Many people only think that a decline in the coin price constitutes a loss; in fact, the real deadliest way to lose is to buy in and get trapped immediately.

This is not alarmist talk. Just look at on-chain data—some coins may have a market cap that looks like several hundred million dollars, but the actual buy-side depth is terrifyingly thin. Once a large holder exits, the entire project can collapse in an instant.

**The Trap of Fake High Market Cap and Empty Cities**

There’s a project claiming to be the "next-generation public chain," with an FDV of up to one billion dollars and ranking in the top fifty. It sounds impressive. But on-chain data reveals the truth—yesterday’s actual turnover rate was less than 1%, and the buy order book depth at ±2% is only $50,000. What does this mean? As long as someone wants to sell $100,000 worth, the price can break through by more than 5% immediately.

This is a typical empty city. Venture capital holds 90% of the chips, high above, while retail investors are immersed in grand narratives. Entering is a dead end.

**Liquidity Traps in Project Halts**

Another risky type of project is those once considered DeFi blue chips. Github code commits have stopped two years ago. The community Discord now only has a few trapped retail investors comforting each other. Development has completely halted, and the ecosystem has long since cooled off.

Don’t be fooled by the name of such projects—they have long become investor graves. Liquidity disappears, trading depth dries up, and you can’t even escape.

Next time you pick a coin, don’t just look at market cap rankings and narrative stories. Open on-chain tools to check turnover rate, buy-sell order depth, code update frequency, and community activity. These data won’t lie—they determine whether you’re investing or gambling.