In January 2026, the digital asset market seemed to be suddenly awakened by some mysterious frequency after a long hibernation, with one piece of data triggering widespread investor attention in the Web3 industry: the social media account X (formerly Twitter) @ant_fun_trade, with the 'Ant' as its totem, saw its follower count undergo a nearly 'violent' vertical leap from thousands to 500,000 in just three weeks at the beginning of 2026.

Having completed a multi-million dollar Series B funding round, secured official support from the Solana Foundation, and launched social live streaming features... ANT.FUN not only instantly swept through major crypto communities from North America and Europe to Southeast Asia, but also unquestionably became the hottest and most widely discussed blockchain star project since the beginning of 2026. At this moment, whether it's a traditional CEX giant or a rising star DEX, everyone had to take notice of this group of giant ants that were swiftly 'moving mountains' globally.

This was not a coincidence marketing miracle. Behind this explosion was a seasoned ToB veteran's stern reflection on the global financial order.

Chapter 1: Escaping the 'Saline-Alkaline Land' — A Veteran's Web3 Expedition

To understand ANT.FUN's explosion, one must first understand its mastermind — Shaun.

In an industry like Web3 with an average age of less than 25, Shaun, in his 40s, belonging to the post-80s generation, appeared as a kind of outlier emanating the 'smell of the battlefield,' leading an engineering team with an average age of 95.

Prior to founding ANT.FUN, he had deep roots in the Chinese ToB (Enterprise Services) track, successfully serving as a chairman to take the company to the NEEQ Innovations tier.

"Doing ToB in China is more like farming in a 'saline-alkaline land,'" this was Shaun's opening statement in a widely circulated internal sharing session. Shaun had compared his own team with a Silicon Valley team across the ocean: the same underlying AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) technology, the same intensity of overtime work, and even his own team's engineering capabilities slightly surpassed. However, in the capital market, domestic ToB companies faced a logical dilemma — the capital market anchored very low valuations to the B-end value. This led to a situation where domestic AI companies often fell into a 'higher revenue, no profit increase, valuation is the peak' deadly cycle.

"If you are engulfed in a local battlefield without global liquidity, even if you perform extremely well, your value will be capped," Shaun's reflection ultimately gave rise to ANT.FUN. In Shaun's view, blockchain is not a vague technical narrative but the only experimental field where top engineering capabilities can achieve 'value instantaneous pricing.' He led his engineering team, who had followed him for many years, with China's most mature internet user experience thinking and the most hardcore AI engineering capabilities, to launch a 'proselytizing' style attack on this market that still harbored biases and barriers.

Chapter 2: From "Tool" to "Brain" — The Trading Experience of AI Neuron Refactoring

In 2026, the decentralized exchange (DEX) space is not a barren land. The Hyperliquid tech stack remains strong, and performance has long evolved. However, they cannot solve a fundamental problem: How to enable ordinary people to think like professional traders?

A traditional DEX is like a cold digital workshop, where users need to look up complex on-chain explorers, search for messy intelligence on Twitter, and then miss fleeting opportunities in cumbersome signature confirmations. The frenzy around ANT.FUN is due to its complete overhaul of this logic. It is no longer a "ledger" but a "digital brain" integrated into the wallet.

The "quantum entanglement" of assets and information flow — this is the killer feature that has earned ANT.FUN rave reviews. Based on its self-developed AI engine, ANT.FUN has achieved a deep real-time correlation between information flow and user asset positions. If you hold a certain share of assets in the ANT.FUN wallet, you no longer need to search for news like finding a needle in a haystack. ANT.FUN's backend captures large on-chain movements or subtle policy deviations in a global financial center. The AI translates, summarizes, and delivers personalized notifications based on your position risk in seconds. This "spoon-fed" precise information gives retail investors, for the first time, a vision of information comparable to high-frequency trading institutions.

Shaun is well aware that to truly bring Web3 to the masses, the traces of "technology" must be erased. ANT.FUN has created a "seamless" self-custody solution through integration with top-notch security architecture. In the bull market surge at the beginning of 2026, this "pick up and invest, put down and it's self-custody" convenience became a key factor attracting millions of new users.

Chapter 3: Red Bull Strategy + Multilingual Localization — "Traffic Nuclear Fusion"

If AI is ANT.FUN's muscle, then its marketing logic is the flapping wings.

Why could @ant_fun_trade attract global attention in January 2026? This is thanks to Shaun's "Red Bull Strategy."

In Shaun's view, cryptocurrency is fundamentally an industry about "energy, adventure, and ultimate efficiency." Therefore, ANT.FUN's brand image has never been as conservative as traditional financial institutions but is full of the tension of extreme sports. They sponsor wingsuit flying, sponsor deep-sea diving, and convey the spirit of "moving mountains like ants" to the younger generation through visually impactful videos.

What makes it even more explosive is the capital power behind it. In October 2025, ANT.FUN completed its B1 round of financing led by mimStream Investment. As a VC firm deeply knowledgeable about the underlying logic of social media and the internet, mimStream's affiliated forces include top giants in the live streaming field, such as the Me One Li Jiaqi Team and Fan Deng Reading Club.

Shaun also set his sights on the global market. "Our product can achieve multi-language translation, enhance user experience, truly enabling Vietnamese users to receive timely and accurate information flow just like English and Chinese users, achieving 'information equity'." He introduced that ANT.FUN has a presence in Malaysia, Vietnam, Argentina, Europe, and North America, also recruiting many local market partners to achieve global operations through compliance, local community, and brand promotion, balancing team size and operating costs.

This cross-border, cross-regional collaboration had a chemical reaction in January 2026. When @ant_fun_trade posted a dynamic, through various traffic matrices, this information was no longer confined to the small circle of the crypto community but quickly spread to the mainstream financial population and even trendsetters. This "social traffic + professional trading" play brought a dimensionality reduction impact to the crypto industry.

Chapter 4: The Shield of Compliance — Gracefully Dancing in the Narrow Gate of Regulation

2026 is the "Compliance Year" of the Web3 industry. With the impending U.S. Cryptocurrency Clarity Act, those naked swimmers are being abandoned by the tide.

ANT.FUN's ability to explode at this point is not only due to traffic but also to those heavy licenses. Behind the surge in fans is the full implementation of ANT.FUN's global compliance system.

According to the latest reports, ANT.FUN has officially obtained a Canadian MSB (Money Services Business) license. This admission certificate issued by FINTRAC signifies that its Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and Counter-Terrorist Financing (CTF) system has reached the standards of international mainstream banks. Moreover, ANT.FUN has also completed compliance filings for STO and RIA (Registered Investment Advisor) under the U.S. SEC framework. This hardcore "licensed operation" attitude has enabled a large amount of previously wait-and-see institutional funds and family offices to find a compliant entry point.

Chapter 5: Who is the True King of DEX? — Reshaping the Value Axis

In the opening act of 2026, it is inevitable that people will compare ANT.FUN with predecessors like Hyperliquid. Compared to Hyperliquid's overly hardcore, even somewhat aloof "tech-savvy" temperament, ANT.FUN appears to be more "in tune with human nature." Hyperliquid wins in trading volume, but ANT.FUN wins in traffic entry.

Shaun said in an interview, "We are not here to build a better exchange; we are here to build a better wallet. Trading is just a side effect of a good wallet."

This logic was validated by the market in January 2026. It marked the end of the era where "only geeks could use DEX" and ushered in a new era of "AI-assisted, social-integrated, and deep-trading" experience. The rising fan curve on the X platform also reflected the resurgence of its ANB token's value.

Shaun continues to embody his characteristic style of being understated and practical. For him, the explosive start of 2026 was just the beginning. In the eyes of these ant-like movers of mountains, although the towering peak of "traditional finance" may seem daunting, in the face of AGI-driven consensus, anything is possible.

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