Bitget was founded in 2018, making it five years old this year. We have been steady and steady, and have gone through all kinds of troubles in the encryption circle. Looking back on the past five years, there have been ups and downs, but we are still confident in the development prospects of the industry. On the occasion of this fifth anniversary, I hope to share with you five stories behind the growth, review the past, and summarize experience. I hope that in this bear market, I can give everyone in the industry who are still struggling a little confidence, and believe that the hard work in the past will not be wiped out. Let’s live up to it and wait for a new ray of dawn together.

Entrepreneurship encounters a bear market, perseverance and choices

Most of the Bitget founding team comes from the financial industry. In 2015, they began to get involved in fund investment, focusing on the TMT industry, and occasionally came into contact with blockchain entrepreneurial projects. At that time, the blockchain in the eyes of the financial world was a “tulip bubble.” Back in the summer of 2018, Ethereum brought about the encryption craze. Early members of Bitget began to study the Bitcoin white paper and the Ethereum ecosystem. They were shocked by these novel ideas and began to believe that crypto assets would play an important role in the future world. , even the Unbank group can benefit from it equally. Seeing the development prospects and huge opportunities in the cryptocurrency industry, our founding team used approximately several million dollars of their own funds to start their business.

Everything is difficult at the beginning. Our start can be said to be hellish. We encountered a bear market when we started our business. Both spot and contract have been tried, and many subdivisions have been explored, but there has not been much improvement. At that time, the companys team was small, only dozens of people. At the end of 2018, we continued to explore the development direction of the contract. At that time, we found that the team was too small to take care of both spot and contracts. Later, after discussion, several founders decided to selectively abandon some businesses and concentrate their energy and resources on developing key businesses. Therefore, we suspended the spot business in 2019. . The company has been losing money for a year, and there is not much startup capital left.

The turning point came in July 2019. We studied the market demand and found that users are actually very interested in forward contracts, and officially launched this type of product. This innovative product was combined with the market conditions at that time, and the transaction volume exceeded 100 million US dollars. That night, the breakthrough was celebrated remotely, even though the team was spread out across the country. After more than a year of entrepreneurship, Bitget has finally started to make a profit. In order to thank employees for their persistence, the company issued bonuses and continued to improve its products, business, market, back office and personnel and legal affairs.

Every time I listen to old employees talk about this experience, I feel like they have also experienced the challenges and struggles in the early days of starting a business. Perseverance is the pillar of belief, but knowing how to make choices is also one of the key factors for Bitgets survival. Concentrate our firepower, target the contract business, and pay attention to user needs, allowing us to take advantage of the east wind when the market rises in 2019. By 2021, we believed that the foundation of the contract business was gradually solidified, so we restarted the spot business. The team works quietly like a sweeping monk and sticks to their faith.

Retreat and practice to optimize follow-up products

If Bitgets growth path can be compared to a climb, then the success of the positive contract in 2019 can be regarded as the first milestone in our climb. It is like a solid stepping stone that stabilizes our feet. The subsequent launch of the copy trading function is like a trekking pole during climbing. After continuous optimization and polishing, this function has gradually become our trump card product.

As one of the industry practitioners, Bitget has been committed to popularizing encryption knowledge. However, we have also found that some users who are new to the industry need more time to understand and learn the crypto industry and how to trade. They can only try and make mistakes in transactions again and again. Some people exchange losses for experience; others leave because of this and brand the encryption industry as Scam.

Bitget hopes to change that. We think it would be great if experienced traders could share their market-proven trading strategies, and newbies could easily and quickly follow and imitate these strategies, applying tools originally intended for professional investors. A win-win situation. Therefore, since the end of 2019, we began to develop the copy trading function and decided to vigorously promote this product to build a bridge between mature traders and beginners. In May 2020, this feature was officially launched. After going online, it immediately attracted hundreds of traders and was warmly welcomed by users.

Although the initial attempt had good results, the follow-up function of the first version still had many shortcomings and needed improvement. At that time, our start-up team started to encounter a bottleneck period after promoting copy trading for a period of time, because at that time, the function of copy trading was not as smooth to use as it is now. Only users who were very interested in this function would spend time studying it. , others find it complicated and give up. Some users who kindly recommended us also complained, Your follow-up products are useful for investment, but not very easy to use. As the saying goes, “Simplicity comes from high road”, we believe that if a product is to be truly popular, it needs to be relevant and simple and easy to use.

Therefore, on a weekend at the end of 2020, our management team and product leader conducted a retreat practice in a remote hotel to conduct a systematic study and summary of the follow-up function. Within a few days, we repeatedly discussed the retention of different functions, and finally decided to delete some uncommon functions in copy trading to make the copy trading product more user-friendly, simpler and more intuitive. Since then, we have been continuously optimizing and iterating the copy trading function, expanding it to the spot copy function, and launching supporting tools such as Strategy Square to provide users with a richer trading experience.

Empathize with Messi’s growth path and watch his peak moments together

In 2022, the World Cup has become a globally watched event, and major encryption companies are actively cooperating with football teams or football stars to further promote the popularity of the encryption industry and enhance brand awareness. At that time, Bitgets business had grown to a certain scale, and we were working hard to build a brand, hoping to let more people know about the encryption industry and understand our mission and goals. So we decided to partner with one of footballs top stars.

We chose Messi for two key reasons: his reputation and his upbringing. Messis achievements and abilities are best proved through wonderful games and trophies. However, we value his reputation more, as he has maintained his image as a good father, husband and captain over the years. More importantly, we see the shadow of Bitgets own growth in Messis growth experience.

In fact, in addition to Messi, we also considered other national football teams at that time. Other football teams are also strong and are expected to win the Hercules Cup again. After learning more about different teams, among the many options, we finally chose Messi. When discussing within our team, we decided to do a small survey and found that many of our employees are fans of Messi and sympathize with him.

Although Messi has football talent, his physical condition is not outstanding. During his childhood, he faced many setbacks: his family was poor and his physical condition was insufficient. However, he not only overcame the adverse conditions, but also became a generation of football superstar through hard training and strong willpower, inspiring and warming countless people. This story has many similarities with the entrepreneurial experience of our exchange. We were founded during the bear market in 2018 and have gone through hard times. We have not experienced huge dividend periods, nor have we had smooth days. Every step is full of challenges and tests. However, we persevered through the baptism of market fluctuations and gradually developed and grew. Just like a small town youth like Messi, he developed outstanding skills through devilish training.

His tenacity, struggle and constant self-transcendence are the values ​​that Bitget advocates and pursues. The partnership with Macy’s not only helps raise Bitget’s profile, it also allows us to communicate the potential and future of the crypto industry to a wider audience. This collaboration represents Bitget’s firm belief that in the future crypto world, we must not only pursue commercial success, but also uphold noble values, grow and influence the world like Messi.

The World Cup final between Argentina and France is still exciting in retrospect. When the game reached the 77th minute and Argentina led France 2-0, I felt that the game was settled. But in the 78th minute, Mbappe scored with a penalty shot. In the 81st minute, France threatened again. Mbappe completed wonderful cooperation with his teammates and succeeded in volleying, tying the score at 2-2. In the end, Argentina won the penalty shootout and won the Hercules Cup.

Messis experience of leading the Argentina team to win the World Cup in Qatar is just like our entrepreneurial process at Bitget. It was full of passion, emotion, and tears. It is an unforgettable moment in a lifetime. This story inspires us and tells us that no matter how big the challenge is, as long as we persevere, we will eventually realize our dreams. Just like Messi, we are chasing our own glory.

After the FTX crisis, sincerity earns customer trust

In 2022, the encryption industry staged a series of dazzling dramas, the most eye-catching of which was the fall of FTX. The rumored acquisition of Binance and FTX set off a fierce war of words, and FTX’s eventual bankruptcy was the climax of the climax.

On November 8, I was on the east coast of the United States, preparing to fly to London to attend the token 2049 conference. While I was preparing, a news message Binance Announces Acquisition of FTX was pushed on my phone. I quickly browsed the messages on Twitter of SBF and CZ, and they had different opinions. SBFs words seemed to announce that the acquisition had been completed, but CZ did not confirm it. At that moment, I realized a key issue: FTXs problem might be more serious than everyone thought, otherwise SBF would not seek cooperation from CZ, who originally provoked this turmoil. I immediately sent out a tweet sharing our views.

https://twitter.com/GracyBitget/status/1590042346632409088?s=20

Before boarding the plane, I asked the team to follow up on this incident, especially asking the production and research team to track the reserve certificate and other matters. During the more than six-hour flight, I repeatedly thought about one question: If FTX really goes bankrupt, where will the crypto industry go? As a centralized exchange, how should we regain our footing and regain the trust of users?

After arriving in London, I attended the Token 2049 conference, along with representatives from exchanges such as Binance’s Helen Hai and Gemini. At that time, the incident between Binance and FTX was still not clear, and even Helen Hai could not provide a definite response. We received so many questions from the audience that it was one of the biggest challenges I’ve faced since joining the crypto industry.

Given that FTX has been having serious liquidity problems and trying to hide them, we decided to take a series of measures to improve the transparency of exchange assets and help rebuild trust and confidence in the market and users. On November 9, 2022, we announced that Bitget’s proof of reserves would be published within a month, and subsequently fulfilled this promise. In December, we launched a Certification of Reserves page, which provides detailed disclosure of our reserves. At the same time, we have increased the original protection fund of US$200 million to US$300 million to provide users with a higher level of protection. In addition, we established a $5 million Builders Fund to support users such as KOLs, KOCs, and traders who were affected by the collapse of FTX.

Through this series of initiatives, we hope to let users and the market understand that there are still active builders like Bitget in the market. In the darkest moments, we need to unite and help each other more, and firmly believe that the dawn is coming. Our efforts have been successful, and in such a volatile market environment, Bitgets user base continues to grow and users trust in us continues to solidify.

Marathon mentality to go the longer distance

As a long-distance runner, I enjoy the solitude and reflection time that comes with running alone. The crypto industry is the fastest growing and most fast-paced of the fields I’ve ever been involved in. In this industry, a company often rises and falls overnight, or even in a flash.

In this environment, it is particularly important to maintain our original aspirations, because only by sticking to the right path can we not lose our direction. Many people have asked me how Bitget became the top trading platform in the world. I think there are two directions worth pondering: what we do and how we do it.

Today, competition among crypto trading platforms is no longer limited to the platform itself, but extends to the entire crypto ecosystem. Therefore, in addition to centralized exchanges, we also plan to extensively deploy diversified businesses, including decentralized wallets, investment incubation, media development and other fields.

It is crucial to accurately grasp the direction of the industry, which is a key prerequisite for the companys survival and development. However, in my opinion, in the crypto world filled with top players and smart people, attitude and mentality may be more important.

During my time working at Bitget, I deeply felt that we have been moving forward with the mentality of a marathon runner. I once discussed the FTX controversy with an industry veteran. He commented: FTX is like a 100-meter sprinter. It is fast, outstanding, and amazing. However, the road to corporate development is more than 100 meters long. Likewise, with derivatives Starting out, Bitget is more like a marathon runner. It may not be dazzling at first, but composure, patience and persistence will forge real value in the baptism of time.” I am happy that people have this view of Bitget, because we have always We uphold the concept of long-termism and firmly believe that this is an essential quality for successful platforms and projects in the industry.

There is a happiness paradox in psychology, that is, it is often difficult to achieve happiness directly, and happiness is more like a by-product of hard work. The satisfaction you get when you go all out, insist on doing the right thing, and work hard for it. The same goes for company development. Real development and success cannot be achieved by simply pursuing it. Just like a marathon runner, you need to be patient, able to endure loneliness, continue to think, and not lose your original intention. At the same time, you need to focus on the work in front of you and pay attention to every step under your feet. Regardless of success or failure, we can give full play to our potential and truly Happiness and growth will come unexpectedly.

Gracy Chen

Bitget Managing Director