Dear AscendEX Users, Community Members, Partners, and Supporters,

Happy New Year!

The year 2020 was a memorable one for all of us at  AscendEX, our community members, and to a large extent, the entire industry. Not only did major digital assets achieve broader adoption globally, but the ever-evolving landscape also saw tremendous progress. Riding the wave of the recent market boom,  AscendEX has further accelerated our remarkable growth along side the development of the broader digital asset ecosystem.

In 2020, we continued building on our innovation-focused core strength to catalyze expansion from product design to industry partnership expansion. With a client-centric mindset ingrained, our global teams have worked around the clock to enhance every possible product detail based on your feedback and suggestions to deliver are liable and seamless customer experience.

After three years, we have expanded our global footprint to five operational centers servicing well-diversified users across 196 countries. From a holistic product offering perspective, we have completed the full integration of "Cash –Margin – Futures - Staking – DeFi Mining" that harnesses the growth benefits of a virtuous cycle for both retail users and sophisticated institutions.  In 2020, the total number of  AscendEX users increased by 300%. Our platform currently supports five different languages and 11 fiat- enabled deposit services via partnerships with third-party vendors.  2020 marked a major step forward in community engagement with the launch of the "Global Community Captain Program.” Since then, we have engaged many new users through collaboration with over 100 top crypto communities.  On the listing front,  AscendEX conducted over 20 primary listings, of which 7 auction projects consuming 20 million ASD.

Let us recap our 2020 key accomplishments and milestones and share our thoughts on strategic priorities for 2021.

2020
January: 

• Provided immediate support for the areas hit hard by Covid-19 pandemic with the donation of medical supplies.

February:

• Introduced derivatives trading via a bitcoin perpetual contract with up to 100x leverage and a distinctive risk engine.

March:

• Strengthened institutional client penetration with dedicated services of comprehensive product suites and infrastructure upgrades.

April:

• Introduced industry-leading Staking Service which currently supports staking of 35 tokens with top performance in returns, staking ratio as well as total staked assets.

July:

• Launched Community Captain Program for active engagement with over 100 digital asset communities. Reached out to over 10 million users and laid the cornerstone for AscendEX’s continued global expansion.

August:

• Hosted the first DeFi Night in Shanghai, China. The event attracted multiple leading media outlets and hundreds of seasoned professionals in the digital asset space.

September:

• Rolled out DeFi Yield Farming, a simple and easy-to-use farming product for users to maximize potential returns on capital.
• Hosted the second DeFi Night in Shenzhen, China.

October:

• Provided multiple-language website support to better serve an increasingly diverse global user base.

November:

• Launched the support for 25X leverage for margin trading of 53 tokens with distinctive features such as one-click unwind,auto borrow/repay via trading, and cross-asset collateral mode designed to enhance user funding efficiency.

December:

• Conducted auction for Terra Virtua (TVK) and Bonfida, following impressive auction results of xDai Chain, Swingby, Serum, Stafi, and Akash earlier this year. In total, 20 million ASD were consumed with those seven successful auctions in 2020.
• Hosted ASD 2nd year anniversary celebration in Beijing, China. The event brought together over 200 blockchain investors, traders, users, and entrepreneurs and featured several rounds of in-depth discussion led by our team on key industry thought-leadership topics from the latest trends in digital asset trading to challenges and future development of DeFi.

2020 was a breakout year for  AscendEX, driven by our continuous innovative product development and early-mover advantage in strategic alignment with the leading projects from DeFi ecosystem. Currently,the platform lists 156 digital assets from a wide-range of industry-leading blockchain projects and offers trading services across over 200 trading pairs with an average daily trading volume of $300 million across cash, margin,and futures products. Our communities were kind enough to recognize  AscendEX as “the Trading Platform of the Year. “

Exceptional performance in 2020 laid a strong foundation for 2021. But there is still much work to be done. Looking back on our past three-year journey through the ups and downs of crypto markets, we have all learned the path to sustainable business growth is not only built upon timely seizing the market opportunity, but also supported by relentless execution of client-centric strategy, global operational efficiency, and continuous product and infrastructure enhancement on the longer term. 

Therefore, in 2021, our strategic priorities will be centered around fine-tuning our operational strategies for accelerated global user acquisition, deepening integration of Trading-Staking-De-Fi product ecosystem, and upgrading our services for better user experience:

• Scale derivatives trading and innovative staking mechanism
• Improve copy trading and fiat on-ramp capabilities
• Optimize platform user functionalities and expand community engagement for more aggressive retail client acquisition and retention
• Enhance VIP offerings and infrastructure solution to further accelerate institutional client penetration
• Broaden and deepen strategic partnership with leading players across the value chain of digital asset industry

With digital asset market capitalization and trading volume reaching an all-time high, the competition has also intensified among all the exchanges and trading platforms, which we believe will lead to a new wave of growth opportunities.  Looking ahead, we are confident that our tradition of innovation, the spirit of continuous improvement, and the commitment to operational excellence will continue setting us apart from other competitors and help us reaching a top-tier global trading platform.

Client-first has always been a core part of our global strategy and execution.  On behalf of our entire  AscendEX team, we would like to extend our sincere appreciation to all of you. Many of you have been long-time supporters and users of our platform from day one. We are deeply grateful for all your enthusiasm and feedback that helps us improve and excel.

With 2021, we see a world of opportunity for digital assets and blockchain technology to power the markets of the future. We are very excited to move forward with you!

Wish you and your loved ones a Happy and Healthy Lunar New Year!

CEO George Cao, COO Ariel Ling,and the  AscendEX team
February 5, 2021