I would like to add $hydra to a United States of America friendly exchange such as Coinbase. The development team will have to help by ensuring we are legal for coinbase asset approval but i feel we are a legal asset so shouldnt have any issues joining coinbase.
This would open the doors for hydra in my opinion by offering the token to United States Residents via a large exchange.
This would also help me individually because i am located in the United States and subject to its laws. I love hydra and everything it stands for, just would like more coverage for my jurisdiction.
Here is a link that should explain how to contact them and submit hydra for inclusion.
https://www.coinbase.com/blog/a-guide-to-listing-assets-on-coinbase
Lets get the pieces moving please to successfully make hydra available worldwide;). Thank you.
I am all for this. I attempted to buy more hydra today on KuCoin and was rejected because I’m not KYC.
Do we need the team to represent to Coinbase or can any one of us be the point person to do this?
I had the same issue, hydra is inaccessible to americans on kucoin now, who knows what other geograghical obstacles we may face in the future for hydra. That will really hurt the chain and i want to avoid pain and give hydra(& all of us) the chance it deserves.
From reading the link about submitting assets, coinbase wants the asset Issuer (hydra team) to upload all the documents to their asset hub for approval.
I imagine there will be folllow up questions that would be better answered by the team (especially florian) because they are better suited to answer questions about the technical side. I see no reason why we wouldnt be listed but i am not a cryptocurrency creator/developer/issuer and not aware of all obstacles we could face. I am more than happy to call coinbase and give a strong push of course…if needed.
This can definitely lay a solid foundation for exposure as well !
Would prefer Kraken instead of Coinbase… or both 
I have very good experiences with Kraken in the last 5-6 years. And it is a worldwide wellknown and
reputable CEX.
Maybe Coinbase would bring more new buyer/investors according its dominance in US???
From what I have found(least in my experience), when people start into crypto or when US people casually or hold some of their crypto. They tend to go to Coinbase first even with kraken being well known. Also with Coinbase listed as a public company, that exposure Levenshtein helps have people find Coinbase as well.
More accessibility via CEX for US and many other countries that were blacklisted by Kucoin would be the topic we should be discussing, and the specific CEX’s should be put to a DAO vote. I think this need/issue has been expressed enough in the Telegram and there seems to be the same sentiment here. I’m using DEX but unable to trade as strategically due to market order(Swap) only and slippage, as well as bridge fees.
While I certainly agree that a Coinbase listing would be a nice thing to have, I don’t think that this is something that can be proposed from the Hydra side. Because ultimately it is up to Coinbase to decide whether they want to list an asset or not.
We applied for Coinbase and other reputable exchanges a long time ago and keep updating the applications regularly. But it’s really difficult to get approved as there are thousands of projects that apply for a listing every month.
Hey Florian! I was unaware that the applications were already in at some of the exchanges and being updated so that is great to hear! I then think that the marketing in place if successful, may help push the volumes up and get the project higher on their radar. I guess we as HydraDAO community members might need a place to just ask questions about our ideas so we can have all of the information necessary on a topic from the team beforehand, so we are more able to write up a proper proposal based on facts rather than speculation.
I am actually happy that this discussion is taking place because it is an opportunity for our community members to realize that listing on an exchange is not a matter of desire. It is a complex fit of criteria that are extremely hard to comply with. Understanding these criteria allows a project to build in the right direction in order to ultimatively reach that goal.
Before I dive into the topic, I want to provide some fundamentals that are important for the discussion.
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By unofficial data, there are approximately 1.8M ERC20 tokens + coins existing. I think it is safe to say that every single of these ERC20 has applied to all tier 1 exchanges. The reason for this is that the filing of the application form takes an insignificant amount of effort while a potential listing on a Tier 1 exchange (e.g. Binance, Coinbase) unlocks significant exposure.
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Of those 1.8M ERC20s, there are approximately a total of 10,000 coins and tokens actively listed and tracked on CG and CMC. This comes as a result of a set of criteria for tracking an asset.
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Of the actively tracked 10,000 assets, Coinbase currently lists 246 assets and Binance lists 388 assets. Kraken lists 231 assets.
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If we draw an average mean among these three Tier 1 exchanges, that makes an average of 288 assets per Tier 1 exchange.
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At the time of making this post, BTC and ETH market cap make up 48.8% and 18.9% of the total crypto market cap 67.7% of the total market cap and approximately a similar number in terms of generated volumes.
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Market cap and trading volumes are two metrics that are to a large extent interlocked. The higher the market cap, the higher the traded volume is since the more people are involved in buying and selling. The only exception is with stablecoins, as they have a limited market cap and a much higher money velocity. But the notion is: in order to generate a lot of volumes for an exchange, you need to have a big market cap. This is also directly related to the number of users that are actively involved from a trading perspective. The average cap per user per asset is somewhat similar.
To give an exaple:
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A project with a market cap of 20M, and 10,000 users, makes an average holding per user in the ~2k range.
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what is not possible is for example to have a project with 20M market cap and 100,000 users or 1,000,000 users
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it is not possible for a 1M market cap project to generate the same organic volumes as a 20M market cap project. And in the same context, a 20M project can’t generate the same organic volumes as a 200M project.
So after outlining all of the factors above, I want our community to now put itself in the shoes of Tier1 exchanges.
As a Tier 1 exchange, you manage a very high risk/very high return business. Your day to day job is taking care of security, compliace, legal, AML, tech and engineering in an extremely fast growing industry.
68% of your business comes from BTC and ETH spot trading. And if we also factor futures contracts that are built on top of BTC and ETH, that figure may very well increase to e.g. 80%.
2 assets bring in 80% of your business, while the remaining 286 assets make up only 20% of the business. And since the industry is growing very fast, your number one priority is to support BTC and ETH as the backbone of your revenue stream.
This means that altcoins and especially non-flagman assets are essentially a highly niched product, which to a large extent play a supporting role for user experience but are not critical for Tier 1 business revenue. The reason why an alt gets listed is because it may come as some form of niched demand from loyal members, and a Tier 1 exchange that offers also support for top ranked alts, may be slightly more competitive in retaining its existing user base. Not having relevant Alts can lead to disproportionate loss of business as existing users may migrate their existing flagman positions to an exchange that supports their desired alts.
The 286 assets on average supported by the Tier 1, gives a direct hint at the absolute minimum threshold for an asset to be considered worthy to be included in this niched side of the exchange businesses. With each asset potentially bringing compliance, security and reputation risk on its own, there’s a minimum traded volumes, income and minimum number of members that make it worthwhile for a Tier 1 to even consider them as being relevant.
Of those 286 assets listed, there are ones which are newly listed and there are many which are delisted or likely to be delisted in the near future, so we should assume a constant inflow and outflow and a certain lifespan of a listing again based on the par market cap, number of users participating in the trading and of course the traded volumes that generate the income.
So the takeaway: Actual Market cap is the biggest determining factor for having a probability of being listed on a Tier 1. Since community size and traded volumes come as a derivative of the market cap metric, we can state that in second place come compliance and reputation and overall project appeal.
This is why 99.99% applications are completely discarded at the lowest level. Tier 1 exchanges have a shortlisting team which filter the applications and ensures a project meets the hard metrics among which market cap and community size are the most important ones before even being considered for further analysis. In fact, in most of the cases when a project applies, it never hears back from an exchange. Quite simply because responding to thousands of application is not possible. And also providing specific feedback would only fuel a race of faking these metrics.
And since 286 is the full list of assets, which also includes ones that are likely to be delisted, we can assume that the actual probability for being listed comes at the mid-point of that number → having a market cap that secures a ranking in the ~143 spot according to CG / CMC for a consistent time and being supported by a consistent data with dense liquidity and activity.
With all this being said, the path to a Tier 1 is similar to a chicken-egg dilemma. You need to have market cap and volumes, to get access to a Tier 1 which on its own arguably unlocks more activity. And even in that case, Tier 1 doesn’t really need you as their number one priority is mitigating risk in order to generate maximum income from the top few assets (BTC, ETH etc).
This is why the whole notion of applying for a listing to get listed is a misconception that is fueled due to lack of understanding.
In my opinion, even though CEXes role is being diminished as a narrative overt he last 3 years, they still present an important pathway to large clusters of audiences. In 2017/2018 it was impossible to build good liquidity without a presence on a good Tier 2 exchange and ideally a Tier 1.
DeFi was not existant, and AMM was not available in large scale. Today, the whole scene is completely different, with Dexes dominating liquidity for most assets even when compared against the strongest CEXes.
This is why I think the strategy for being listed lies on working on the product and really becoming worthy through fundamental value and through effective support on Tier 2 exchanges (e.g. MXC, Kucoin etc) as well as DEXes.
A ladder like strategy where goal is to grow the community, and therefore gradually increase the market cap is a more realistic pathway for achieving the goal.
Build Innovation → List on Tier 2 / DeFi → Build Liquidity on Tier 2 / DeFi → Grow as adoption and community (Innovate/Marketing/Promotion) → repeat…and at some point if the project is successful in growing its user base it inevitably unlocks also presence on Tier 1.
Having proper liquidity and presence on quality Tier 2 as well as Dexes enable pathways to the same audience and market cap and volumes can be unlocked only if the project grows organically. While we witness a handful of projects moonshot from launch to Tier 1, this occurrence is extremely rare. Again referring to the 1.8M tokens total pool, of which we see no more than 3-4 projects moonshot to Tier one per year. Even if we narrow the number to the 10k actively tracked, the probability is still similar to that of a lottery.
HYDRA: The path of Hydra is in building value through technological worthiness and acquiring new audiences. It’s important to know that the process is not linear and that the growth may be accelerated over a very short period of time after a long period of waiting and accumulation. This is why It is important to work consistently on marketing, tech, and liquidity in order to increase the probability of the outcome. Failure is of course an option as the industry is extremely competitive.
What I want to assure everyone is that applying for a listing on a Tier 1 exchange does not come down to filing the form. It’s 90% about being big in size, active in terms of community, and 10% about luck…as even in such a condition there’s an abundance of hundreds of projects waiting in line as the market recycles itself.
Hello Nikola,
I just wanted to extend my gratitude for taking the time to provide such a detailed explanation of the issue. It all makes sense, and I’m truly appreciative that this information was shared with the community. Having an accessible platform to ask questions and gain insights that might otherwise be unavailable is crucial. It ensures that we’re all on the same page, avoiding any potential gaps in understanding.
The lack of clarity and information surrounding this matter was evident, and now, with the community-wide understanding, we can collectively move forward from a shared starting point on this topic.
With this new clarity, my thoughts on the issue have become much more coherent. I’m eager to take a proactive step by compiling a list of tier 2 DeFi and CEX platforms that might be able to work around the region restrictions affecting our current markets. If the team already has access to this information, kindly let me know. Otherwise, I’m more than willing to assist in gathering this data, and I believe others from our team or the community might also be interested in contributing.
Does the concept of identifying the potential tier 2 CEX or DeFi platforms to collaborate with and provide liquidity align better with the approach you’ve outlined? It seems like a promising way to approach achieving the desired volumes and market capitalization necessary for potential inclusion in tier 1 CEX platforms.
Thank you again for sharing your insights, and I’m looking forward to contributing more to this initiative.
Thanks for sharing this information. It’s a good read to understand that these procedures are so complex and tough. Mitigating circumstance though is that every blockchain has to deal with this hard criteria. So it’s not the end of the world. Tier 2 will do fine. And who knows, maybe dexes are more future proof. I agree to take the steps that are readily achievable and have the main focus on those first.