Dialogue Zhao Changpeng Heyi: In the future, people don't need to know about coin security

In 2013, the third year of Meituan's establishment, Meituan just finished the war of thousands of groups, covering 70 million consumers, and realized the first annual profit. In 2015, bytedance was in its third year, just breaking even, when it decided to go global and focus on short videos. In 2018, Pinduoduo, in its third year of existence, successfully listed on Nasdaq with an annual active buyer of 344 million and a market value of 24 billion US dollars.

And one month from now, Coin will celebrate his third birthday.

It is now the industry's biggest trading platform, with net profits of around $120m in the second quarter of 2019 * and now worth more than $2.4bn. (* According to the ratio of buyback and destruction in Taiwan dollar)

Like other industry disrupters, CoinMarketCap has built its own ecological map within three years, with 10 wholly-owned acquisitions and more than 20 investments. The total amount of investment and acquisition is expected to exceed 500 million US dollars. The acquisition of CoinMarketCap, a data collection platform, was exposed in April this year with 400 million US dollars.

In the first quarter of 2020, the total amount of investment and financing in the block chain industry was only about 800 million US dollars, and the acquisition of Coen accounted for half of the total amount of investment and financing in the industry in the first quarter.

At the same time, coin security is becoming more and more controversial. Coin, who has always taken a high-class route overseas, has also adopted the strategy of a well-dressed little sister. Co-founder He Yiya has been scolding "friends" on social media platforms almost every day.

The greater controversy is at the business level. Last year, CoinMarketCap also made its own leverage of "Diss". In addition, CoinMarketCap, the market platform with the largest traffic flow in the industry, was just mentioned in the first half of the year.

What makes us more puzzled is that in the bitcoin bear market, which should have passed smoothly, It was really worth the fanfare of marketing, acquisition and frenzily matching with friends and businesses. Do you have enough money to do whatever you want, or are you playing a big game?

In April this year, Legal BlockBeats interviewed Zhao Changpeng (hereinafter referred to as CZ) and He Yi, the two founders of Coen, and had an in-depth discussion with them on the future of Coen and the whole blockchain.

Playing and ecology

Rhythblockbeats: Coan is a very successful sailing company, but now the most successful sailing company in China should be toutiao. Today, the whole Bytedance system is valued at more than 150 billion DOLLARS. I found that no matter Zhang Yiming or Wang Xing, the top Internet entrepreneurs in China, they all follow the "unlimited game" approach, which has no boundaries and expands to all walks of life. But are today's developments too limited by the total market value of cryptocurrencies? Would COinstar have grown more in another industry? Do you feel like the ceiling of the industry is being hammered by Bitcoin?

CZ:I think it's the other way around, thanks to the rapid growth of Bitcoin and digital currencies. I admire Toutiao very much, but I don't think I'm better than them. I think the coin security has developed so fast in less than three years and is totally dependent on the development of the digital currency industry. Bitcoin doesn't limit our growth, it helps us grow.

What a:Tencent started in social, but it is more than social. Now Tencent has built a business empire integrating finance, games, entertainment and e-commerce. It is not only the mobile phone business itself that enables Xiaomi to reach the top of the mobile phone market. The ecosystem of "software + hardware + Internet services" is the internal driving force for xiaomi's rapid development.

There is a saying in the Internet field, "Application-oriented companies are worth billions, platform-oriented companies are worth billions, and eco-oriented companies are worth billions". A company wants to be strong, not by self-adaptation, but by expansion. Let own business from thin to sound, in order to remain invincible. For traditional Internet companies, the block chain industry is also.

Coinan is more about building a blockchain ecosystem with a global perspective and becoming a real infrastructure provider in the blockchain field.

Focusing on the trading business itself, we have completed the trading product line, launched contracts, C2C, bulk trading and other business areas, including options and mining pool business which will be launched soon (now it is launched). We have also made acquisitions on several larger platforms, such as WazirX, the largest bitcoin exchange in India. We are actively expanding legal tender channels around the world, and have opened more than 180 countries and regions.

Based on the vision of building blockchain ecology, in the past two years, we launched the first public welfare organization based on blockchain technology, Coin-An Charity Foundation, which made our contribution in the fight against the epidemic in Wuhan at the beginning of this year. It has launched The Yuan 'an Institute, which provides free blockchain and blockchain asset education resource center in 17 languages around the world. Coin-based chain was launched last year and developed a decentralized trading platform based on coin-based chain.

Rhythblockbeats: Apart from completing ecological construction through acquisition, top Internet companies also rely on internal innovation to achieve value iteration. For example, multiple product groups will be set up in Toutiao at the same time. It is very likely that the team next door is working on a product with millions of daily products. Money security also has an internal racing mechanism, the current effect?

What a:Coin security is a special management structure. We don't really want to give boundaries to employees. Let me give you an example. But at Coan, we want to maximize the value of each person. If you feel that no one is doing anything, or that others are not doing it as well as you, you rush to do it, and once you've done it, you're on your own.

This in the Chinese Internet industry, tencent is such, headlines, too, in the horse race mechanism, do a better job of that or get more resources in the race for the contract, we spent a month's time to look at the user's holding and feedback, finally from traditional financial team to get more support, but there are many other game can be run, experience of failure is also very important.

BlockBeats: Before, there was a sensational event in the industry, it was reported that CoinMarketCap (CMC), a data collection platform, was acquired by CoinMarketCap at a price of 400 million USD. Although the traffic of CMC is very large, is 400 million USD too expensive?

CZ:I can't comment on the price, but the figure is not accurate. All I can say is that we quoted the price only once, and since I volunteered the price, I certainly didn't think it was expensive. I've always appreciated CMC, so I offered a number that they wouldn't refuse. Everyone has different ways of seeing things. The traffic volume of CMC is the highest in the whole industry, and it is not one of them, but the liquidity is relatively low.

BlockBeats: As we all know, Nasdaq, in addition to its exchanges, is a media company that helps listed companies create information services, including an advertising screen known around the world. Do you also hope that CMC will be a part of the future media business of ECOwas when acquiring CMC, or what do you think CMC can bring to EcoWAS?

CZ:It is not necessary to say that CMC brings anything to currency security. What we consider is the value of CMC? What value can it bring to the industry? Can we make it more valuable?

Nasdaq itself has very low transaction fees, they make money by selling data, and Bloomberg's data business is very profitable. Our industry is relatively new, and some extended data businesses or content services are not mature, so I think their future value should be great, and there should be a lot of space for content data.

BlockBeats: At $400 million, it's the biggest acquisition in the Internet industry this year. After the acquisition, CMC founder Bradon Chez announced his departure, a takeover style that is reminiscent of BAT's practice of not allowing competitors to acquire rather than focusing on the development of the company itself.

CZ:The CMC team remains except Bradon, leaving him alone. He spent 7 years to bring CMC to this scale and wanted to have a rest. We didn't send him away. I really wanted him to stay.

We don't necessarily follow the acquisition style of Alibaba or Tencent. My idea is that we should help others grow. It makes sense for a platform to grow faster than the original way into an ecosystem.

In fact, CMC does not need to sacrifice their own value for currency security diversion. Currency security in the industry has been proven competitive. Each sub-business of Coinstar should grow independently, we will not sacrifice the growth of another business for the growth of one business.

Last year, it was revealed that FCoin was ranked the first among the CMC, and many small trading platforms in China bought it. In 2018, FCoin ranked the first among the CMC, and then FCoin exploded, which will inevitably affect many users who are diverted from CMC to FCoin. After the acquisition, will CMC still have such profitable behavior?

CZ:As far as I know, CMC does not sell ranking, I understand that they are very neutral, the trading platform reports their trading volume to them and then they rank. Therefore, FCoin, for example, should not pay a sum of money to CMC, but FCoin, because users will report high transaction volume after they brush up.

Are these diversion problems CMC? From the perspective of values, I think this kind of thing has nothing to do with CMC. It's like the media reporting on a project and then blaming the media for losing money after the user invested it. You can't say there's no responsibility to protect the community at all, but there are tradeoffs.

From my point of view, I want the team to solve their own problems. My suggestion is to conduct a quarterly user interview and ask the users to tell them what problems they want to solve. If the ranking mode is the most complained about problem by the users, then the team has the responsibility to solve it. The way I manage it doesn't mean I tell you what's wrong with you, tell you the solution, or just help you fix it. It doesn't. I always put users first and let them tell you what the problem is. I pay more attention to the market share and the number of users, which can be used to measure the ability of a team.

Yuan An founder Zhao Changpeng (CZ) photo source: Network

Rhythblockbeats: Coan has recently started the mining pool business. In fact, many trading platforms have launched the mining pool business for a long time, and coan just launched its mining business today (it has been online for over a month now). Is it because there is no increment in other businesses of Coin security that we are making these products?

CZ:I think there will be a lot of incremental digital currencies in the future, most of which are trading platforms of some scale, some of which were established in 2013 and 2014. At the beginning of Coin security, we were short of hands and could not do other things. We could only do a good job of one product first, then start the second one and expand in turn. Instead of one business growing and moving on to the next, each business has its own team.

Rhythblockbeats: You said before that Coinbase and Coinbase have different styles of play. Coinbase is compliant before growth, while Coinbase is growth before compliance. The story of Coinbase is that institutions only trade on compliance platforms, but there are actually many institutional traders trading on BitMEX. How do you see compliance now?

CZ:First of all, I need to make it clear that COinan has never been about growth before compliance, and coinan has been developing in compliance. We do play differently. Coinbase is big in the US, which accounts for 20% of global GDP, and Coinbase only focuses on the US market.

Coinan is available all over the world, but in regions with strong supervision and high compliance requirements, coinan will avoid it in the early stage of development, because the cost of compliance is too high, the preparation process may take a year, and the legal fee is tens of millions of dollars. Coinbase has been around since 2011, extending the compliance timeline.

Currency security is the beginning of the currency trading started, do not touch legal tender, so it is not limited by the state. There are only a small number of people in each country who use coinage, but we can grow 180 countries together. I didn't choose this strategy in particular, but it was the best strategy for Coinage at the time.

It is a false proposition that institutional users only trade in compliance exchanges. Institutions and individuals are not the same, the institution to trade stocks, can go to register a stock company; Institutions that trade digital currency can simply register a new company. Companies are infinite.

There are few licensed exchanges and high fees, such as the Bakkt. Institutions that really want to trade digital money can register a company anywhere, and they're smart enough to choose the most lucrative trading platform.

Before, when Wu Jihan was at the peak of Bitcoin, he once put forward a vision: In the future, Bitcoin will invest in 20-30 private central Banks that issue currency with blockchain technology. This is also the most ambitious story I have heard in the currency circle. What is the ultimate vision of Bitcoin?

CZ:I think the vision of COIN security is to provide liquidity and infrastructure services for the entire digital currency industry, but no one needs to know it is provided by coin Security.

You don't need to know which company built the road. Turn on the tap, and you don't need to know which company supplies the water. What I hope EcoWas can do is to provide some basic services across the industry and become a tool for others.

In the future, if you want to use digital currency, you may be able to go to any website to buy it, but the underlying liquidity of these websites is using the services of Coin Security, which you may not know.

Bitcoin and U.S. Stocks

No one will forget that the secondary market disaster has caused the market to rethink the nature of Bitcoin in the minds of the market.

From peer-to-peer payments to value stores to digital gold, bitcoin is now marketed as a commodity. Bitcoin's price movements between March and June now follow U.S. stocks almost perfectly, and are part of a global secondary market.

And when will the currency as a commodity, its disadvantages are more obvious, circles, amount, and the attention of hot money is far from being compared with the traditional secondary market, is the most intuitive feelings, amazon, Facebook, Tesla's stock has hit a record high, and the encryption of the industry leading currency COINS and etheric fang nearly a month extremely stable and inventory in the game in the field of Defi.

BlockBeats: You've been calling for bitcoin on Twitter. What do you think bitcoin is now? Is religion a commodity?

CZ:If I choose between the two, I think it's a belief in the long-term development of Bitcoin. The traditional definition of bitcoin is very limited. It's like looking at a car and discussing what kind of horse it is. Although the car functions as a horse, it's not a horse.

Rhythm BlockBeats: Have you been looking at other assets lately? Like the recent boom in crude oil or the U.S. stock market?

CZ:I'm probably unique in that 99.9 percent of my assets are in digital currency, and my situation is different. Even if the digital currency drops 90 percent now, the rest of my digital assets are still alive if they are converted into cash. I have better luck. I can carry the wave.

BlockBeats: So Coinstar won't be thinking about competing in other commodity markets?

CZ:It's not necessarily, we don't touch that much, but it's more likely to be the pass-through of traditional financial assets. Trading crude oil and gold directly may not be clear, but using token as a proxy is possible.

Beat BlockBeats: Some time ago, Wu Jihan said in a conversation that he was not as enthusiastic about Bitcoin as before. I haven't communicated with Him, but I guess he may think the odds of Bitcoin are not as high as before. What do you think of Wu Jihan's opinion?

CZ:He must have his own data to make this judgment. Everyone has different opinions. I think bitcoin has a lot of room to rise. The first is that only one in a thousand people in the world owns digital money, and most of them have only a few assets in digital money. In this respect, there is still a lot of room for development of digital money.

Second, we cannot use traditional assets to value innovative products, just as we cannot use the taxi market to estimate didi's potential market, didi can tap demand outside the taxi market.
So I think there's still a lot of room in the digital money market, but it's not bitcoin, which is another topic, but we don't see an alternative yet.

He Yi, co-founder of Coin Security, photo source: Network

Subsidence and controversy

Since this year, coin in the Chinese Internet reputation is not good, experienced several crisis public relations. In the marketing of Chinese Internet, the practice of coin security is different from that of foreign countries. In foreign countries, coin security is displayed as "high and high", while in China, start takes the so-called "sinking" route: he yi often disputes with rival products in the community, and recruits a group of girls with bright appearance to do community customer service. The move has also triggered criticism within the industry, which sees the currency as a source of stigma.

Rhythm BlockBeats: how do you see the relationship between trading platform and traffic, currency in painting style is becoming more and more different at home and abroad, the foreign currency remains strong and professional, before you accept an interview with bloomberg, to the acquisition, investment can be as access to and operation of traffic, but in domestic, currency, are also beginning to start the community little sister, remember last coin Ann also recruit a group of G5 ivy league big customer manager, is a high level of football in China is it won't work?

What a:In any market, to be successful, you have to know your audience, so I used to boast"& have spentCurrency an chief customer service& have spent "", but as the business line of Coin is getting longer and longer, the team is getting bigger and the time is getting less and less. Although I still spend some time in the early morning to see what the community is talking about and what people are focusing on, it is really far from the early days. We even in the Chinese community for a period of aphasia, manpower is the most limited, our marketing and operations plus major account department only one employee in the Chinese currency circle media communication.

At the end of last year we've added a few big customer manager, because money user across more than 180 countries around the world, the bilingual or multilingual is the basic requirement, elite school English at least, have certain work experience is required in the financial sector, but in general agency concerns different between users and the community, they pay more attention to the order frequency, financial products, rates, currency Ann's big client teams spread around the world at present, I often receive feedback on their thank users, I am very fond of "all things", the growth of large customers and institutional users is proof of that.

Community user concerns not the same, we all know that all things in the rumor spreading fastest, community and social media aphasia is brought about by the constant black draft attack and stigmatized, and a lot of rumors actually withstand scrutiny, such as: money short, platform have a certain scale users will want to see the dollar price of a bear market comes, poundage is not sweet? The industry is 10 times bigger, the users 10 times more income 10 times more, who wants to destroy their own job?

We miss the recruitment of new media marketing team sisters, on the one hand, because this year history of online marketing will become a global business an inflection point, and the online community will become mainstream, weibo, WeChat, live the high frequency of interaction will become the norm, we only predict the future, on the other hand, the coin Ann in the Chinese community in the past seem to be very "cold", because we don't have hands, open recruitment after received a lot of resumes and peer recommendations, the same treatment can find beauty and spelling of little sister again, I why want to find a pick my feet man pretend to be the little sister? Of course, we also welcome talented people to pick their feet. We are always open to talents.

BlockBeats: Since the start of this year, COen has suffered a lot of PUBLIC relations crises. We have also seen clarification from Coen, including many malicious attacks, especially in the Field of Chinese Internet. Is there any mistake in the previous market public relations strategy?

What a:I think we in Chinese Internet circles, already can't use mistake to describe, do not completely, not because we value, no man, is also not to budget, we don't spend money on PR, international and we are in this world, a group of idealism to acme, on the one hand and lack of status, for an example of extreme; Last year we had only one person in charge in all of Latin America.

Chinese Internet market is more like a "river's lake", where there are people, there are rivers and lakes, and all disputes are based on interests, the bottom decides the head. We haven't the contract products, there is no discrepancy gold outside, most users abroad, you can understand to delimit jiang and rule, each other, but in the last year we started products began to contract, also opened the otc, opinion and negative evaluation and was positively than our business development, business is getting better and better, public opinion is also more fierce, we contract govinda, public opinion of the situation and to spread rumors in the group to worry oneself sick, for I experienced thousands of information war, was in the horizon.

BlockBeats active BlockBeats is really strange. It is rare to see co-founders in other industries have to fight against rival products in various user groups all day long. All of them are founders and co-founders with tens of billions of valuation.

What a:In this world, some people live in high-rise buildings, some people in deep trenches, to see the world's inequality, know who they are, what they want to enjoy their life.

I never think of myself as a "big guy" or how successful Coan is. When I speak in a group, No matter who the other party is, I am in a relatively equal dialogue atmosphere. Therefore, I care about every suggestion that is criticized or praised coan. Because I care, I am willing to take the time to listen to the advice of a person who may be inexperienced and penniless. I also want to take the time to popularize common sense. At this point, it would have been hard to imagine a decade ago that the President of the United States would "tweet the country" on social media. This is the trend of the world.

I think on the mentality and way of life, I did not change over the years, including the attitude to the world, but with the community to appear more and more small ma3 jia3, water army after the systematic manipulation of public opinion, I think the time cost is a little high, the community from the communication is a "hot media", everyone can get some information quickly, but the fastest spreading and some effective tend to be cowards heard rumors, compared to other industries, block chain circle and small lot, if the market down stock fight conflict often becomes more intense.

If I am still active in the community, these communication into others "popular" inertial path and manipulate public opinion field, I will think of this communication has been relatively invalid, this time I just feel, in fact, I resort can communication and hiring a dozen people to do community service, they can do better than me, because I too direct communication way, don't like me is directly said.

Welcome to join the official BlockBeats community:

Telegram Subscription Group: https://t.me/theblockbeats

Telegram Discussion Group: https://t.me/BlockBeats_App

Official Twitter Account: https://twitter.com/BlockBeatsAsia