Binance IEO's latest project Hooked Protocol: Introduction, Advantages and Risk

Author: @CC99Carol

Preface

Recently, Binance announced the launchpad of its 29th project, Hooked Protocol (HOOK), which has not surprisingly generated a lot of buzz. The project’s first DApp, Wild Cash, became the only Web3 app in Indonesia to be ranked on Google Play for 9 consecutive days. And when Hooked Protocol was announced to be launched on the BNB chain, the price of BNB Token also increased by fifteen percent in one day.

Project Introduction

1、Introduction

Hooked Protocol is a community-driven Web3 gamified social learning platform designed with Token economics to enable its users to have a gamified learning experience while reaping the social benefits. Currently, Hooked Protocol has completed a seed round of funding from leading VCs like Binance Labs, A&T Capital and Sequoia Capital.

2、Economic model overview

1) Hooked Protocol uses a single token (HOOK) oriented structure, supported by the only token used in the ecosystem, HGT (Hooked Gold Token). Gold tokens earned through the game can be exchanged for uHGT through the Exchange at the top of the wallet page, and uHGT tokens can be exchanged for BUSD through the Swap function.

2) Currently, HOOK has a total mintage of 500,000,000 tokens, with 50,000,000 tokens in circulation online, accounting for 10% of the total mintage. The total number of tokens allocated to CoinA Launchpad is 25,000,000 HOOK (5% of the total token supply), private sales are allocated 100,000,000 HOOK (20% of the total token supply), team tokens are 20.00% of the total supply, ecosystem/treasury tokens are 30.00% of the total supply, and community tokens are 25.00% of the total supply. Right now Coin Launchpad is selling at 1 HOOK = $0.1 (BNB’s price will be determined before subscription).

3) HOOK is used as a governance token for the Hooked Protocol ecosystem for the following functions.

·Governance platform token for the Hooked ecosystem

·Access token for community events and exclusive NFT privileges

·HOOKs used for certain in-app purchases (game tools, secret boxes, etc.) will be destroyed to reduce the overall token supply

·Future Gas tokens for the Hooked Application Rollup Infrastructure

·Pledge reward program tied to platform profitability

·Application Infrastructure: Infrastructure integration to load more applications and businesses into the Web3 and Hooked ecosystem.

3. First application: Wild Cash

Hooked Protocol’s first pilot product is “Wild Cash”, which uses the Quiz-to-Earn mechanism. with over 2 million active users in Indonesia, Wild Cash allows users to experience gamified learning features, as well as earn coins through testing, invitations and mining.

The following is a list of product features currently available in the application.

·Quiz Earn: Users can earn their own token rewards while experiencing the Web3 learning experience.

·POWT (Proof of Work Time) mining game: A game designed to motivate users to contribute effort and time within the platform through the classic proof-of-work mechanism.

·Social referrals: Users build their Web3 social graph through sharing; they can also gain monetary benefits through their social connections.

·Pledge and swap: Users can own and store crypto assets in their wallets and then make their first crypto pledge and swap.

Reasons for the project’s interest

1、 Reasons for investment by capitalists

According to the limited known information, Hooked Protocol has completed a seed round of funding, and the list of its funders clearly shows eye-catching words such as Binance Labs, A&T Capital and Sequoia Capital. This has helped Hooked Protocol gain a lot of attention in a short period of time. Regarding Hooked Protocol, A&T Capital gave the following reasons for investment.

1) Application layer and customer acquisition are the future trend

A&T Capital believes that Hooked Protocol, which focuses on infrastructure, captures the trend of application layer and is expected to be accepted by the mainstream. Moreover, it combines the innovative mechanism of social profitability and gamified learning, and is capable of acquiring and retaining more users.

2) The combination of Hooked team and Binance ecosystem has a high probability of success

Hooked Protocol’s team has rich experience in 2C marketing and strong product capability, which can guarantee its quality to a certain extent. Moreover, the Binance ecosystem itself does not have Learn & Earn products that can resist fighting, so for Binance, the cooperation with Hooked Protocol is a win-win situation and has a high probability of success.

3) Clear development path

Hooked Protocol attracts users outside the circle by earning rewards for completing game content from the stage of single product platform to attract traffic for Web3 applications, and then to the stage of X-to-Earn aggregator, cooperating with other X-to-Earn to expand user base, and finally Hooked platform will lead users to other Web3 projects, including exchange, Gamefi, NFT, DAO, etc.

2、 Initial Token Offering Program (ieo)

1) Preparation Period 2022–11–24 00:00 (UTC) to 2022–12–01 00:00 (UTC): During this period, user BNB balances will be calculated on a daily hourly snapshot for 7 days. The average daily BNB balance calculated by the subscriber during this 7-day period will determine the maximum number of BNBs the subscriber can submit later.

2) Subscription Period 2022–12–01 06:00 (UTC) to 2022–12–01 09:00 (UTC): Subscription will be open for all eligible users for three hours at this time. Prior to submitting a BNB, users must also sign a token purchase agreement at the same time. Please note that once submitted, the user’s BNB will be locked and subsequently will not be able to redeem or access any other functions such as transfers, withdrawals or transactions until the final token distribution.

3) Calculation period 2022–12–01 09:00 (UTC) to 2022–12–01 10:00 (UTC): Subscription ends and token distribution calculation begins.

4) Final Token Allocation 2022–12–01 10:00 (UTC): The final token allocation for users will be calculated and the corresponding BNBs will be deducted from the number of BNBs locked by users. After the deduction, users’ HOOK and BNB tokens will be transferred to the spot wallet at the same time.

For the current status of the project itself and risk analysis

1、At present, Hooked Protocol’s only application, Wild Cash, is only hot in Indonesia and has not yet caused a big wave in the coin circle, so there are still doubts about the strength of the project itself, after all, only one application cannot show the content and advantages of the project itself. There may also be a certain possibility of brush volume. In Southeast Asia to make enough user volume to deceive investors andpartners is currently a conventional gamefi operation, but in fact the value of individual customers is extremely low. The core of gamefi is to see the external positive cash flow and sustainability, which has not been seen on Hooked, and its product power is difficult to judge for the time being.

2、Hooked Protocol is currently only released on the BNB chain. As we all know, the gas fee of BNB is relatively low, so the threshold is relatively low, and the value of a single user is low. Referring to the past experience of BNB chain projects, the whole is still in a mixed state, especially the gamefi quality is very low, so the confidence of the circle of people in the project itself is also greatly reduced.

3、The overall market is in a deep bear state, coupled with the FTX lightning incident, which makes the survival pressure of companies in the market become more. Therefore, Hooked Protocol’s capitalists are too anxious to endorse, do not rule out the risk of fund-raising, may also want to restore vitality by absorbing the funds that are not much in the market today, but also let outsiders think that it may not necessarily have long-term solid development.

4、According to some recent tweets, Hooked Protocol’s creative team may be of domestic origin, and there are some controversies, as a domestic project, often with a history of pursuing too fast cash, also makes investors begin to be cautious about it.

Reference

A&T Capital. A&T Family: Why did we invest in Hooked Protocol?[EB/OL]. 2022–09–14 [2022–11–27]. https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s?__biz=Mzk0MDI2ODg0Mw==&mid=2247485710&idx=1&sn=d079ca397f62e2a6478890646f84444d&chksm=c2e5054af5928c5c89e140d8cb642133c4019bb32784b1c0293eaffab00d15c5adfc5e5efe3d#rd.

Binance Research. Hooked Protocol (HOOK) [EB/OL]. November 23, 2022 [November 27, 2022]. https://research.binance.com/en/projects/hooked-protocol.