I’m Optimistic…
Hey,
It’s Kevin, and I’m back.
This week, I sat down with Gracy Chen, the CEO of Bitget. We spoke for over an hour and went deep into what it actually looks like to run a global exchange today, how you scale a company across markets and cycles, and what it really takes to lead when everything around you is moving fast and often in the wrong direction.
Gracy is a single mom, taking care of her son and her parents, while running a 2,200-person company operating 24/7 across time zones. She joined Bitget in early 2022 and was appointed CEO in May 2024. Under her leadership, the platform has evolved from a mid-tier exchange to one of the world’s top 5 CEXs. Today, Bitget has around $20 billion in daily trading volume and over 45 million active users on the exchange, operating in over 150 countries.
But what I found most interesting is that she doesn’t talk about this as a “crypto exchange” story. She talks about it as an infrastructure shift. One of the key things she’s pushing now is what she calls a universal exchange, moving beyond just crypto into a broader marketplace where users can trade everything from Bitcoin to commodities to tokenized equities, all within the same environment.
But before we get further into the pod, let’s talk about what’s happening in the market right now.
On The Market…
Bitcoin moved higher this week following the announcement of a ceasefire, and while it’s always tempting to read too much into a short-term move like that, what matters more to me is how the price is reacting to information rather than the price itself. For the past few weeks, we’ve had a really resilient market that wasn’t dipping despite bad news. And now, as soon as we get something even slightly positive, we see a sharp reaction to the upside.
I mentioned this last week, but it’s even more obvious now when you speak to people. A lot of investors are still sidelined. They’re out of the market, sitting on cash, waiting for what they believe is an inevitable crash into the low 50s or even lower. And the logic is always the same: there hasn’t been a real capitulation event, there hasn’t been an FTX-style collapse, despite the liquidations like in October, there hasn’t been that moment where everything collapses. So they wait. And the longer they wait, the more anchored they become to the idea that a “real bottom” still needs to happen.
The problem is, markets don’t move based on what we think is logical. When Bitcoin dropped into the $59k–$60k range, that might very well have been the “bottom”. We had a meaningful flush, and more importantly, many people didn’t even get filled on their buy orders. Price moved too quickly, and before most people could act, the opportunity was gone.
Does that mean we can’t go lower from here? Of course not. There’s still a lot of uncertainty, especially with geopolitics, and if things escalate again, markets will react. But what it does mean, at least for me, is that trying to perfectly time the bottom is becoming less and less attractive compared to just consistently building exposure. That’s why I’ve been comfortable continuing to DCA, even when the broader sentiment feels negative.
And you can feel that negativity everywhere, not just in the market, but in the business as well, with potential partnerships appearing and then disappearing just as quickly. There’s this general sense of caution, and there’s a lot of uncertainty. Ironically, this kind of bearish vibe is usually closer to a bottom than a top. When everyone is confident, that’s when risk is highest. When people are uncertain, defensive, and slightly depressed, that’s often when the market is positioned for a bull run.
Another cool thing with a pump like this week’s is getting to observe where the money flows first. When the market bounced, you could clearly see which assets were being bought aggressively. Hyperliquid, for example, held up very well during the downside and held strongly with the upside. But Zcash jumped around 25% almost immediately following the ceasefire news. And Bitcoin itself moved from around $67k to $72k, its highest level in roughly 20 days. These moves give you a sense of where conviction is building and what the market is willing to reward when sentiment shifts, even slightly.
Then you have these smaller but still very meaningful signals, like Iran suggesting that payments through the Strait of Hormuz should be made in Bitcoin.
So overall, I’d say I’m cautiously optimistic, but probably leaning more optimistic than cautious. I’ll keep buying, keep building exposure, and let the market do what it does.
From The Pod
One of the things that stood out to me in this conversation is that Gracy doesn’t really talk about Bitget as a “crypto exchange” anymore. She talks about it as infrastructure that goes beyond listing tokens and competing for trading volume within crypto. It’s things like tokenized US stocks, commodities, and broader financial instruments being integrated into a crypto-native system, all tied together by stablecoins as the settlement layer. And when you zoom out, what she’s really doing is moving Bitget toward what she calls a universal exchange, a place where users don’t just trade crypto, but trade globally valuable assets using a single infrastructure.
That shift is a strategic response to something she’s very explicit about in the episode, which is that parts of the crypto market are becoming more competitive, and in some cases, even shrinking. If you stay confined to that, you’re fighting for the same pie with more players. So the only real way forward is to expand the pie entirely.
Beyond infrastructure, there’s the operational layer. Managing 2,200 people across different countries, time zones, and functions is not something you can run on intuition or culture alone. The way she describes it is very simple but very strict. Everyone has clear objectives, clear key results, and performance is reviewed consistently. Whether you are in an office or working remotely doesn’t matter. What matters is whether you deliver.
At the same time, it’s not purely mechanical. She also talks about the need to create moments of cohesion, whether through events, shared rituals, or internal incentives, because a fully distributed organisation can easily fragment if there’s no intentional effort to keep people connected. What you end up with is a system that is both disciplined and human, structured but still flexible enough to operate globally. And again, that reflects how she thinks more broadly. It’s not about choosing between control and autonomy, but about designing a system where both can coexist.
We also spent a fair amount of time on what it actually takes to build something at that scale, and she was very direct about it. Most people are not suited to being founders. Not because they lack ambition, but because the job itself is very different from how it’s perceived. There’s a difference between wanting to be an entrepreneur and actually being one, and she draws that line quite clearly. Real founders are focused on solving problems that people need solved. They talk to users, they iterate, they adjust. Wantrepreneurs, as she calls them, are often more focused on optics, on recognition, on being seen as builders rather than doing the work of building.
That idea connects back to her own journey. From starting out in media, to moving into startups, to eventually leading Bitget, there’s a consistent pattern of stepping closer to where value is actually created. She talks about leaving her early career because she didn’t want to just observe people building companies, she wanted to be part of it. And that same mindset shows up in how she runs Bitget today. Everything is anchored around usefulness, around solving real problems, around building something that people actually rely on.
We also got into her personal journey, from her early career in media to building companies, to the biases she faced as a female founder raising capital, and how those experiences shaped the way she thinks about leadership today. There’s a very strong thread of resilience in how she approaches both business and life, and balances her responsibilities, at work and at home, and she even frames herself as the “CEO” of her family in the same way she runs her company.
We talked about what makes someone actually suited to building a company, why most people aren’t, how to think about markets when they’re uncertain, and where she believes crypto is really going over the next few years.
We covered these and a lot more, so check out the full pod here 👇
Before You Go
If there’s one idea that ties everything together this week, it’s this tension between waiting and moving. In the market, you see it clearly. A lot of people are sitting on the sidelines, waiting for a cleaner entry, a bigger crash, and more certainty. But markets rarely reward that kind of patience, and by the time things feel clear again, most of the move has already happened. That’s why I keep coming back to the same approach.
And then you see that same idea play out in the conversation with Gracy. She’s not building Bitget in perfect conditions. She’s building it while the market is evolving, while competition is increasing, while parts of the industry are becoming less attractive. Instead of waiting for clarity, she’s expanding into what comes next, whether that’s tokenized assets, stablecoin-based trading, or a broader financial infrastructure that goes beyond crypto. It’s the same principle, just at a different scale. The people who move, who adapt, who build while things are still uncertain, are usually the ones who end up ahead.
And that’s it.
There is always more interesting stuff to share, more high-profile guests, and more projects worth paying attention to, so keep an eye on your inbox.
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I’ll be back next week.
Till then
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Mr Shift