Over 20 million people have been exposed to digital assets, and Vietnam is becoming a new hotbed for the next generation of cryptocurrencies

Author: Followin

Walking on the streets of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, the humid air, the incessant lights, the roaring army of motorcycles, and the vibrant DJ show in the center of the square all exude a sense of youth and vitality. Here, the Web3 industry is rapidly growing.

In 1986, Vietnam began to learn from China's "Doi Moi" (Renovation), entering a period of rapid economic development, with an average annual GDP growth of 7% over the past thirty years, surpassing all countries in the ASEAN region and successfully ranking among the fastest-growing economies in the world. In recent years, during the global supply chain restructuring, Vietnam has also emerged as a winner, continuously climbing in its position within global manufacturing.

Vietnam is the third most populous country in Southeast Asia and has become the 15th country in the world with a population exceeding 100 million. Data shows that nearly 70% of Vietnam's population is of working age. At the same time, the proportion of young people in the population has reached a historical high, with those aged 10 to 24 accounting for 21.1% of the total population. The optimistic economic development prospects and the large young population have made the entire Web3 industry see the potential for future market growth.

Returning to the Web3 industry itself, a report by Triple-A indicates that over 20 million people in Vietnam have held or used digital assets. According to Chainalysis 2023 report, Vietnam ranks third in the Crypto adoption index, and it was first in both 2022 and 2021. Additionally, in exchanges like Binance, BingX, and MEXC, the Vietnamese market has become one of the top five countries by trading volume. By December 2022, Vietnam had birthed over 200 blockchain projects, with Coin98 and Coin68 (Kyros Ventures) recognized as the leading players.

The panoramic view of the Vietnamese crypto industry shared by Kyros Ventures CEO Zane showcases the entire Web3 ecosystem in Vietnam.

As one of the largest blockchain events in Vietnam, 2024 is only the second year GM Vietnam has been held. GM Vietnam 2023 saw over 2,500 participants and more than 15 surrounding events, while by 2024, the number of surrounding events has rapidly expanded to over 100, with Web3 project activities seemingly everywhere on the streets of Ho Chi Minh.

Whether it’s established public chains like Polygon, Avalanche, and Polkadot, or relatively new projects like SUI, Aptos, Ton, Starknet, and Zetachain, all have active presences here. Of course, GM Vietnam is also a gathering for exchanges, with OKX, BingX, CoinEx, and HTX all having booths at the venue. Followin, Rhythm, Foresight News, and Chain Catcher have also come to Vietnam to report.

More than Gamefi, Web3 Games Explore Diverse Development Directions in Vietnam

Thanks to the phenomenal success of the blockchain game Axie Infinity, gaming has become a very important part of Vietnam's Web3 ecosystem, and Web3 games are exploring different development models.

The offline event held by the Web3 shooting mobile game MATR1X FIRE may be a microcosm of the localization development of Web3 games. On June 6, MATR1X FIRE hosted an offline competition where eight Vietnamese teams competed for the championship, with the winner earning a spot in the Taipei Major Finals scheduled for August this year. At the event, the competing teams sat on either side of the stage, and two professional hosts provided live commentary during the video broadcast, creating an intense esports atmosphere.

The event took place at Vikings Esports Stadium, a gaming café chain with locations in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, which has hosted many professional competitions in Vietnam. The professional team of the same name, Vikings, is currently active in games like League of Legends (LOL), CSGO, and PUBG.

Meanwhile, the organizing party Flazers is a PUBG Mobile Super League gaming team that has now ventured into Web3 as a gaming guild. With hardware configuration, local resources, and event organization, the MATR1X FIRE model even feels quite "Web 2". In the Gamefi-dominated Web gaming space, MATR1X FIRE is carving out a unique path with its gameplay and esports-oriented operations.

In addition to the MATR1X competition, the event venue also gathered various Gamefi games for experience, including Pirate Clash, Legend of Arcadik, and Last Odyssey. At a designated computer, staff would guide you to quickly try out a game. After fully experiencing Pirate Clash, we found that "gold farming" still seems to be the core essence, with not much surprise. However, we could still see investors from multiple countries, including South Korea and Singapore, coming to inspect various game projects at the event.

After the rapid rise of Notcoin on the TON network, many realized that perhaps taking the "gold farming" approach to the extreme might not be out of the question. At the Summer Night Bash event hosted by Followin, BeraSig founder Haney introduced us to BeraBeeCatcher, a project similar to NOT. By opening it on Telegram and starting the mini-program, users can continuously click on the little bees that appear on the screen, with the number of bees corresponding to future tokens called SUGAR. Checking the game's leaderboard, there are already over 75,000 players. BeraSig itself is a mobile application and Chrome extension that allows users to experience Berachain in one place. While airdrops are certainly effective in attracting interaction, combining games and the story of NOT's surge may lead to a new round of "two birds with one stone."

According to Statista's market forecast data, Vietnam's game user penetration rate is expected to reach 10.1% in 2024 and 11.6% in 2029, which translates to nearly 12 million people. With the 10-24 age group accounting for 21% of Vietnam's population, there are over 20 million young people. Whether in gaming or gold farming, the prospects are very promising.

On-chain Trading Booms, Vietnamese Investors Actively Move Onchain

Many might think that most crypto investors in Vietnam are still active in CEX. According to data shared by Kyros Ventures CEO Zane, currently, 61% of crypto assets in Vietnam are stored in CEX, while 39% are directly on-chain. In the past year of 2023, "BRC-20" topped the list of the five most searched crypto terms in Vietnam, with many Vietnamese users participating in the BRC 20 Summer.

As the meme year of 2024, the on-chain meme craze is also happening in Vietnam. During the several-day-long Vietnam Blockchain Week, the local meme coin project TRAU caught our attention. The founder, wearing horns, enthusiastically introduced TRAU to many attendees: "Water buffaloes play a crucial role in the production and daily life of Vietnamese people, carrying rich cultural connotations."

Checking the on-chain market data, we found that TRAU's market cap once reached about $1 million but has now dropped to only $50,000, with fewer than 200 holding addresses. While many see it as a dead project, the founder remains passionate, and the official Twitter continues to update various event photos and introduce water buffalo culture, seemingly more active than some "value coin" projects.

Limited by the inherent constraints of the Vietnamese market, and perhaps because water buffaloes are not a meme attribute with strong cultural universality, TRAU's potential may not be optimistic, which seems to be a natural dilemma for purely localized meme projects in Vietnam.

Faced with the rapidly expanding on-chain market, OKX, one of the leading exchanges participating in GM Vietnam, has focused its promotion on the OKX wallet. In the main agenda speech, OKX President Hong Fang detailed the features, advantages, and product philosophy of the OKX wallet; at the booth, there were numerous displays of various functions of the OKX wallet. Even in the official press release, the highlighted products were the wallet, DEX, NFT market, and Web3 DeFi, fully emphasizing its on-chain attributes.

In fact, according to data disclosed by OKX, among many countries and regions, Vietnam ranks in the Top 4 for active users of the OKX wallet. Facing the grand goal of "Reaching Billions Onchain," the Vietnamese market has become an important market for OKX's continued deep cultivation.

The First Afternoon Agenda of the Conference Canceled, Is There a Shift in Vietnamese Regulation?

In April this year, the Vietnam News Agency reported that a representative from the Ministry of Justice stated that cryptocurrencies are not banned in Vietnam, but it is necessary to establish a legal framework to ensure their normal development and mitigate risks. Meanwhile, Cao Dang Vinh, Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Economy and Civil Legislation, stated that there are no regulations governing the development of cryptocurrencies in Vietnam, and cryptocurrencies are not considered legal assets.

Not banned, but also not fully legal, seems to be the current status of cryptocurrencies in Vietnam, which many crypto practitioners are familiar with or have become accustomed to. However, what happened at the GM Vietnam conference surprised many. After the morning agenda concluded smoothly, the afternoon agenda was delayed, and participants were eventually notified that all roundtables were canceled. On the second day of the conference, some main agenda segments continued, but aside from the peripheral booths still showcasing, all booths in the three conference halls were closed. A conference that had been brewing and preparing for a long time presented itself to participants in such a "half-hearted" manner. In fact, even before the main agenda began, some surrounding activities had already been temporarily canceled due to warnings.

Insiders revealed that the trigger for all this seemed to be a seminar organized by the Vietnam Blockchain Association a few days earlier regarding legal frameworks and investor protection. "When the issue is clearly presented to the management level, for the sake of stability or protection, the management will still choose to intervene, and the reason for the halt is that the organizers did not obtain permission for the AMA (roundtable)." Of course, the conference had obtained permission for the meeting and speeches, but indeed did not have permission for the AMA.

Local practitioners in Vietnam indicated that this might be another instance of internal power struggles within the industry. The association originally wanted to gain more voice, but after the incident, it exceeded the association's control and harmed the entire Vietnamese crypto industry. After all, the actual result is that the conference sponsors were left in despair, and participants found it absurd.

Despite this, Vietnamese practitioners are not worried about a "one-size-fits-all" approach; they see it more as a minor episode.

When Sun Wukong Meets Mickey Mouse, the Web3 Summer Belongs to Vietnam

Many Chinese people feel a sense of both strangeness and familiarity when they come to Vietnam. The similar political system and the influence of Chinese culture make people feel at home, while the army of motorcycles on the streets reminds them of the electric bike army in China, and the street stalls evoke the bustling atmosphere of Chinese streets.

However, in the daily lives of young people in Vietnam, they watch YouTube, Netflix, scroll through TikTok, search on Google, socialize on Facebook, and chat on Messenger, which is a completely Westernized system for most Chinese people. At the same time, the influence of French culture during the colonial period and the influx of many Westerners as a tourist country have led to a cultural fusion that gives a sense of Western flavor. In Nguyen Hue Walking Street in Ho Chi Minh, seeing two cosplayers dressed as Sun Wukong and Mickey Mouse standing side by side may be how many people perceive Vietnam.

But returning from the real world to Web3, everything still has a familiar flavor. At the Summer Night Bash event hosted by Followin, we interacted with many Vietnamese Web3 enthusiasts. Vietnamese investors complain about VC coins, lament missed opportunities with NOT, and express frustrations about the challenges of this bull market. Young people face Web3 with strong ideals, hoping to create the next Killer App. Entrepreneurs aim to ride the wave of Notcoin to successfully develop their game projects. Contract traders also engage in high-leverage bets, seeking to get rich or face liquidation. Retail investors vent their frustrations about local projects lacking vision and cutting corners, while local project teams seek English branding to disguise themselves as foreigners. The shared experiences resonate deeply, evoking a sense of déjà vu. The joys and sorrows, laughter and anger, all reflect a passion and vitality that belong to Web3.

Ho Chi Minh is located in the tropics, with temperatures exceeding 30 degrees for more than half the year. Vietnam's Web3 Summer is equally hot. Upon meeting a weary friend, he expressed that he had discovered the truth about GM Vietnam, which is not about saying "GM (Good Morning)" early in the morning, but rather the "GM" seen after an all-nighter when witnessing the sunrise the next day!