decentralised AI
While Bitcoin crossed $126,000 and the crypto market hit $4.1 trillion in 2025, over 35 major blockchain projects shut down, including Kadena (once worth over $4 billion), Alpaca Finance ($1B+ TVL), and 300+ Web3 gaming studios.
The same year projects collapsed, M&A activity exploded: 340+ deals worth $20-30 billion, a tenfold increase from 2024. Coinbase spent $2.9B on Deribit. Ripple deployed $2.25B across Hidden Road and GTreasury. Kraken acquired NinjaTrader for $1.5B.
The pattern is clear, established players with capital are eagerly acquiring the wreckage of overambitious founders. Clear consolidation hidden in plain sight, masquerading as bull market growth.
Web3’s irrational optimism creates predictable casualties. Unsustainable tokenomics, governance theater, product-market fit delusions, and a blatant lack of focus on any sort of sustainable business models burn through VC funding until the inevitable happens: distressed sales, bankruptcy auctions, or quiet shutdowns.
Arasaka operates in this opportunity space that others avoid discussing. We provide distressed asset brokerage, connecting failing projects with strategic and financial buyers. We deliver intelligence reports that track early distress signals such as GitHub activity collapse, team exodus, and competitive erosion before the market notices. We offer strategic advisory, repackaging our market research capabilities and product expertise for operators navigating consolidation.
When markets rally, we map vulnerabilities. When markets crash, we facilitate acquisitions. The decentralised AI sector combines bleeding-edge speculation with enterprise infrastructure potential. Maximum distress, maximum consolidation opportunity.
Our thesis: In ecosystems built on “WAGMI” delusion, someone should profit from “NGMI” reality. That’s us.