Welcome to Slate Sundays, CryptoSlate’s weekly function showcasing in-depth interviews, knowledgeable evaluation, and thought-provoking op-eds that transcend the headlines to discover the concepts and voices shaping the way forward for crypto.
Gracy Chen leaves fairly an impression. As the one feminine CEO among the many high 10 crypto exchanges, she’s nicely conscious of the challenges going through ladies leaders, and she or he’s decided to make use of her female wiles to her benefit. But, not like a few of her counterparts who yank up the step ladder on their method up, Gracy lifts as she climbs—half of Bitget’s administration workforce is feminine. As she jokes:
“That’s like discovering a Bitcoin pockets that didn’t get misplaced in a boating accident—uncommon, however superb.”
Bursting into the Bitget for UNICEF press convention in Dubai, in a vivid blue UNICEF cap, her charisma lights up the room. There are two male representatives from UNICEF Luxembourg current, however their innovation lead, Sunita Grote, is unable to attend. Her journey plans have been disrupted by rising regional tensions. “You don’t typically get males masking for girls,” Gracy laughs, with a depraved glint in her eye.
Gracy’s humor is a robust weapon in her arsenal, and she or he makes use of it typically to place individuals relaxed, together with a showstopping smile and killer mind. Underestimate her at your peril. With an MBA from MIT with a GMAT rating within the high 1% of the nation, Gracy’s as sharp as a razor.
Beneath her management, she’s taken Bitget out of relative obscurity to change into a number one trade with the biggest copy buying and selling platform and 120 million customers globally.
“My objective is to carry Bitget to the next stage, to amass extra customers, and to construct stronger partnerships,” she says.
Gracy Chen is a grasp in primary autonomy and a Michelin-starred chef
If Gracy’s chosen profession path is uncommon, her background is equally unconventional, rising up in Southwest China with a robust feminine position mannequin. She shares:
“I used to be so impressed by my mother, who was a single mom, but in addition an MBA. As a result of she was so busy along with her work and examine, at 9 years outdated, I used to be mainly a Michelin-starred chef already. If a Michelin star means boiling instantaneous noodles with out burning the home down.”
She smiles:
“My childhood was very very similar to a mini MBA, the place MBA stands for Grasp of Primary Autonomy. Lesson one: if you would like noodles, you higher study to cook dinner them your self.”
Whereas her mom didn’t move on her culinary abilities, she did take Gracy to a variety of eating places, and, having studied at the perfect college within the area, she imparted three worthwhile classes:
“One: independence. Two: going after what you need. Three: how important it’s to get an training.”
Analysis has proven that educating ladies and ladies is essential to bettering communities, Gracy explains, and even to rising a rustic’s GDP. “That’s why I used to be so excited to accomplice with UNICEF and be part of the Recreation Changers’ Coalition,” she enthuses.
Gracy’s rewriting the principles of inclusion in web3
The Recreation Changers’ Coalition seeks to advance digital training and gender equality by empowering ladies and ladies in blockchain and web3. Along with UNICEF, Bitget will present scholarships, mentorship, and academic packages to 300,000 contributors throughout eight growing nations, together with Morocco, India, and Cambodia, with a long-term objective of reaching 1.1 million individuals throughout 12 nations by 2027.
The initiative emphasizes constructing foundational abilities, supporting ladies as creators within the digital financial system, and growing a world assist community. With such lofty objectives, Bitget isn’t doing issues by half, however then, I reasonably doubt that Gracy would put her identify on something much less.
“We all know that girls are underrepresented in our crypto neighborhood, however we need to rewrite the principles of inclusion in web3. The Recreation Changers’ Coalition is our subsequent step in doing that. If we need to have true equality, it’s important that every one these ladies are given alternatives to study this new and paradigm-shifting expertise. “
This isn’t Gracy’s first foray into mentoring and supporting ladies. Bitget launched its Blockchain4her initiative, spearheaded by Gracy, in January 2024, which focuses on “elevating, empowering, educating, and embracing” ladies and making ready them to take management roles. Amongst its inspiring ambassadors are Gracy’s good good friend, Solana President Lily Liu, and Lighting Labs’ founder and CEO, Elizabeth Stark.
If they’ll do it, you are able to do it: Why altering perceptions is essential
I inform Gracy a few truth I heard that girls CEOs usually need to undergo much more postings than their male counterparts, and that girls in blockchain come up towards extra boundaries, reminiscent of widespread misogyny and stereotyping. On multiple event at a convention or aspect occasion, I’ve been mistaken for the girl serving drinks.
In fact, educating ladies is a strong initiative, I say, however when boundaries like this exist, how else will we go about altering these lingering perceptions? She sits for a second in quiet thought earlier than answering:
“That’s undoubtedly one of many objectives of Blockchain4her. It’s about constructing feminine position fashions and altering individuals’s views. We now have a protracted line of feminine ambassadors… We need to arrange these examples for females to know which you could be one in every of them… if they’ll do it, you are able to do it.”
She continues:
“The opposite factor about altering the mindset is, I really say this so much in numerous panels, particularly once I’m in a panel with 5 totally different gents speaking about stablecoins or laws, or exchanges, or enterprise, et cetera. Folks ask me so much: You’re a feminine CEO. How do you steadiness work and life? I’m like, why don’t you ask them? In addition they have a household. Why don’t you ask them the right way to steadiness work and life? Issues like that about mindset altering are what we need to work towards.”
Are there ever instances when Gracy feels she’s taken much less significantly as a feminine CEO or her opinion given much less weight?
“There is perhaps circumstances the place I’m not taken significantly, and in these circumstances, I don’t actually care. I’ll simply show myself and do the suitable factor for me and the corporate. Additionally, there are specific different circumstances, particularly by way of advertising, the place being a lady grew to become a leverage, and a bonus.”
She provides the instance of a latest function in Coindesk’s high 50 most influential ladies in web3 and AI, among the many likes of Cathie Wooden and Cynthia Lummis. She shrugs:
“It simply provides me extra advertising alternatives. That’s what I imply by saying being a lady on this business is each a blessing and a curse.”
Past the Arctic and Antarctica: Bitget’s quest for international development
Gracy began at Bitget in 2022 as Managing Director and was promoted to CEO in Might 2024. I ask what imaginative and prescient she delivered to Bitget and what her aims have been approaching as CEO:
“My imaginative and prescient, and in addition a part of the founding workforce’s and better govt workforce’s imaginative and prescient, was to carry the 2022 model of Bitget to a extra international platform.”
As a China-born trade, Gracy was one of many “only a few” executives who spoke fluent English, and her position as Managing Director was to raise the Bitget model picture and affect globally. She affirms:
“As we speak, we’re certainly a world trade. We serve greater than 100 nations. Our personal workers come from greater than 42 totally different nations, and passport holders, and now we have groups on each single continent apart from the Arctic and Antarctica.”
She unlocks her cellphone and holds it up. “Right here,” she says, “I can simply rapidly present you.” I’m taking a look at a display with the clock faces of a number of locations. She says:
“I actually have Los Angeles all the way in which coated to Auckland in New Zealand. So I must know the place everyone seems to be and if I must have a gathering with them, what’s their time zone, what’s my time zone? Issues like which are a great way of taking a look at how international we’re.”
That is the primary time I’ve come throughout a CEO or founder who gave a flying hoot about what time they referred to as their workers, or who didn’t outsource this job to their EAs. Seems, brains, wit, and respect for her fellow people. I feel I’m growing just a little crush. She continues:
“Now, am I glad with all the outcomes? Are we international sufficient? I feel there are nonetheless methods to work and to enhance.”
A case-by-case foundation to raised serve institutional purchasers
Past onboarding worldwide customers and workers, a large chunk of Bitget’s development this 12 months is pushed by establishments. Gracy says:
“I’m in conversations with plenty of market makers, VCs, some tokenized cash market funds, and all the varied institutional partnerships we’re constructing. As we speak, we’re extra centered on the institutional aspect as a result of we have been lagging by way of institutional purchasers, possibly earlier than final 12 months.”
If Bitget was lagging within the institutional race, the trade has rapidly caught up: 80% of Bitget’s spot quantity now comes from this group, and 80% of crypto quant companies are utilizing Bitget to commerce. What attracts them to the platform particularly, and the way does this affect the corporate’s method?
“This afternoon, really, I would like to fulfill native regulators to speak about us getting totally different licenses. Dubai is one area. Truly, it’s not simply Dubai, it’s additionally Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, totally different nations and jurisdictions we’re taking a look at to have conversations or we’ve had some conversations.”
She says that Bitget has modified its technique to accommodate institutional purchasers in a number of methods, however “compliance is certainly one in every of them.” Bitget can be rolling out steady updates and tooling, reminiscent of unified buying and selling accounts, to make institutional purchasers really feel at house.
“Institutional purchasers want extra dashboards. They want greater, quicker traces. In any other case, they simply don’t need to be part of you. Unified buying and selling accounts is a brand new product we’re launching as a way to higher serve our institutional VIP purchasers.”
Since no two purchasers’ wants are equal, Bitget takes its institutional method on a case-by-case foundation. Gracy explains:
“Even when they’re all market makers, they’ve totally different preferences. Some need this, some need that. So what we do is rather like working a restaurant, we give them a menu and so they can select this and that.”
She smiles as she returns to a restaurant analogy, a enterprise she seems to grasp nicely and thinks fondly of from her days boiling noodles and shadowing the footsteps of her superhero mother. I need to ask if that’s the place Gracy could be if she hadn’t fallen down the crypto rabbithole, however I do know she doesn’t have a lot time, and we transfer on swiftly as a substitute.
Regulation, market cycles, and ballooning M2 provide
With a change of guard in Washington and a groundswell of assist for crypto, we flip the dialog stateside. Crypto companies have been frozen out of Fortress America for a lot too lengthy, however with the biggest financial system on the planet nonetheless leagues forward of China and a crypto adoption charge round 28%, does Bitget plan to pursue this profitable market now? Gracy pauses and measures her response.
“We now have given a variety of thought to serving the U.S. jurisdiction, possibly beginning with a sure group of customers. However to date, we haven’t determined whether or not we are going to enter the U.S. market. I don’t see that coming quickly. Even when the U.S. is turning into extra crypto-friendly, passing the stablecoin invoice… laws round exchanges are nonetheless type of cooking, and we will’t make any resolution primarily based on assumption or hypothesis.”
And what are Gracy’s ideas in the marketplace right this moment? With Bitcoin grinding slowly up, then buying and selling sideways, and altcoins notably trailing, are we in a bull or a bear? For that matter, are we even in a standard cycle, or does Gracy subscribe to the supercycle thesis?
“My private opinion is that we don’t have the four-year bull-bear market anymore. We’re in a supercycle, and this supercycle is basically pushed by macroeconomic components, together with M2 provide, like quantitative easing, and totally different fiscal and financial insurance policies around the globe, particularly within the U.S., Europe, and China.”
With U.S. M2 provide sustaining its agency trajectory of up and to the suitable, I suppose which means Gracy expects Bitcoin’s worth to considerably rise. She nods her head:
“For my part, you understand, $100K, right this moment’s Bitcoin worth, remains to be an excellent buy worth or entry worth for many who don’t have any Bitcoin. I feel we’re in a supercycle. However supercycle for Bitcoin doesn’t imply supercycle for altcoins.”
Past Ethereum, Solana, and “possibly another cash,” Gracy says it’s not as straightforward because it was to boost capital and construct a mission that draws and retains a significant consumer base.
“The very small cash are seeing plenty of issues proper now, particularly the older initiatives which were listed on many exchanges, however the mission workforce isn’t doing very nicely… As we speak, it’s a lot tougher as a result of you actually need to construct an applicable product and have plenty of customers. And I feel that may be a more healthy method of individuals getting into this business.”
Trying forward: What’s developing on Bitget’s horizon?
Past partaking with regulators and rising its worldwide and institutional base, what else is within the pipeline for Bitget?
“We’re not simply constructing an trade,” Gracy insists, “we’re extra excited by the right way to serve our customers higher. What are their wants by way of buying and selling? What are their wants by way of every day actions? So we’re embedding so much round PayFi.”
PayFi is Bitget Pockets’s blockchain-based initiative to simplify crypto and real-world funds and financing by integrating DeFi and real-world belongings (RWAs). Gracy explains:
“What we see proper now could be, all the worldwide bank card networks have virtually a 3% to six% value per transaction that’s taken from merchandise and from the retail customers, and typically it takes three to 4 days to simply settle a world transaction. So plenty of effectivity, and cash, and time could be saved in these transactions by stablecoins and PayFi.”
She’s fast so as to add that Bitget will, “in fact,” observe all the mandatory procedures, together with Anti-Cash Laundering (AML), Know Your Buyer (KYC), and Know Your Enterprise (KYB). She provides:
“One other factor we’re working arduous on is AI; the right way to have AI bots and utilizing AI to streamline a few of our companies to detect fraud, or to serve our customers for efficiencies, these kinds of issues. So, AI and PayFi are a number of the companies that we’re extra excited by.”
Gracy has to fulfill with one other journalist earlier than her afternoon appointments, however she’s not too busy to insist on a photograph with me in entrance of Lionel Messi’s signed soccer shirt with the Bitget brand embossed on the entrance.
I’m wondering if this sort of interplay comes naturally to Gracy or whether or not she’s needed to work at it; and, for that matter, whether or not she’s needed to work at it twice as arduous as a person. She replies:
“Being a lady is who I’m and what I used to be born with. I don’t actually care what individuals consider me. It’s extra about what’s the suitable factor and the right way to carry this firm ahead.”