This year will be remembered as the year of airdrops. Clearly if you have never taken an airdrop you cannot have the slightest idea of what we are talking about. The real airdrops in DeFi are not the $5-10 ones and above all they are not raffle giveaways. Users simply interact with platforms or chains that do not have their Governance token and on an unspecified day they could be rewarded. You should keep in mind, however, that nothing is guaranteed. 70-80% of airdrops are huge opportunities to increase your stock for the bull run, however there are also airdrops that can be disappointing. For example, Eigenlayer, a restaking platform, was the protagonist of one of the most disappointing airdrops of the year 2024 on April 29th. Also in recent days, two other protocols have greatly disappointed expectations: Kamino (Lending platform on Solana) and Renzo Protocol (platform of restaking connected to Eigenlayer). However, late 2023 and early 2024 released absolutely huge airdrops: Tia, Dym, Jupiter, Starknet, Aevo, Pyth, Purr (memecoin for those who have used Hyperliquid), Wormhole and Saga. Personally from these airdrops I have received a minimum of 2k up to almost 10k (Wormhole). You shouldn't underestimate airdrops because for minimal expenses (fees) or tokens you are holding on exchanges you could receive huge bags.
SANCTUM AND LIQUID STAKING
This Liquid Staking platform ( Sanctum ) on Solana is very interesting because with the introduction of points and gamification it seems to have the firepower to release a truly huge airdrop. Sanctum is an aggregator of validator nodes on Solana. Airdrop could be similar to that of Jito Network. At the end of 2023, Jito Network became the protagonist of one of the largest airdrops in history. Basically it was enough to keep 1 $Sol (at the time around $50) in staking for 3 months to receive an airdrop in JTO tokens of around 15k (yes, you understood correctly. Around 15k at least!).
What Sanctum does through its platform is allow the trading of these $Sol derivatives. You sell 0.20 $Sol and get 0.20 $BonkSol or 0.20 $JupSol (example). These are not altcoins or memecoins, they are simply liquid tokens that track the price of $Sol.
How do they work? If you stake your $Sol on the Jupiter Aggregator validator you get $JupSol which is an interest bearing token (it accrues income in your wallet and you can sell it at any time on a dex). If you sell 1 $Sol for 1.10 $JupSol you will have the volatility of the price of $Sol + staking income (around 7.5%).
HOW TO PARTICIPATE IN THE AIRDROP
Sanctum in its gamification program called "Wonderland" (ok, the name brings back bad memories) aggregates 18 $Sol liquid token:
-JucySol
-JupSol (Jupiter Aggregator)
-BonkSol
-Dsol (Drift Protocol)
-HubSol
-CompassSol
-PathSol
-StrongSol
-StakeSol
-Inf (Sanctum liquidity token for Sol)
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Each of these is a validator node on the Solana blockchain. You stake $Sol and receive their liquid derivative (directly in the wallet and you can sell it at any time for $Sol, $Usdc or whatever you want!).
How does Sanctum work? If you hold these tokens (at least 0.10 $Sol) you earn XP and therefore points. When you hold at least 0.10 $Sol of one of these liquid derivatives in your wallet, you receive a "pet". Basically you sell at least 0.10 $Sol for 0.109 $JupSol (example), you get a $JupSol + pet (this increases XP and level). They will also evolve.
If you are wondering beacause my Inf is at level 73 and the others at lower levels, it essentially depends on 2 reasons:
1) I've been holding Infinitie ( $Inf ) for several months (it was the only derivative present on Sanctum before this gamification)
2) Infinitie has greater quantities than the other 17 pets (all varying from 0.15 to 0.59 Sol)
Why do I own larger quantities of $Inf? Because it is Sanctum's liquid staking token! However, I believe that the more pets you keep, the greater the airdrop will be!
You can have 1 pet and up to 18 pets (essentially have at least 0.10 $Sol for each token present on Sanctum). You could also buy these derivatives on Jupiter Aggregator. I'm accumulating as many points as possible because it seems like a really interesting gamification model. It doesn't matter where you swap your $Sol, you could do it on Sanctum or Jupiter Aggregator. You can buy/sell these tokens on both platforms.
Today it is possible to accumulate XP and level up only by holding these tokens in the wallet. This is not a game. Remember that you can take your $Sol back at any time! Furthermore, if you decide to unstake, your pets and XP points will remain.
Are there any risks? Where you see the "blue check", the liquid staking tokens are verified so the risks should be close to 0 or in any case very low (keep in mind that for example Jupiter or Drift are platforms that have been active for years so they are risk-free). Obviously, however, if you decide to join you should still do your research (DYOR).
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