Gifto 2019 Q2 Review — A letter from team

Gifto Official
Jul 17 · 11 min read

Q2 was a quarter of wild ups, and wilder swings, fueled as usual by big news and rumors in the digital assets industry, from Facebook’s Libra to controversy with Tether and U.S. congressional hearings. Bitcoin was up more than 3x at its peak in Q2, at which point the bull market of 2019 was called. The quarter ended with volatility and a snap of whiplash that continues as we speak. The community is asking: Where is this market going, and how does Gifto play into this? With Libra etc. in the pipeline, how will Altcoin X grow?

To know where we’re going, we first have to look at where we’ve been. The project team delivered an array of Gifto apps and wallet features to users in the last 18 months: From social gifts, e-commerce, to crypto games, to charity events, to uDiamond conversion in the Gifto wallet, to CoinUp…. and in the process, encountered many challenges on the path of mass adoption of crypto.

However, we have not shared our learnings nearly enough with the community, nor how we plan to evolve the Gifto ecosystem based on those learnings to achieve massive growth. As one of our community members recently reminded us, “communicating the challenges is just as important as lofty goals.” We want to take a step back here and share with you some of these learnings, which are the core of what is driving Gifto 3.0, the next major release of the vision that we are very excited about, coming in Q3.

Gifto was one of the first projects to push exclusively for mass adoption in the crypto world. This has been our primary focus since we started in the Fall of 2017, and on the way, we met head-on with crypto’s true hurdles:

But first, some project history.

  • Difficult for Uplive’s non techies, non holders to understand the basics of blockchain and crypto. Metamask, keyphrases, etc. are all huge hurdles for everyday internet users.
  • Difficult for them to acquire crypto with fiat, without going through complicated KYC.
  • Many countries had begun cracking down on crypto, and we, as a well known and large company with 15 physical office around the world, are right in the middle of legal compliance.
  • Dapps weren’t built with user experience/need in mind, and very few dapps are actually being used.

These are big hurdles, even for a large company like us who actually own a huge userbase. This points to how immature the crypto and blockchain industry really is, and explains why in July 2019, mass adoption of crypto is no where to be seen.

As we encountered each hurdle, we at Gifto project tried to solve them as entrepreneurs:

  • “Crypto was hard to understand” => We created and polished the Gifto Wallet, a mobile web wallet that we have opened up to Uplive’s millions of iOS and Android users; as well as CoinUp and Crypto Girls crypto media portals, the latter seeing 1m views (note: it’s in Mandarin) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8ZCG7cs4Ns
  • “Crypto was hard to get” => We pursued and released multiple paths for fiat onramps for our wallet users after legally reviewing 80+ jurisdictions. Today, we have more fiat purchase options for Gifto globally than many much larger projects, in part due to strategic partnerships with exchanges ACE, Infinitex, and Binance, and through our innovative uDiamond-to-Gifto conversion gateways in the Gifto Wallet.
  • “Most countries had begun cracking down on crypto” => We focused all communications and activities on regions where it was legal to do so ONLY, with full legal vetting, and avoided major regulatory headaches and lawsuits that have ensnared other projects.
  • “Most dapps weren’t being used” => We focused on building products that used blockchain tech in ways that advanced our vision and which users would use and be delighted by; such as the Giftomon game, Universal Gifting and blockchain engraving, the Gifto Wallet, and e-commerce rewards. ALL of which had REAL users that were more than most blockchain applications.

In short, everything we did over the past two years was tied to:

  • The Gifto vision of rewarding content creators, fans
  • Growing usage of Gifto in Uplive
  • Solving REAL problems with delivering blockchain tech, at scale, to worldwide mainstream users

However, as much developments as we pushed out, we still have not progressed as far as we would like. It’s still hard for users to use our crypto dapps on a daily basis; in comparison, we are used to millions of daily users on our “traditional” internet/mobile apps. We hunkered down, stopped making yet another dapp using GTO tokens, and thought hard.

Breaking Down the Walled Crypto Gardens

First, we started to question some fundamental assumptions that the industry has about what it takes to be a successful project. We now challenge the assumption that to be successful, token projects must require that all users buy and use THEIR tokens, THEIR chain, THEIR smart contracts, exclusively.

Indeed, crypto greed has poisoned the open, distributed world that blockchain enthusiasts have envisioned all along, and left thousands of walled gardens of manipulated capital, zero-sum games of your exchange vs. my exchange, your chain vs. my chain, your dapp vs my dapp. And there’s no better project than Gifto, with our emphasis on sharing and giving, to get back to the soul of blockchain in a practical way, that lifts many boats — and Gifto’s as well.

With this major learning in mind we’ve continued to build our Universal Gifting vision in a way which addresses these hurdles collectively, not individually. And the result will be released in the next few months.

The Winds Are In Our Sails

Taking a step back from our learnings; with dozens of large tech brands like Facebook, Visa, and Stripe in 2019 publicly dedicating resources to accelerate the mainstream adoption of crypto, we have more opportunities than ever to grow our lead at the forefront of social, mainstream use of cryptocurrencies.

One year ago, these brands working together to advance crypto would have been unthinkable.

In short, Gifto’s opportunity is bigger and more relevant than ever, and this last quarter was a pivotal one for getting close to that vision. In the past short twelve weeks, Gifto:

  • Dramatically expanded access to Gifto with the opening of 10 new uDiamond-to-GTO payment gateways in Uplive.
  • Launched almost 100 new e-commerce gifts in the Gifto Wallet store.
  • Made a groundbreaking move as part of the first batch of projects to have their tokens supported on Binance Chain, a more suitable chain for a mass-adoption token.
  • Experienced the launch of multiple USD stablecoin pairs on Binance.com, a rare and key milestone only seen by the highest-quality projects.

But most importantly, behind the scenes, we continued to dedicate most of our resources to building the vision of enabling anyone to send fun, valuable crypto gifts online with just a link; the original whitepaper vision of Universal Gifting.

The internet is full of places to spend money already, but the core of our whitepaper vision — rewarding content creators online through virtual gifting — will not be addressed with new stablecoins alone, and is uniquely suited to be addressed by Gifto.

Timing and patience, combined with our unique experience rolling out Gifto and crypto-gifting in Uplive globally over the past year, along with the many other use-cases of Gifto we’ve tested, have set a foundation for us to execute well on the vision of Universal Gifting in a way that will make all Giftoers truly proud. We will unveil details on this over the course of Q3.

A Closer Look at Q2 Achievements

In Q2 2019, the following commitments were completed:

In addition, we also accomplished the following:

  • Binance announces new stablecoin trading pairs for Gifto — GTO/USDT, GTO/PAX, GTO/TUSD and GTO/USDC
  • Collaborations with ACE Exchange in Taiwan, the fastest-growing and most global exchange in Taiwan, on Gifto community airdrops for IEOs of tokenized Taiwanese enterprises, including Taiwan’s largest coupon company
  • GTO became the platform token of InfiniteX Exchange in Australia
  • Ongoing design and development of Gifto 3.0

Commitments made in Q2 which we did not achieve:

  • Release of beta test of fiat top-up in the Gifto Wallet

Current State of Gifto Ecosystem

Gifto & Uplive: the largest independent video social platform overseas

The Gifto Wallet in Uplive, the world’s most easy-to-use wallet for everyday internet users, up until this quarter only allowed users from four countries to exchange uDiamond to GTO. This quarter we added another 10 countries, bringing the total to 14, allowing a new wave of consumers to acquire Gifto tokens in a safe and compliant way and use them directly in Uplive for virtual gifting.

Above: Promotion of Gifto in Uplive

Regarding Uplive, many community members have asked us:

  • Gifto is backed by Uplive, so why not leverage Uplive for more marketing?
  • Why not enable users to buy GTO via fiat directly in Uplive?
  • Why not enable users to buy VIP privileges by staking Gifto?

Previously we held off on marketing Gifto to users who did not have an easy way to acquire the token. As we’ve begun opening up new uDiamond conversion and e-commerce purchase gateways, we’ve set a foundation for further promotion, including enabling users to stake for privileges.

Regarding fiat top up — we’re working on it and are now targeting Q3 for release. But this requires legal compliance and has partner dependencies, which make hard timelines difficult to predict.

Gifto & E-commerce reward

Our earliest e-commerce gifts for Taiwanese Gifto Wallet users — the 20% Cheesecake discount — has sold out, an important milestone for our first test of e-commerce rewards for non-crypto geeks who received Gifto gifts.

Building off of this, this past quarter we opened a new slate of e-commerce gifts across 14 geographies which can be bought by users with Gifto in the Gifto Wallet directly:

Gifto & ACE: A Gifto Fiat Exchange in Taiwan

ACE is Gifto’s strategic partner in Taiwan, offering users fiat purchase of GTO directly with Taiwan dollars. ACE is the fastest-growing fiat-crypto exchange in Taiwan and held a blockbuster IEO with Mogong, Taiwan’s largest digital coupon company. Through our partnership with ACE, our fiat-to-GTO channel there, and ACE partners like Mogong, established Taiwanese businesses who are digitizing their assets, with millions of mass consumer customers, Gifto has many complimentary opportunities to grow the Gifto ecosystem in Taiwan to explore in the latter half of 2019.

Gifto & InfiniteX Exchange: Fiat exchange in Australia to drive mass adoption for crypto industry

Gifto is now THE platform token of InfiniteX Exchange, which is expanding the use of Gifto. We look forward to growing Gifto usage on InfiniteX with our strategic partner and leveraging their technology for improvements to the Gifto Wallet.

Gifto & CoinUpNetWork: Gifto incubated live social media

Coinup is a crypto industry livestream platform incubated by Gifto, with crypto projects EliteMining, Original Protocol, and CryptoMonday’s all regularly streaming on it this past quarter. Gifto’s own Ask Gifto Anything linvestreams are held here.

Many community members have asked why we released CoinUp. The answer is that a crypto-focused streaming platform, with crypto gifting, is a step towards our vision of Universal Gifting for content creators on the web, and provides an opportunity to expose other crypto communities to Gifto as well as educate non-crypto users.

Gifto Token Now Supported on Binance chain

In Q2 we decided to move to Binance Chain, which we believe will play a huge role in driving the mass adoption of crypto over the next few years. Gifto apps and the Gifto wallet will continue to support ERC20 alongside BEP2 GTO for at least another year, though the Gifto Wallet is still developing compatibility.

Questions from community users:

Q: How do I swap my GTO back to Ethereum?

A: There is currently no direct way to swap a BEP2 GTO with an ERC20 GTO. Users can still sell a BEP2 GTO and purchase an ERC20 GTO on a non-Binance exchange, though.

Q: I want to move GTO on Binance to other exchanges, but the address is not correct..

A: Users can only send BEP2 GTO to exchanges which support Binance Chain and thus have a Binance-chain deposit address.

Q: Why the price is different on Binance and Ethereum?

A: This is based on market dynamics the team cannot control. Watching and working closely with Binance to ensure a smooth migration, we anticipate these kinds of things to be resolved over time.

Why Gifto supports to Binance chain?

Having Gifto token available on Binance Chain offers the following advantages over being on Ethereum alone:

  • On-chain transactions complete in 2 seconds; the gifting of Gifto Tokens on Binance Chain would be transparent to the world.
  • Gifto becomes traded on Binance DEX, enabling Gifto token exchange with other DEX tokens with minimal KYC
  • Gifto is now a member of the Binance Chain family and will be heavily involved in roadmapping, joint marketing and community development led by the one of the world’s best crypto exchange.

Learn more here: https://medium.com/@gifto/gifto-successfully-issues-new-token-on-binance-chain-28f1d2b41339

Q2 Key milestones & announcements

Q3 plan

  • Public beta release of new Universal Gifting platform
  • Announce and implement major partnerships tied to Universal Gifting and the Gifto Wallet
  • Release 30 new uDiamond-to-GTO conversion geographies for Gifto Wallet users in Uplive
  • Beta test of fiat-top-up directly in the Gifto Wallet for at least one fiat currency

Gifto Official

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The mass adoption crypto token and wallet for fun, fans, and content creators.

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