China, Driving the Bitcoin Wagon with BitMEX and Others

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China is the biggest contributor to the Bitcoin sector in many ways. We all know that majority of the hashing power is currently contributed by the Chinese mining pools; it probably has more Bitcoin mining data centers than any other country, and most of the Bitcoin ASICs are designed and fabricated in there.

The Chinese contribution is not only limited to the technological infrastructure; the Chinese are also active traders, and a significant number of transactions over the Bitcoin blockchain originate from mainland China and other territories like Hong Kong, Taiwan, etc. The region also leads when it comes to Bitcoin-based businesses and trading volumes.

To give an overview, two of the top three Bitcoin exchanges in terms of volume distribution are based out of China. OKCoin and BTC China take the top two positions with 65 percent and 14 percent, respectively, followed by the US-based BitFinex at 8 percent. Even in terms of currency pairs, the largest market share is held by Chinese yuan at 78%, followed by the US Dollar at 19% and Euro at 3%.

Another significant Bitcoin exchange platform in the country is BitMEX, short for Bitcoin Mercantile Exchange. BitMEX was founded by Arthur Hayes, Ben Delo and Samuel Reed in January 2014. The Bitcoin exchange was part of the Shanghai-based Chinaccelerator, from where it started its operations in the country by mid-2015.

Since then, BitMEX has raised close to $200,000 in funding, and is currently handling transactions worth close to $5 million per day. In the past few months, BitMEX has seen a huge surge in the amount of users and trading volume, and currently the platform has about 3,400 registered users with more joining every day.

Soon, BitMEX will be providing an option for the Chinese users to invest in stocks, bonds, currencies and commodities. The company’s vision is already being equated to Goldman Sachs of the Bitcoin industry.

Such prolific usage of Bitcoin in the country can be attributed to various factors. The main factors being:

Population

China has the highest population in the world, and the majority of the Chinese are knowledgeable when it comes to Bitcoin and digital currencies. These factors contribute to an increased number of Bitcoin users and traders in the country.

Regulations

China doesn’t have clear-cut Bitcoin regulations at the moment. In addition, the Chinese government has foreign investment restrictions in place for its citizens, making it almost impossible for them to access international markets. Bitcoin trading fills in the gap for them by offering an alternative investment opportunity.

Weakening of the Chinese yuan has also played an important part in driving investments into the Bitcoin market in the recent days. BitMEX and other Bitcoin companies are currently capitalizing on the current market conditions in the country by offering new innovative products.

References:

Bitcoin Charts

He left a cushy finance job to build the Goldman Sachs of Bitcoin - Tech in Asia