Binance and BitMEX shared a social media bro hug after the latter publicly accused its fellow cryptocurrency exchange of plagiarizing documentation featured in its recently-launched crypto derivatives testnet.
On Wednesday, the BitMEX Twitter account ribbed Binance over its testnet launch, highlighting apparent plagiarism in the two platforms’ documentation.
Congrats on the Testnet Futures launches @binance. Glad to see you enjoyed reading our documentation as much as we enjoyed writing it! pic.twitter.com/lLzcLcX6t4
— BitMEX (@BitMEXdotcom) September 4, 2019
CZ Takes Responsibility for Plagiarized Documentation
The CEO of Binance, Changpeng Zhao, quickly responded to the tweet, taking responsibility for the duplicated copy and apologizing to BitMEX.
Shame on us. 😂 Sorry about that. Missed this in the DD process before the acquisition (didn’t read the BitMex docs ourselves). Will fix/remove ASAP.
The official docs of Futures A platform (developed internally) are here: https://t.co/TPjvYgB2hr for your review.
— CZ Binance (@cz_binance) September 4, 2019
Arthur Hayes, the CEO of BitMEX, tweeted a meme apparently indicating his forgiveness for the error.
https://t.co/ck1Y2yARXD pic.twitter.com/JjR85KgrhW
— Arthur Hayes (@CryptoHayes) September 4, 2019
The seemingly-friendly interaction between the two exchanges comes amid Binance’s entrance into the cryptocurrency derivatives market, which is dominated by BitMEX.
BitMEX’s 100x leveraged XBT/USD contracts currently comprise the single most-traded cryptocurrency product available to retail investors, while Binance ranks as the largest spot exchange.
In addition to launching two testnets for the exchange’s futures platform, this week also saw Binance announce its acquisition of JEX, a Seychelles-based cryptocurrency exchange that supports spot and derivative trading. Through JEX, Binance will launch futures, options, and perpetual swap contracts.
Moving forward, the platform will be rebranded to Binance JEX. It will offer a native cryptocurrency token called JEX, which Binance plans to distribute through “marketing activities and community incentives.”
Competition Heats Between Regulated and Unregulated Crypto Derivatives Platforms
The JEX acquisition came during the same week that The Wall Street Journal published a report claiming that VanEck will seek an SEC exemption by exclusively offering shares in its so-called “limited bitcoin ETF” to qualified institutional investors.
Speaking to CCN, Ricky Li, the co-founder of cryptocurrency market maker Altonomy, said the cryptocurrency market boasts “among the most fierce competition” in the derivatives industry.
Li said the cryptocurrency derivatives market is divided between regulated entities seeking to target institutional investors and unregulated entities serving retail investors:
“The market is pretty clearly divided between ‘regulated’ and ‘unregulated’. On the US side, a list of exchanges are all pushing push for proper federal licensing to prepare for large institution entry. On the unregulated market, it is still a game for retail investor adoption. Each has their own contract modifications to reflect these different audiences.”
Bitfinex also appears to be seeking to compete with BitMEX, with the exchange recently launching 100x leveraged perpetual swap contracts paired against Tether (USDT) for both BTC and Ethereum (ETH).
