Fomo could help you track KOL moves

This is a segment from The Drop newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe.

Wondering what your fave crypto influencer is buying and selling? Fomo could help paint that picture — at least a little bit.

“The name Fomo for us is very subversive,” Fomo co-founder Paul Erlanger tells me.

Fomo is an upcoming SocialFi and crypto trading app (Kaito’s CEO is an investor). It tracks what signed-up users are doing with their assets. It’ll have a lot of “attention-based assets,” as Erlanger puts it, but it’s not just for memecoins. 

“We’re not a memecoin-trading app. The goal is to be something a lot larger,” he said.

Fomo is planning a real-time feed showing data on users’ trades, tokens, what they’ve been holding or selling over time, and more. If you choose to look at a token, you’ll see which of your “friends” are holding that token and how much.

They’re going to pull from internal data as well as broader financial data so that you’re well-aware of broader happenings too, like federal interest rates or other relevant pieces that could help inform your next sell or buy. 

Wallets on Fomo are non-custodial, meaning you hold the keys to your own crypto. While some builders believe that custodying others’ crypto is easier for newcomers, many crypto believers — myself included — see non-custodial wallets as an integral, critical part of the crypto ethos and experience.

“I think the non-custodial experience will win, and that’s kind of our advantage to Robinhood,” Erlanger said. 

Fomo won’t be able to identify external or additional wallets at first, so they’ll only be able to track what people are doing via Fomo itself. That means Fomo users could be posturing as buying or selling a token from their Fomo profile, but could be doing the opposite on a secret wallet — so take the data you can see with a couple grains of salt.

But the team is considering a way to provide even more data, like tracking wallets and tying them to various users so you can get a fuller picture of what people are doing.  

The Fomo team is planning to launch its beta in three weeks, the founders tell me. They’re planning to test it first with up to 10,000 users. In about six to eight weeks from now, we could see a full public launch.

Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:

• Blockworks Daily: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.
• Empire: Start your day with top crypto insights from David Canellis and Katherine Ross.
• Forward Guidance: Explore the growing intersection between crypto, macroeconomics, policy and finance with Ben Strack, Casey Wagner and Felix Jauvin.
• 0xResearch: Get alpha directly in your inbox — market highlights, charts, degen trade ideas, governance updates, and more.
• Lightspeed: All things Solana, in your inbox, every day from Jack Kubinec and Jeff Albus.
• The Drop: The newsletter for crypto collectors and traders, covering games, tokens, apps, memes and more.