Zhao Changpeng, the richest Chinese in the cryptocurrency world, has earned nearly 600 billion.
For the sake of his faith, he sold his house in Shanghai in 2014 and bought all the money in Bitcoin.
He can be said to be the first person in the country to "hold 99% of his assets in Bitcoin."
The Binance he founded has become the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange.
No one expected that the United States would not only be jealous, but also claim that he was a "terrorist"...
1. Poker Game
2013, Shanghai.
Several middle-aged men were sitting together playing cards.
The room was an ordinary private room and they played the usual games.
Anyone who comes to see it will not notice anything special.
Only Zhao Changpeng vaguely felt that his life might take a turn for the better here.
Why?
Most outsiders don’t know, but he knows it very well in his heart.
Not everyone can come to this card game.
Let’s put it this way, if you throw a brick into the sky now, anyone it hits will be an entrepreneur or founder.
Zhao Changpeng became a senior executive of a large company at the age of 27 and a startup boss at the age of 36. He is definitely a young talent.
However, at this table, he can only feed cards to the player above him.
At this moment, he was clenching the cards in his hand, pretending to think.
But his ears were perked up to listen to the conversation of people next to him.
Zhao Changpeng knew the big man next to him, his name was Li Qiyuan.
He is the founder of China's first Bitcoin exchange, Bitcoin China.
The company was founded in 2011 and ranked first in the world in terms of trading volume in 2013.
At that time, not many ordinary people had heard of this currency, let alone making money from it.
Li Qiyuan is the absolute pioneer and enlightener of this industry in China.
Zhao Changpeng dared to guarantee in his heart that more than half of the poker players here came here to try out this new trend.
Thinking of this, Li Qiyuan actually took the initiative to talk to me before he even played any cards.
The two of them just started chatting.
At that time, Zhao Changpeng only had a vague understanding of Bitcoin.
But Li Qiyuan only used one sentence at the beginning, and then he just threw away the cards in his hand.
“Bitcoin is the future.”
Imagine that there is a currency that is not controlled by any country or organization and is completely in the hands of everyone.
It can circulate freely around the world without worrying about exchange rates or inflation.
And through encryption technology, absolute security can be guaranteed.
In a word, it means punching the financial crisis and kicking inflation!
If these concepts were put into practice today, most people would probably just laugh when hearing them.
But 10 years ago, it was absolutely beyond the scope.
Zhao Changpeng was stunned on the spot.
The electric shock-like excitement was almost like finding a martial arts secret book.
In particular, the core concept of Bitcoin's decentralization allows everyone to truly become a unique individual.
This is completely in line with his vision of the future world.
Zhao Changpeng was so engrossed in what he was saying that he didn't realize why Li Qiyuan wanted to say so much to a poker friend.
I guess Li Qiyuan himself may not even know it.
Perhaps it was because of his extraordinary bones, or perhaps it was because he had a hunch that this young man could shine in this industry.
The game was over and the bosses went home.
Li Qiyuan forgot about this conversation within a few days.
For him, it was just an ordinary "sermon" that he had given to countless young people who wanted to join the game.
But a seed had already been planted in Zhao Changpeng's heart.
A seed that will shock the world in the future.
2. The Wisdom of Stud
After returning home, Zhao Changpeng dreamed of Li Qiyuan's words.
Although all his knowledge comes from a game of cards, he has become firmly optimistic about Bitcoin.
For him, now is the earliest time to enter the game.
I have to say that Zhao Changpeng is a ruthless person.
He simply gave up his startup and chose to start from scratch, entering the Bitcoin industry as a worker.
At the beginning, he joined an overseas company called "blockchain".
There, Zhao Changpeng met many big names in the virtual currency industry, and with his own abilities, he became the third in command of the company.
Afterwards, he was invited by OKCoin, a well-known domestic virtual currency trading platform, to serve as technical director.
In 2014, more and more people paid attention to the Bitcoin track.
Zhao Changpeng has become a senior and experienced figure in the industry due to his decisiveness in entering the industry and his strong execution ability.
It took him less than a year to go from a young and naive boy to debut as a member of the "Bitcoin Band".
During this year, as his understanding of virtual currency deepened, Zhao Changpeng's belief in Bitcoin became stronger and stronger.
At the same time, he also felt that he had figured out the game.
I have been immersed in this for many years. I have also done international financial transactions and played with currencies. Isn't it that I am good at it?
With his confidence in himself and his belief in Bitcoin, Zhao Changpeng was obsessed with it.
He made a decision that made everyone call him "crazy". He simply sold his property in Shanghai and put all his money into Bitcoin.
Even people in the industry were dumbfounded by this kind of behavior.
There are many ruthless people in the cryptocurrency circle, but this is the first time that Langmie dares to bet his entire fortune on a single bet.
But everyone also thinks that if the big guys take action, there must be a reason. Could it be that the price is going to change?
Everybody just waited and watched, and guess what happened?
Prices have indeed changed.
Less than a year after Zhao Changpeng went all-in, the price of Bitcoin was cut in half.
The housing prices in Shanghai have doubled.
Three words: what a loss.
It is said that if you win, you will be a young model in the club, and if you lose, you will go to work in the adult industry.
If an ordinary guy suffered as much as Zhao Changpeng, he would probably not go into the industry and would just queue up on the rooftop to save trouble.
What's the point of talking about faith? It's better to just die.
The cryptocurrency world has exploded, it’s over, the big guys are going crazy again.
But Zhao Changpeng is not an ordinary person.
Despite such a huge loss, he did not resort to speculation or go into the sea of trading. Instead, he became even more determined in his belief in Bitcoin.
Why?
It's very simple. Even though he is a talented young man and a veteran in the industry, he was taken advantage of.
Then whose leeks are not harvested by Bitcoin?
No matter how you think about it, there is definitely a way.
Everyone knows that there is a top secret book called the Sunflower Manual. If you want to practice this skill, you must castrate yourself first.
Zhao Changpeng is similar. He cut himself first, thus achieving the evolution of faith.
This reverse thinking alone has reached the fifth level.
According to the general script, when the magical power is mastered, the person should be invincible.
Just as Zhao Changpeng deepened his faith and prepared to expand and become stronger, an accident occurred.
Not long after he started working at OKCoin, the Bitcoin team started to have internal conflicts.
Zhao Changpeng and the company's CEO Xu Mingxing had a disagreement on the future development direction.
No one knows the specific reason, all we know is that the two of them started cursing each other online because of a disagreement.
One said that the CEO relied on robots to fake trading volume and the performance was all exaggerated.
One said that Zhao Changpeng’s academic qualifications were fake and he also deceived the company.
As the matter got bigger and bigger, Zhao Changpeng saw that he could no longer stay in the company, so he simply chose to leave.
After going solo, he continued to start his own business, but did not touch Bitcoin again.
It’s not because he gave up his faith, but because Zhao Changpeng is waiting for an opportunity to establish his own Bitcoin exchange.
Soon, in 2017, the opportunity came.
3. Takeoff
In 2017, the fire of cryptocurrency finally reached the cognition of most people.
A duck knows first when the water in the river warms in spring. There is no need to do any research. Even old duck Zhao Changpeng knows that this will be a crazy year.
The probability of stories of getting rich overnight by speculating in cryptocurrencies appearing in conversations after drinking has skyrocketed.
When buying vegetables, you can hear old men and women talking about this currency and that currency.
When a track is even being talked about in the vegetable market, it means that countless leeks will appear.
Zhao Changpeng understood that now was the best opportunity.
In July 2017, he founded Binance, a cryptocurrency exchange in Shanghai.
Users can trade various virtual currencies on Binance and then withdraw them into US dollars or other currencies.
What Zhao Changpeng earns is the transaction fee for each transaction.
The profit model looks simple, but it is actually quite difficult:
Why should people come to you to trade?
There are no less than three exchanges in China that are ranked among the best in the world.
"Huobi", the old acquaintance "OKCoin", and "Bitcoin China" from Li Qiyuan, the mentor who enlightened me back then.
Now, several companies are taking advantage of the favorable conditions and developing rapidly.
Binance, which was just founded by Zhao Changpeng, can only survive in the cracks.
But no one expected that Binance would start the unparalleled leeks-cutting mode as soon as it went online.
Because no one understands the power of "faith" better than Zhao Changpeng.
When he first joined the industry in 2013, he had little experience in the industry.
But as long as you enter the industry early, there will always be a day when you become a senior.
Now that the boom has exploded in 2017, in the eyes of new people, Zhao Changpeng is one of the big guys who expanded the territory with Li Qiyuan and others back then.
The reputation we have put up is backed by time and experience.
Besides, it’s hard to find someone with more faith than Zhao Changpeng.
After all, he really sold his house in 2014 and put all his money into Bitcoin.
He can be said to be the first person in the country to "hold 99% of his assets in Bitcoin."
With this story as their support, players were moved to tears and had no choice but to choose Binance.
Everyone knows that the leeks of the "Faith Party" are the easiest to harvest.
Zhao Changpeng used his beliefs to bring a group of loyal fans to Binance.
In just half a year, Binance attracted 6 million users.
With a transaction capacity of 1.4 million times per second, it has become the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange.
Whether it was his former colleagues or opponents, they were all left far behind by Zhao Changpeng.
This was his first peak in life, but it did not last long.
In July 2017, Zhao Changpeng just founded Binance.
In September of the same year, the People’s Bank of China, the Cyberspace Administration of China and seven other ministries jointly issued an announcement.
It clearly defines virtual currency issuance and financing activities as "illegal financial activities" and requires all related trading platforms to clean up and close transactions before the end of the month.
With just one ban, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange has become an illegal organization.
Several other domestic exchanges raised the white flag and shut down their services.
Even Li Qiyuan gave up his business and turned to blockchain.
For the first time, Zhao Changpeng was a little shaken.
Even my mentor has chosen to abandon Bitcoin. Is it really necessary to persevere?
In the end, for the sake of his beliefs back then, he was ready to give it one more try.
It was this completely different decision that led to completely different destinies for Zhao Changpeng and Li Qiyuan.
