Year 2018 may have been rough for cryptocurrencies and investors when it comes to prices all around the industry, but that does not mean that the year was a total waste. In fact, the numbers reveal that people actually got more involved with crypto trading and related activities.
In fact, Huobi, a well known cryptocurrency exchange platform with global reach, published several interesting statistics about people’s usage patterns. Via a press release on February 7th, the company confirmed that it experienced a 100% increase in trading volume from 2017 to 2018.
The firm, based in Singapore, is a growing enterprise after it increased its staff from 400 workers in early 2018 to over 1,300 at the moment of writing this piece. It has 15 offices in a dozen countries around the world. Its CEO is Leon Li.
The Huobi Cloud and its success
Huobi and its OTC (Over the Counter) trading desk has slowly, but surely become one of the leading such platforms in the planet. Not too long ago, the company launched Huobi Cloud, a tool that has entered over a hundred partnerships over the last six months.
Huobi Cloud was an innovative resource that was introduced to the market in July 2018, and it lets customers develop their own digital assets services, primarily OTC and exchanges. It has been a resounding success.
As part of its review of 2018, Huobi also mentioned development in several critical markets in the cryptocurrency industry, such as Japan, the United States, and South Korea. Huobi.com, which is the company’s strategic partner in America, got a Financial Crimes Enforcement Network-approved Money Services Business license, known as MSB.
Crypto Trading Capabilities Added
Huobi also introduced fiat to crypto trading capabilities this week, precisely on February 5th. The exchange will provide support to three different trading pairs initially, all tied to the US dollar: Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and Tether (USDT).
If the pairings prove to be successful, the Singapore-headquartered firm has the objective of offering more fiats to crypto pairings in the future, depending on customers’ demands and responses.
The fiat support is provided by a partnership between Huobi and Prime Trust, an American financial institution that makes its money with its custodian and escrow offerings for both digital assets and fiat transactions.
Other plans of the famous Asian company involve the tentative launch of its own stablecoin, a report that has been floating around since January. The initiative is part of Huobi’s expansion plans.
The crypto exchange has already secured one of the 17 crypto licenses issued in Japan thanks to BitTrade, whilst also managing to acquire a Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) permit from Gibraltar to offer blockchain assets trading in the European area with guaranteed compliance.
Despite of a recent December report by Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post that stated Huobi had intentions to dismiss personnel because of the market volatility in 2018, the firm explained that it would continue to add talent to the enterprise for other critical departments and ventures, such as emerging markets and core business.
By Andres Chavez
