The 101 for Crypto Asset Managers

In the first part of this series of essays I covered the importance of safety and security when interacting with blockchain protocols. Today I will cover the tools that I use to track the portfolio of assets that I manage. Some of these tools perform multiple functions over and above simple portfolio management, but for now I will focus on their basic tracking utility for the sake of simplicity.

Crypto asset ownership has grown exponentially in recent years. As the number of cryptocurrencies, decentralized applications, and non-fungible tokens has ballooned, managing a diverse portfolio of digital holdings has become increasingly complex. In the early days I used to track my assets manually via spreadsheets. Thankfully we're well beyond that and specialized management platforms now offer very sophisticated solutions.

A key challenge for crypto investors and asset managers is maintaining oversight as their portfolios expand across multiple blockchains, protocols, and marketplaces. Without centralized tools, correlating price fluctuations, transaction histories, and asset locations across disparate ledgers is daunting. Compounding this, the volatile nature of crypto markets demands near real-time portfolio monitoring and balancing.

As the crypto economy matures, these specialized management tools will play an increasingly vital role in simplifying oversight and optimization of diversified digital asset portfolios. So without further ado and in no particular order lets run through my primary workflow of portfolio apps.

Zerion has emerged as a powerful tool for holistic digital asset portfolio management. Founded in May 2016, the platform aggregates data and services from across the Ethereum and decentralized application eco-system into a single interface. Its non-custodial model allows users to retain control of private keys while granting visibility of holdings.

Simply provide it with the wallet addresses or ENS names you want to manage and Zerion populates a unified portfolio view displaying balances, transaction histories and market valuations of cryptocurrencies, tokens and NFTs.

Where Zerion differentiates is through its integration of DeFi protocols. It sources liquidity and trading pairs from DEXes like Uniswap, empowering users to execute swaps and provide liquidity with one click. Advanced traders can also access yield strategies and indexes from platforms integrated into Zerion.

For active investors and traders, Zerion's "Explore" feature provides curated baskets of digital assets. Examples include large cap crypto indexes as well as thematic funds tracking Memecoin and GameFi sectors.

By presenting a unified interface spanning the breadth of the crypto economy, Zerion has significantly streamlined my portfolio management workflow. Its non-custodial model and integration of decentralized services represents an innovative approach that has made it the first app that I open when I start my day.

I am admittedly fairly new to the Inter-Blockchain Communication protocol, but the recent Celestia airdrop brought me screeching into it. Staking the $TIA token has resulted in receiving a few other airdrops and as such I needed a tool that provided me with the same functionality as Zerion does for Ethereum.

Keplr streamlines managing crypto assets by allowing users to hold tokens from across the Cosmos eco-system. As more projects interconnect using IBC technologies, Keplr ensures your portfolio can easily roam across those chains without friction.

Through the browser extension, mobile apps or web interface, the non-custodial Keplr wallet gives you complete control of your assets. You can perform actions like sending, receiving and swapping tokens with just a few clicks.

One of the primary use cases for tokens in the IBC is staking. The Keplr dashboard integrates staking support for any compatible projects allowing you to participate in on-chain governance as well as earn and claim the staking rewards.

For those holding assets on multiple blockchains, Keplr brings order to the chaos of juggling different wallets. Its dashboard provides a single place to monitor your portfolio's performance, transaction history and asset distribution across IBC chains.

Frankly, the quality of the Keplr dashboard is impressive. I sincerely hope that other portfolio tracking tools like Zerion add similar functionality as the usefulness and design of Keplr is well worth emulating.

One of the issues I run into as an asset manager in the crypto space is that some of the tokens and coins don't show up in my primary Zerion dashboard. This is usually because the project is very new and the developers haven't added it to the list of tracked tokens.

Zerion has a policy of only tracking tokens that appear in multiple public token tracking lists such as coingecko.com. This makes sense as Zerion is trying to present itself as a more professional tool and wants to minimise exposing its users to the riskier and more degenerate parts of the cryptosphere.

That's all well and good but that does mean that there are times where assets that I manage aren't visible to me. To get around this I use multiple portfolio tracking tools similar to Zerion. I won't go into any detail about them here as they are basically the same product, but I would advise anyone entering the Crypto Asset Management game to use multiple tools to ensure that non of the assets you are managing fall through the cracks. Here is a short list of my recommended products. These are all active parts of my daily workflow.

https://zapper.xyz/
https://rhino.fi/
https://debank.com/

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