As we near the end of another year, it's time to reflect on all that we've accomplished at Coinchange in 2022. Despite the turbulent year in the crypto markets, our teams have worked tirelessly to push the boundaries of decentralized finance and solidify our position as a reliable and strong player in the DeFi space. From major updates to our product offerings to the expansion of our business operations, we are proud to highlight the achievements of each department at Coinchange. Keep reading to learn more about all that we've accomplished in 2022.
We are excited to announce our product updates for 2022! Coinchange has been working hard to bring you new features and improvements that will make it even easier for you to earn yield on your crypto. Here are our 2022 updates:
Platform improvements:
Web and mobile client applications:
We are pleased to announce a series of significant improvements to our yield generating strategies for 2022. The DeFi team at Coinchange has been working diligently to enhance your DeFi Yield in a safe and compliant way, and we are excited to share a summary of our efforts:
Major on-chain platform updates:
Quant research and development:
Offchain/orchestration improvements:
All these improvements above allowed us to create the ‘Framework for Automated Yield Strategies’ (FAYS) which reduces strategy development time from months to weeks.
As a result, we've developed, implemented over a dozen uncorrelated market-neutral yield strategies and continue expanding our flagship strategy families, some of which include:
You can read our updated Tech Litepaper here.
Welcome to the Coinchange Regulatory Department's annual review of 2022. This year has been a busy one for our team, as we've made a lot of progress in the world of cryptocurrency regulation. From working with governments and regulatory bodies to defining our stance on cryptocurrencies to collaborating with industry leaders, we've been hard at work ensuring that Coinchange operates in a compliant and transparent manner.
Here's everything we achieved in 2022:
Overall, it's been a productive and successful year for the Coinchange Regulatory Department. We look forward to continuing to work towards a more transparent and compliant cryptocurrency industry in the years to come.
Despite 2022 being a turbulent year in the crypto space, Coinchange has emerged as a serious player in the Defi field, with a comprehensive branding refresh and product diversification that sets the tone for the coming years. This included a brand message refinement, positioning towards the B2B market, product diversification, design changes with a website refresh, and much more.
Above all, Coinchange’s main mission remains the same, to bridge the gap between traditional finance (TradFi) and DeFi, and make DeFi accessible to everyone. As we move forward into the next year, Coinchange will continue to provide users with a secure and reliable platform for their digital assets.
The content team at Coinchange has been producing a variety of high-quality materials that educate and inform our audience about the exciting world of DeFi. From weekly blog posts and monthly DeFi-Research news articles to Guest AMAs and Q&A podcasts, our team has helped to make DeFi accessible and approachable for people of all skill levels. Here’s a glimpse of the diverse range of content we've produced this year, and some of our achievements:
Statistics from Social Media Platforms:
Monthly DeFi-Research news
3-2-1 Q&A Bi-weekly Podcast
Guest Ask Me Anything (AMA) Podcast
Interview to Crypto Jebb
Maxim Galash, the CEO of Coinchange, held a YouTube interview with Crypto Jebb, and it was an exciting event, filled with enlightening insights into the world of cryptocurrency. Maxim gave his views on the current state of the industry, the future of digital assets, and his plans for Coinchange.
He also discussed the importance of security and privacy in the cryptocurrency space. Furthermore, he provided his thoughts on the potential of the technology, and the many opportunities that it presents.
The audience was highly engaged throughout the interview, and it was an amazing event that provided an interesting and informative look into the cryptocurrency industry.
The video has already been viewed over 4,000 times, with an average watch time of 10 minutes, which is an impressive metric for a YouTube interview.
Coinchange was an active participant in the DeFi community in 2022, attending and organizing a range of conferences and events that allowed us to connect with industry leaders and stay up-to-date on the latest developments in the field. From hosting our own educational seminars to presenting at international conferences, we shared our expertise and learned from others in the DeFi space. We attended a total of 16 events, spoke at 5 and hosted 2 of our own events. Below are the conferences and events that Coinchange attended and organized in 2022:
Ethereum DevCon 2022 event in Bogota, Colombia
Coinchange participated in Ethereum DevCon 2022 to showcase our crypto risk management and yield platform to the Ethereum community. Our team interacted and networked with other companies interested in developing their products on Ethereum, laying the groundwork for new project ideas and future collaborations.
Messari Mainnet 2022
Our CEO Maxim Galash was at the Messari Mainnet 2022 event in New York to meet and discuss the future of the DeFi landscape with key industry players.
DeFi Security Summit, Stanford University, CA
This event was full of blockchain security experts presenting on how the crypto space can be secured. We chatted with security engineers from Immunefi, MakerDAO, Gauntlet, Polygon, Certora,Trail of Bits and Hacken. We are collaborating with some of them to further strengthen our Coinchange Risk Assessment Framework.
VipNightLife MAXIM MIAMI Event
Coinchange teamed up with VIPNightlife and Maxim Magazine to host the hottest party of BTC Miami 2022🔥
A Night With Maxim took place at Hyde Beach SLS, a beautiful oceanfront space in the heart of South Beach🌊🍾
BTC MIAMI 2022
Coinchange team attended #BTCMiami2022, including our CEO Max Galash.
We are really proud to be represented at this world-renowned event and speak with the biggest crypto players🔥
Epay Summit Europe 2022, London
Coinchange met with payments professionals to discuss how to shape, de-risk and simplify payments moving forward.
The payments ecosystem is becoming increasingly vast and complex as the range of products and services available to consumers continues to increase at a rapid pace🚀
Our CEO Maxim Galash was among the speakers on stage to talk about the DeFi ecosystem🙌
AIBC Toronto
The Coinchange team attended the AIBC World-Leading AI and Blockchain Conference - Americas which took place from June 6th to 9th, 2022 in in our home city🚀 Toronto!
CONSENSUS, JUNE 9-12, Austin, TX
The Coinchange team attended the Consensus 2022 festival taking part in Austin, Texas from June 9th-12th!
It covered all sides of blockchain, crypto, Web 3, and the metaverse. This event was hosted by CoinDesk, the most influential and trusted platform for the digital world.
FUTURIST, AUGUST 9-10, Toronto
Coinchange attended Canada's largest blockchain & crypto event - #blockchainfuturistconference that took place on August 9-10 in Toronto.
We meet top leaders in Blockchain, Crypto, DeFi, NFT + Gaming, DAOs, FinTech, Privacy and more.
MAINNET, September 21-23, New York
Our CEO @officialmg86 was at Messari #Mainnet2022 in New York🗽 to meet the key players of our industry and discuss regulation, market opportunities and new tech developments.
Digital Assests Summit (DAS) London, October 17-18
Coinchange attended DAS: London - Europe’s leading institutional crypto conference for asset managers and financial services professionals 🚀
During this two day in-person event, industry leaders from the world of finance and digital assets gathered to discuss crypto from the perspective of industry practitioners.
X Merge by Fintech Nexus in London, October 17-18
Coinchange attended X Merge by Fintech Nexus in London!
⏰ 17-18 October, 2022. We got to witness the impact web3 is having on financial institutions and fintechs at Merge.
DeFi Landscape Eductional Seminar, November 10, Toronto
Coinchange hosted an educational seminar "DeFi Landscape: Current and Future" in collaboration with Fasken Law Firm. We talked about the mistakes of traditional media about DeFi, how DeFi is different from CeFi, the current state of DeFi markets and the future potential of DeFi markets. The seminar was available in both a live and virtual capacity.
Fintech Talents Festival, London
Amazing two days at Fintech Talents Festival. General Director of EU office of Coinchange, Alexander Borowski discussed the future of cryptocurrency and DeFi markets, met lots of people in the sector and exchanged ideas
Algorand Ventures, Decipher 2022, Dubai
Algorand Ventures, Decipher 2022, Dubai
Coinchange is at Algorand Ventures, which is being launched at Decipher 2022.
It is the second annual gathering of builders, founders, investors, and strategists deciphering the future of Algorand.
Cryptoassets Regulation & Compliance Conference, London
Intense day at the Cryptoassets Regulation & Compliance Conference!
Alexander Borowski, our General Director of EU Office, is excited to attend the panel, "The Landscape for DeFi Firms as Regulation Evolves," and discuss how Coinchange uses new technologies to stay competitive, mitigate risks, and respond to new regulations in the cryptoasset ecosystem.
The DeFi research team has produced long form reports, index and benchmark comparison together with asset allocation reports. Through these research reports, we shed light on sectors, protocols, and various aspects of the crypto space to allow a broad spectrum of new, and existing participants to easily understand the trends and the opportunities available. The index and benchmark report have been recently providing a clear overview of the yield generation space. Lastly the asset allocation reports have been providing more transparency about how Coinchange deploys clients assets, a first step toward full transparency that will soon come in the future.
Coinchange published 5 long-form research reports this year with multiple co-authors and co-publishers.
Permissioned DeFi: Paving The Way for Exponential Growth
Our first report was based on Permissioned DeFi where we discussed the emergence of regulated decentralized finance for the institutions. Co-Authored by Fireblocks team and Reviewed by Alkemi Network and Maple Finance team. Institutional adoption will come from two angles in the next few months and years: Institutions using regulated spin offs of already existing applications or building their own permissioned application catered to their needs.
NFT Landscape General Report & NFT Financialization Report
Our second and third reports were published on the topics of NFTs. The second report was about the NFT landscape with insights on adoption and misconceptions about NFTs, like storage, immutability and challenges. Co-authored by TradeZing and XSolla teams, companies actively build platforms and solutions around NFTs.
Our third report focussed on NFT financialization and the potential yield-generating opportunities in the NFT sector which was also co-authored by TradeZing and XSolla teams. It covered topics that are crucial for the NFT sector and for brands/communities today: NFT utilities and use cases need to be worked on before speculating on prices. The report shows that it is the only way to make NFT digital financial assets.
Institutional Asset of Choice and Barrier to Entry
Our fourth research Report discussed the types of institutions interested in crypto, the various barriers to their entry and how some companies are solving these barriers. This report was co-authored by 1291 Group and SUN ZU Lab. It highlighted that institutions have all the tools and solutions to onboard in crypto and start using the different protocols that were highlighted in our first report on Permissioned DeFi
Crosschain interoperability and secur ity - Categorization and solutions
Our fifth and most recent research report discusses the need for interoperability of blockchains, the different types of bridges, why and how bridges break and finally what can be done moving forward to analyze and mitigate bridge risks. This report will show that bridge technology and applications are being developed and improved at a frantic pace, while they are the platform leading to the highest amount of lost funds. Understanding bridge security models and their categories will help secure them.
This monthly report provides a comparison of Coinchange yield against different comparable indexes and benchmarks. Components within the 4 indexes and 3 benchmarks are direct, indirect or closely related, to yield generation in DeFi and CeFi, and interest generation for TradFi while maintaining strict requirements on funds availability with little to no minimum investments and high liquidity for USDC, USDT and DAI. Indexes are categorized by risk.
All yield indexes have fallen due to market environment and the specific events like Terra/Luna meltdown, 3 Arrow Capital bankruptcy and lastly FTX/Alameda collapse. However, all indexes with some risk maintained higher yield (+1.2% to +3.4%), than their counterpart in the Minimal Risk category, which maintained an average rate of 2.3% throughout the year.
This monthly report provides information on how Coinchange deploys client's assets and diversifies the investments while minimizing risks and maximizing potential earnings.
It covers the deployed assets over broad categories of protocol types, blockchains and client invested currencies. Within those categories, the deployed assets are allocated to specific strategies, which undergo continuous optimization and re-allocations based on the evolution of the market, DeFi protocols, and the technology landscape. Those reports are the first steps that Coinchange has undergone in providing more transparency which will be switched to full transparency when Cooinchange will be fully on-chain and non-custodial.
Coinchange has researched and put together the steps to create an MVP of insured earn accounts with InsurACE and Nexus Mutual. The project has not been made in production as the current DeFi insurance landscape still has some challenges that make this MVP limited in capacity.
Insurance options offer the following coverage types: Protocol/smart contract vulnerability which covers failure in smart contract, failure in economic model, oracle attack, governance attack. It covers all blockchains that the protocols are deployed on.
Stablecoin peg insurance compensates the loss occurring when a stablecoin loses its peg (depeg) and trades below a defined price level within the coverage time frame. This applies to USDT and pegged volatile tokens like stETH.
We are following the development of programmatic insurance as they seem promising in answering the challenges of current DeFi insurance providers.
The DeFi research team has created 3 (soon 4) frameworks for risk assessment and analysis of the protocols, assets and blockchains it interacts with. They have been created from scratch thanks to the extensive research done by our team of experts and by sourcing elements from already existing specialized frameworks. These frameworks form the DeFi Risk Assessment Frameworks (DRAF) that guide Coinchange Framework for Algorithmic Yield Strategies when selecting which protocol to select for strategy prioritization and deployment.
Coinchange DRAFs assesses up to 90 individual data points in up to 37 graded questions to provide a numerical risk score of smart contract, operational, decentralization and liquidity risk in protocols, blockchains and soon bridges.You can learn more about Cionchange risk mitigation process reading the assessment framework overview.
In 2023, Coinchange Research team will start its project of open-sourcing all of its framework in an attempt to create a unified set of definitions for DeFi risk, analysis and mitigation processes.
The Operations Team has been working tirelessly around the clock to ensure that the platform is running smoothly, while the systems and counter-parties behind it are optimized. This year, we placed a special emphasis on our banking environments, liquidity and order execution, and fraud prevention.
We are in the final stages of onboarding with OpenPayd, a European Omnibus account that will enable us to accept Euro deposits via SEPA and Wire transfer. We have made significant progress in obtaining a similar account in the USA with partners like Arival Bank and MVB. Both accounts are key to ensure that we are operating with the highest level of compliance when it comes to Money Transmission.
Giving our clients the best environment to buy and sell their cryptocurrency is of utmost importance. This year, we switched from using Centralized Exchanges to our first Liquidity Provider, DV Chain, to emphasize this priority. We have since onboarded with StanHope and are in the final stages with B2C2 to ensure that going forward our prices are the best on the market. These new LP’s, along with Circle, allow us to offer custom rates to our High Net worth clients should they be trading larger volumes.
Working closely with our Compliance and Customer Success teams, the Operations department placed a heavy emphasis on fraud prevention over the course of 2022. After careful review, we now have strict procedures to monitor any funds flowing in and out of our platform. This combines proprietary systems and counter parties to ensure the maximum levels of safety for our clients funds.
The accounting…this will be your favourite section on this blog. Accounting is the system of recording and summarizing financial transactions and analyzing, verifying, and reporting the results. The accounting at Coinchange can be split into two, accounting within our DeFi system and accounting for all other financial transactions outside of the DeFi system.
An example of a financial transaction outside of the DeFi system includes paying our suppliers, these types of transactions are fairly simple and not large in volume. These are recorded by the finance team. The finance team have derived procedures to ensure all the transactions are recorded and accurately reflect their true economic substance. There is one additional review of the records and this is performed by an independent third party, in this case Grant Thornton, our auditors.
An example of a financial transaction within the DeFi system includes allocating funds received by the clients to the corresponding client account, i.e. Bob deposits $500.00 and the funds are allocated to Bob’s account with Coinchange. These types of transactions are performed in the backend, a computer system which is not directly accessed by the user. The transactions are complex and large in volume, and therefore require a bespoke system which can automate the process of recording the transactions with accuracy, completeness, and reliability. The project to build this system is being undertaken by the development team who are working alongside finance to ensure the double entry system is in line with the accounting standards. It's a continued effort to improve the treasury and reporting systems as they stand at the core of our business.
Ending this section with a statistic our team was extremely proud of… a total of around USD $200 million worth of currencies was traded on our platform.
The compliance team has been working hard on multiple fronts this year. We have recently integrated with a new KYC (know your customer) provider, Onfido, to quickly onboard and verify new clients. We automated Sanctions screening with KYC2020 to provide initial and ongoing sanctions screening. We are currently onboarding with KYB (know your business) provider DocFox to automate the majority of the corporate onboarding process. Chainalysis continues to be an effective tool to assist with transaction monitoring. We have engaged RCS to perform a Compliance Effectiveness Review to test the various elements of our compliance program and assist with updating any elements.
On the client success team, we have worked hard to make sure that we are able to support all client needs through means that are most convenient for them. Here are the new features that we fully implemented this year:
Throughout the past year, we have managed to answer a lot of questions (around 11,000). 89% of those inquiries we were able to respond to within 24 hours of first contact.
We do have some ways to go, our CSAT score was 77%. We take feedback to heart and always strive to improve your experience.
Our help center seems to have been a valuable resource for clients; we’ve had a lot of views this year with most receiving positive feedback. There are a few gaps that we’ve outlined within the content of the pages and are actively updating it with relevant information.
Some notable sales metrics:
150k retail accounts opened on the platform
60k KYCed customers
Around USD $200 million worth of currencies was traded on our platform.
35 business customers among which nft marketplaces, crypto miners, blockchain developer agencies, bullion dealers, exchanges, venture funds.
Ongoing DeFi Earn API integration discussions with 10+ partners among wich are 3commas, champion bank, fair invest, spirit blockchain, qredo, checkout wallet, onramp, etc. We empower them to offer a structured DeFi Earn product on their applications with simple API integration, please review Partner overview for more details - https://docsend.com/view/qy4vz3whfajj7r2i. We have successfully tested upcoming institutional products utilizing a new set of active DeFi strategies (market risk, sharpe, drawdown, etc). We are also launching the institutional active managed DeFi fund with Gibraltar based bank Damex.io
Coinchange.io is committed to providing the best possible service for our users and the crypto industry. We have ambitious plans for 2023 and beyond with a focus on both our YaaS (centralized) and non-custodial product offering. We plan to develop and open-source a DeFi Risk Assessment Framework to help our users make better decisions. We are also planning to apply for the VASP license and meet all applicable MICA requirements in the EU. To make sure our users and the community stay up-to-date with the latest trends and developments in the crypto space, we will be hosting over 40 guest speakers throughout the year to discuss complex and important topics such as regulation, liquidity, NFTs, ETFs, and more. With our roadmap, we strive to make Coinchange.io a leader in the industry and help everyone adopt crypto in a compliant, safe and effective way.
We are on a mission to make blockchain and cryptocurrency mainstream and accessible to everyone. We believe that through our innovative products and services, we will provide users with the best possible experience and help shape the future of the crypto industry. We aim to be at the forefront of the industry, eagerly anticipating what lies aheadWe strive to become a leaders in the industry and look forward to what the future holds. We invite you to join us on this journey as we strive to "Yield the Impossible" with Coinchange. Together, let us make it happen!
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