With the recent crypto market crash, investors are now very fearful of the market. Who would have thought Luna can lose almost 100% of its value in just a few days. Even the big boys like Bitcoin, Ethereum and BNB are not spared either, with huge losses all across the board.
Smart Investor spoke with Wei Zhou who is the new CEO of Coins, Philippines’ leading crypto and mobile wallet to find out more on this topic. Coins.ph is regulated by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) and is the first ever crypto-based company in Asia to hold both Virtual Currency and Electronic Money Issuer licenses from a central bank. One of its uniqueness is that it has a crypto license by the regulators and by becoming a bridge between virtual and real-life, accepting crypto and fiat along the way.
A brief introduction about Wei Zhou, he formally served as Chief Financial Officer of Binance, Zhaopin.com, and Charm Communications. He also led the landmark acquisition of Grindr, where he served as Vice Chairman. He started his career at Goldman Sachs, and he graduated from Harvard University with a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics and East Asian Studies.
According to him, everyone needs to learn about digital asset, since it is the future. Start by taking the time to understand the blockchain technology behind it. Then move on to the digital assets itself, such as Bitcoin and Ethereum. Understand what it is, why it was created, what are the benefits and what causes its price to move up and down.
It’s Easy To Get Started
Start opening up your own account by creating your own crypto wallet. It is now so much easier whereby most onboarding process can be done online. Some can even be done using only your smartphone. There are also platforms that did not even require its users to undergo a KYC (Know Your Customer) process.
Next up, get to know more about Non-Fungible Token or NFT. A non-fungible token is a financial security consisting of digital data stored in a blockchain, a form of distributed ledger. The ownership of an NFT is recorded in the blockchain, and can be transferred by the owner, allowing NFTs to be sold and traded.
We may have seen an NFT in the form of pictures, digital art. As the adoption rate of NFT gets higher, so does the NFT market value in general.
What’s The Reason For The Crypto Market Crash?
Crypto is still in its early stage and is highly speculative. There may also be an element of the Greater Fool Theory, where the next person is willing to buy more for crypto despite it not having any clear fundamentals.
But in all honesty, it is not only the crypto that is suffering from the bears. The world’s stock market is also crashing down.
For those who are suffering huge losses now, you need to go back as to why you bought them in the first place. Do you believe in the digital asset? Its ecosystem? Or do you simply buy because everyone else is buying?
That’s the reason why it is so important to be doing your own research. But the take-up rate for crypto is considered to be still low. With more people coming in the crypto market, the price will start going back up.
Upcoming Trends?
The blockchain is definitely the future. It is a proof of ownership for digital assets. There will be more games and metaverse taking the spotlight in the years to come. For content creators, NFT are good for them to able to earn an income.
But there must be a huge effort to build up the community, build up your trust and brands.
In the sports industry, national associations such as for basketball and football are partnering with the blockchain players.
Plans For The Future?
Wei Zhou is set to come out with additional tokens that has its own value in the market. Also, there are plans to come out with new NFTs with utilities that can benefit the holders.
He is also keen to embark on play-to-earn games which lets gamers earn money while playing their favorite games.
Start Small But Start Now
The easiest way to get started is by going on social medias and following influencers on their Twitter account. Next is to listen to podcasts so you are able to understand the terms and jargons that is being used.
Once you are in, there’s nothing better than getting your feet wet by joining in the crowd as community managers and engage the audience directly. At Coins, there’s the Coins champion for this purpose.
Making Money From Digital Asset?
Finally, Wei Zhou advises us to have a diversified portfolio and not to put everything in digital assets. Make sure you invest in real estate, stocks and start-ups, before going into digital asset.
Also invest in time as there are a lot of opportunities out there, waiting for it to go boom. This is true in the metaverse space where there’s a lot of hardware and software involved.
