At 20:00 on June 18th, the joint online live broadcast event between Bixin and Cambridge University was held in the Bixin Live Room. Mustafa Yilham, director of global business development at Bixin, talked with Apolline Blandin, head of cryptocurrency and blockchain at Cambridge University Judge Business School, and discussed the global mining distribution map, enterprise development trends and applications.

This dialogue will be live-streamed on the Bixin Wallet App, co-hosted by Jinse Finance and Lianwen.

Bixin Introduction

Bixin is a blockchain asset platform integrating wallet, transaction and social networking. Since 2014, Bixin has accumulated many years of experience and innovative product concepts, and has won the love of millions of users. Currently, Bixin has opened core functions such as fiat currency trading, one-click instant exchange, lending, leverage, co-management wallet, guaranteed payment, mining machine mall, YBay, and Bixin group live broadcast. We support multiple assets such as BTC, USDS, etc. Safe and reliable custody services combined with multiple transaction functions and novel blockchain social methods make Bixin stand out among many established wallets.

In addition, the perception of users, sensitivity to the market, and the ideal of promoting the development of the encrypted asset industry are the driving forces for us to make good products. In order to create a good blockchain ecology, so that everyone can equally hold, use and manage their own bitcoins, and realize the original payment vision of bitcoins, Bixin is constantly updating and upgrading on the basis of consolidating existing functions Products to bring users a more optimized experience.

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Mustafa Yilham: Apollon, welcome to the Bixin live broadcast room, we are very happy to have you join us. Can you tell us a little bit about your background and how you got involved in the crypto industry?

Apolline Blandin: I'm so happy to be here! I became interested in cryptocurrencies when I was working in France for the National Technology and Startup Investment Association. I interacted regularly with French and European crypto asset startups such as Ledger and Coinhouse and learned a lot. I was so passionate about the crypto industry as it fit perfectly with my research interests (i.e. financial technology) that I decided to go back to academia and spend most of my time studying cryptocurrencies. This is how I ended up attending CCAF in early 2018.

Mustafa Yilham: Cambridge is one of the most famous educational institutions in the world, and we are delighted to see its participation in the cryptocurrency space. Can you tell us more about the work you do at CCAF? When and why did you start your cryptocurrency research program?

Apolline Blandin: The Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance (CCAF) was established in 2015 by three Directors: Dr Robert Wardrop, Raghu Rau and Bryan Zhang, and it is a research affiliate of the University of Cambridge Judge Business School. Initially, the launch of CCAF focused on peer-to-peer lending, equity crowdfunding, which is still being researched today. In late 2016, the center established a cryptocurrency research team, initially led by Dr. Garrick Hileman. The team has grown since then, and we spend most of our time researching the industry, understanding how it is developing, capturing emerging trends, and setting industry standards, among other things.

Mustafa Yilham: We recently saw an interactive bitcoin mining map released by Cambridge, can you tell us a little bit about the map and what it conveys?

Apolline Blandin: In July 2019, we published the Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index (CBECI), a near real-time estimate of the electricity consumed by the Bitcoin network and the first step towards a reliable estimate of Bitcoin’s environmental footprint. The second stage is to accurately understand the geographical distribution of Bitcoin hash rate. We have preliminary predictions for this, but lack the actual data of miners or mining pools. Therefore, we decided to partner with Bitcoin mining pools to see if together we could make an interactive map of the global hash rate distribution on a national and provincial level. The first version of our map was published in early May and covers the period from September 2019 to April 2020, with data provided by three mining pools: BTC.com, Poolin and ViaBTC.

I'll just cite a few interesting findings:

1. As expected, most of the mining activity takes place in China, although we observed a slight drop in hash power from 75% in September 2019 to 65% in April 2020.

2. The growth in the China region seems to have shifted to overseas regions, such as Kazakhstan or Russia. What the data doesn’t show, however, is whether this is demand-driven (i.e. overseas miners try to connect with Chinese mining pools) or supply-driven (i.e. Chinese mining pools actively diversify their client base).

3. The data also allowed us to study the migration pattern of miners in China, in which Sichuan province topped the list during the rainy season, and miners gradually migrated to Xinjiang at the end of October.

4. We should keep in mind that the map was made based on data from Chinese mining pools, which accounted for 37% of the total hash rate during the study period, so it may be slightly biased towards China. For example, we believe that Canada is underrepresented, with less than 1%.

Mustafa Yilham: Have you seen an increased interest in the mining industry from companies and institutions in Western countries?

Apolline Blandin: Hard to say. North America seems to be more interested than Europe, although Europe also has some mining hubs. In general, the mining industry is often overlooked by those outside the cryptoasset industry.

Mustafa Yilham: We also recently read your research report, The Second Global Cryptocurrency Benchmark Report, in which you discuss in more depth the different areas within the industry, global usage, storage, security, regulations and outlook, We would therefore like to ask a few questions about this report. Why do you think there are more and more companies globally operating in different market segments?

Apolline Blandin: First of all, I would like to remind the audience that our research mainly covers three market segments besides the mining industry: transaction, payment and custody. We currently do not have enough data to identify why more and more companies are operating across markets globally (i.e. one company is involved in different market segments). These companies may be trying to become a "one-stop shop" for crypto asset users, or to operate across industries in order to generate more profit points in response to frequent industry downturns. Both of the above are possible.

Mustafa Yilham: Do you think the global usage of cryptocurrencies is increasing? In which industries are you seeing the greatest growth?

Apolline Blandin: It is difficult to make accurate numerical predictions. Our second global crypto asset benchmark study estimates that the number of crypto asset users increased from 18 million users in 2017 to 35 million in 2018, an increase of 94%. Despite the bear market in 2018 and increased awareness, growth rates are likely to continue to be sluggish. We are currently working on the third edition of the report and hope to share updated data with you soon.

Mustafa Yilham: Which geographical regions of the world are most of the encrypted digital asset companies you have observed so far?

Apolline Blandin: From a geographic perspective, our second global cryptoasset benchmark study estimates that most companies are headquartered in North America (primarily the US), China, the UK, Switzerland, and Japan in terms of the number of companies alone. Now, other jurisdictions have become hubs for many cryptocurrency companies, such as Singapore

Mustafa Yilham: What do you think of the current state of global regulation building? Are we moving in a positive direction?

Apolline Blandin: In 2018, we have noticed the "best practice" in regulation in the industry. For example, data shows that having a compliance team has become the industry standard. Even for companies operating only in the cryptocurrency space (i.e. not supporting fiat currencies), we are seeing more standard compliance for KYC/AML. Now, with the FATF recommendations, we expect an increase in the development and implementation of these standards. It is also an important topic if the industry wants to attract institutional investors into the crypto asset market. However, I should mention that the best practice approach to these regulations can vary by region, with North American companies appearing to adhere to higher standards.

Mustafa Yilham: What is Alternative Finance? Do you think they will generally integrate into the mainstream financial system?

Apolline Blandin: Our center defines alternative finance as "any online financial instrument, mechanism or system that emerges outside of the traditional financial system," because you'll see that cryptocurrencies naturally fall under the center's purview.

The life cycle of an organization active in the alternative finance industry typically follows four main stages:

1. Incubation: solutions to problems whose core alternative economic functions are not clearly regulated;

2. Democratization: The disruptive potential of business models becomes apparent when established players feel increased competition and investors seek opportunities to support new business models;

3. Mainstreaming: Mainly characterized by the introduction of a regulatory response or framework that provides regulatory certainty;

4. Adapt to the existing system: Either the alternative business model becomes a partner in the existing value chain, or is acquired, or copied; or the alternative business model replaces the traditional enterprise until a new balance is reached. This phase typically translates into the regulator introducing an activity-based regulatory framework.

Mustafa Yilham: Are you seeing increased interest from institutional investors globally? What is your outlook for industry growth in the next 3 years?

Apolline Blandin: Institutional investors entering the encrypted asset market has been the hottest topic. Some interesting research articles show that institutional investors are more interested in crypto assets. A recent report by Fidelity Digital Assets, published last week, is one such study, which revealed that 80 percent of institutional investors surveyed are interested in crypto assets. Historically, the crypto asset market has been primarily retail driven. However, the development of institutional-grade tools and infrastructure that replicate traditional market structures may further increase institutional investor interest. If the industry continues to grow like traditional markets, and achieves compliance and greater transparency, we may see more institutional investors join in the next few years.

Q&A

Mustafa Yilham: What is your own price expectation for Bitcoin at the end of this year?

Apolline Blandin: We don't study the financial price attributes of Bitcoin, but basically look at technology and mining data, so I can't answer this question.

Mustafa Yilham: Do you think miners are more centralized?

Apolline Blandin: This is a very controversial issue, but our research survey shows that computing power and mining machine manufacturers are more concentrated. We believe that mining pools will become more decentralized through some future technologies. However, we are a little worried about the regulatory issues faced by Chinese mining pools. If the regulation becomes stricter in the future, it may have a certain impact on the Bitcoin computing power.

Mustafa Yilham: Can you see the Bitcoin payment scene in the UK?

Apolline Blandin: I know that some companies support bitcoin payments, but most of them are online bitcoin payment scenarios. There is a pub at the University of Cambridge that also used to accept Bitcoin payments.

Mustafa Yilham: In which field will the encrypted digital industry lead the development?

Apolline Blandin: We do have many scenarios and applications in the payment industry. The largest application provider is the exchange itself, but we will see more and more applications in lending and other financial fields in the future. I have seen more and more research on cryptocurrencies in many departments of Cambridge University. Our research is also to let the public have a correct understanding and eliminate misunderstandings about Bitcoin.

The content of the live broadcast only represents the personal views of the guests and does not represent the platform's position.