Exclusive interview with WEEX Vice President: The current trading track is far from meeting the needs of traditional financial players

In the cryptocurrency industry in 2024, trading platforms are far less popular than in previous years. A series of regulations, platform crashes or changes of ownership encountered by giants have made this track no longer as rich as in the early days.

However, this seems to be an opportunity for young platforms, such as WEEX. Two years after its establishment, they have just launched the platform currency WXT. Previously, WEEX has brought a lot of traffic with 0 handling fees and the combination of social and trading, and the latest platform currency WXT is also the most important strategy for WEEX at present. To this end, we interviewed Andrew Weiner, the vice president of WEEX who has just taken office. Before joining WEEX, Andrew Weiner served as vice president of MEXC Global for two years. In addition, he has served as vice president of iComplyKYC for more than three years. The company focuses on providing innovative regulatory technology solutions in the field of cryptocurrency. The solutions it has developed have been adopted by well-known companies such as IBM, HSBC, and DTCC Securrency. Based on Andrew's industry experience, we talked to him about the characteristics of WEEX, future plans, and views on the platform track.

From iComply to MEXC Global, and then to WEEX

BlockBeats: Can you briefly introduce your experience in the cryptocurrency industry? I saw that you were the VP of MEXC Global.
Andrew: I started at iComply Investor Services and developed a patent for off-chain cryptographic verification. This patent can process sensitive consumer data securely and scalably, and is compliant with the requirements of the Travel Rule.

Then I met the MEXC Global team and eventually served as Vice President and Spokesperson. During this period, we established cooperation with many excellent project developers and KOLs, and rapidly increased the number of users worldwide from 6 million to 12 million.

BlockBeats: What motivated you to join WEEX as VP? What do you think are the advantages of WEEX?

Andrew: The market today lacks a truly innovative project that includes a full range of financial derivatives, copy trading, and DeFi.

WEEX, with its rapidly growing network of developers, community leaders, and media partners, is becoming a new standard for providing high-quality user experience for everyone. Whether you are a professional, retail investor, or a novice, you can find trading methods and tools that suit you on WEEX.

「WXT is a deep reinvestment in the user base」

BlockBeats: Many people believe that the current trading platform track is saturated. How do you think WEEX gets traffic?

Andrew: I completely disagree with this view. As an industry, we are far from meeting the huge global demand for these products - especially when we narrow the discussion to derivatives trading, or consider how much capital will flow into the currency from traditional financial participants this year.

As I said at the Blockchain Futurist Conference in 2022, there is up to $19 trillion in real-world assets and innovative ideas pouring into this space. We have observed that there has been a small wave of capital inflows through the recent ETFs, but the subsequent capital inflows are simply not enough for our existing services to cope with.

Simply put, we are in a bull market period, and the world is preparing for these new TradiFi consumers who have never participated in such digital financial services. I personally pay attention to key events, such as NASDAQ's acquisition of a cryptocurrency custody license, MasterCard's acquisition of CipherTrace, and DTCC's acquisition of Securrency, which will allow us to better understand the types of users we will start serving.

By bridging the customer service gaps we have identified between TradiFi, CeFi, and DeFi, WEEX plans to become the top choice for millions of users and thousands of projects by the end of 2024.

BlockBeats: Recently, WEEX is launching its own platform token. What different attributes and capabilities do you think WXT has compared to other platform tokens?

Andrew: We carefully designed WEEX Token (WXT) to make every holder a partner in the continued growth of our platform and share the fruits of our development. This will enable us to establish a relationship with our users that far exceeds the connection between our competitors and their users.

BlockBeats: What are the scenarios and potential benefits for users holding WXT in the future?

Andrew: WXT is our deep reinvestment in our user base. It is their trust and support that makes us stand out in the field of cryptocurrency contract trading. In return for their contribution, we provide WXT holders with a series of exclusive benefits, including trading fee discounts, customized rewards, decision-making participation in the future development of the platform, and priority participation in our selected projects and exclusive events. We will add some new partners in 2024, and the practicality of WXT will continue to increase.

"The primary concern of the exchange is user experience, product security and service reliability"

BlockBeats: What gaps do you think there are in the trading platform track? What plans does WEEX have to fill these gaps?

Andrew: Market investors usually have accounts on up to 4 to 5 platforms each. Whether it is problems accessing certain services, the ability to enter and exit funds, the availability of specific assets, or other reasons, users in our field seem to encounter many pain points every day.

WEEX hopes to achieve integration so that everyone can find everything they want on one platform and feel a sense of belonging to a single product or service provider.

BlockBeats: After FTX, the market seems to not recognize the behavior of exchanges having their own market makers. Do you think exchanges should have their own market makers? Or use mainstream external market makers?

Andrew： Good question. In this case, I agree with the market. Therefore, I also believe that exchanges should not act as their own market makers.

As an exchange, my primary focus is the user experience, the security of the product, and the reliability of the service. There is no role for price manipulation in this focus.

As you mentioned, the market maker dynamics created a conflict of interest, and millions of users who suffered heavy losses are still scared of that incident. As I said in the Mario Nawfal podcast, intimate connections between any two entities should be avoided, and proof of reserves is proof that consumers deserve in the future.

BlockBeats: Now almost every trading platform will have its own on-chain ecosystem, that is, develop a chain by itself. What plans does WEEX have in developing a public chain in the future?

Andrew: In the near future, WEEX will provide unique opportunities for network developers to work more deeply with them. Although I cannot disclose any further information about our WEEX Wealth initiative at this time, we hope to reveal more information about this in the coming months.