GoCrypto 2022: A year of growth and prosperity
When looking back at the year behind us, we can only be proud of all our accomplishments, and grateful for all the opportunities we got. Overall the year was full of challenges, not only for GoCrypto as a company but for us all in many ways. We have entered a bear market, which has exposed the vulnerability of some of the major players in the industry. However, we are stronger than ever as we approach the end of the year and have ambitions to make crypto payments available across the globe.
As many of you are aware, we have built our workforce throughout the years based on quality rather than number. We made sure that every member of our team was an expert in their field, and that has helped us get through the hardest periods. We have been relying on one another and constructing a future that is noteworthy. We are each day moving closer to achieving our unique purpose of bringing crypto payments to the mainstream. The GoCrypto team is made up of believers, subject matter experts, and hardworking individuals. And more than ever, we want to celebrate our team, which made all of this possible.
Another thing we would like to reflect on is the changes and restructuring of our company in terms of focus. As you know we started with a strong focus on our Elly POS, and are finishing the year invested in building the most technologically advanced crypto payment infrastructure in the world. All of the steps we have been through, and everything that we have learned, brought us to the position where we have a greater understanding of the market and can easily introduce our solutions to new markets. Which we have proved with our latest Plan ₿ Lugano project.
So many amazing things are to come, but let’s first look back at our bright moments from 2022.
Holistic POS on the UK market
At the beginning of the year, we had a strong focus on the UK market, introducing our holistic Elly POS solution to SME merchants. We successfully set up and educated a local sales team and began the sales phase in early March. We acquired and onboarded many new merchants in just a few weeks and conversed with more than 1500 leads generated with our sales campaign. We also onboarded a reliable UK local support team that provided support to our merchants.
Among our most significant achievements were the Alipay, WeChat Pay, LayBuy, and Paynt integrations which enabled merchants to cater to a wider range of customers. Additionally, we integrated into SwooPOS and eBlagajna cash registers in the UK market. We also developed the Elly POS eCommerce, which like the POS service supported card, crypto, and digital payments on all major eCommerce platforms.
Our holistic POS proved to be a reliable solution designed to accommodate new payment methods. We opened our 1000th site with Elly POS at Hot Horse, Slovenia, in May this year, and for us, the proof of concept was complete. The Holistic POS operates flawlessly and represents future infrastructure in the retail industry and we will be distributing our holistic solution in multiple countries next year.
White labeling solutions — GLS use case
In 2022, our team has put a lot of focus on white-label solutions. Many larger companies have shown a significant interest in integrating customized payment solutions into their business but under their own brand.
One of those clients is the global parcel service provider, GLS, for whom we white-labeled the holistic eCommerce payment solution. GLS is now offering to its clients, for whom only delivery services have been conducted so far, the GoCrypto holistic white-labeled eCommerce solution, called GLS Pay, that supports card, digital and crypto payments. This is generating additional revenue for GLS as well as simplifying processes for online stores that now use a holistic solution.
The pilot project in Slovenia plans to expand to other GLS present countries and is ready to be
white-labeled for other clients that are interested to expand their service with our holistic solution, tailored to their targeting markets.
Money 2020
Our CEO, Dejan Roljić, was a guest speaker at one of the biggest global FinTech conferences, Money 2020. Together with some of the most brilliant names in the payment industry, he discussed how the point-of-sale will become the key to customer engagement and innovation.
Dejan’s take on the event was the following: “Events like Money20/20 are hard to beat as they host only top-level companies and the most experienced people from the FinTech industry. It’s a place where you can meet everyone and do business with anyone. If you have a product or a service that can digitize someone else’s business, striking a deal is inevitable. Everyone is open to discussion and companies are there to share their precious experience. I was amazed at the level of organization. Everything was running smoothly, without one glitch. Another amazing aspect was that crypto and blockchain were by far the most interesting segment of the event. Many companies are looking at crypto in a totally different way than they did a few years ago. Crypto is going mainstream and GoCrypto is leading the way. It was a great event leading to many new partnership opportunities. Money 20/20, see you again next year!”
Apart from Money 2020, our team participated in numerous 2022 crypto conferences, including Montenegro Blockchain Forum, Tomorrow conference, 5th New Challenges 2022 conference, Plan B Forum, WebSummit, BitcoinCash22, and more.
Primavera Sound with Binance
Together with Binance, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world, we created a unique crypto payment ecosystem that allowed Primavera Sound attendees to pay in crypto for food, drinks, and other goods. Visitors were able to pay with their Binance Pay app on our GoCrypto POS terminals on a number of stages located around Barcelona’s Parc del Forum and the Parque da Cidade (Porto).
Our collaboration with Binance continued throughout the year, making a huge impact on bringing crypto payments to new locations.
Eastern European Market outreach
Prague Tram with Global Payments
Global Payments and GoCrypto made a significant advancement by integrating crypto payments into Czech public transportation systems. Tourists and locals in Prague can now pay for their Tram tickets with crypto through the GP tom app. They can choose from more than 50 cryptocurrencies by selecting one of the three supported cryptocurrency wallets: Binance Pay, Bitcoin.com Wallet, and Elly Wallet.
Acceptance of cryptocurrency by European public agencies is a significant indicator of mass crypto adoption.
The Entertix ticketing platform with Binance
Our partnership with Binance continued as Romania’s biggest ticketing platform added cryptocurrency as a new payment option on their online eCommerce platform. By integrating GoCrypto, Entertix enabled its customers instant and seamless crypto transactions. Fans can use Binance Pay, Bitcoin.com Wallet or Elly Wallet to purchase tickets to see their favorite band or sports team! Another step to mass adoption! What’s next?
Lugano’s Plan ₿ with Tether Foundation and City of Lugano
The Swiss city of Lugano is transforming into a European crypto hub where crypto payments will enjoy equal status to other mainstream payment methods. The Municipality of Lugano is realizing its vision through the highly-anticipated project, called Plan ₿.
Both the City of Lugano and Tether partnered with GoCrypto to build an intricate crypto payment infrastructure all across the city, supporting payments in Bitcoin on Lightning, USDT on Polygon, and their local LVGA token, setting all three as their official legal tender currencies. Crypto payments will be supported on all city levels, from small and medium-sized merchants to larger companies and even public services.
Our team designed a POS system that merchants can use to process crypto transactions in-store or on the go. Systems have been optimized to complete transactions in record time, 4–6 seconds on Lightning to be exact, making crypto payments viable in everyday situations. Customers can pay with any wallet supporting USD₮, Bitcoin Lightning, and LVGA, and even benefit from 5% or 10% cashback when paying with Lugano’s loyalty LVGA token.
In just two months, we onboarded more than 110 merchants who now accept Bitcoin and Tether, as well as 300 merchants who accept LVGA. Visitors in Lugano can spend their bitcoin in art galleries, casinos, coffee shops, bars, and restaurants, including the one-and-only McDonald’s.
Plan ₿ Forum
The highlight of the Swiss crypto adoption project was the Plan ₿ Forum which took place on the last weekend of October. GoCrypto was the Platinum sponsor, benefiting from an excellent position right in the center of the conference venue.
The venue was packed, with over 2,000 participants experiencing crypto payments in real-time. The Bitfinex Pay POS terminals (provided by GoCrypto) were spread across the event, enabling visitors to pay for their merch, food, and drinks in crypto.
The event was a wonderful networking opportunity and our team made an outstanding impression. The GoCrypto line of products, our team’s expertise, and the crypto shopping corner stole the attention of all and paved the way to build new business partnerships.
Building crypto payment infrastructure in the Caribbean
Our mission to revolutionize the payments landscape and promote the decentralization of financial services has led us to the Caribbean islands, more exactly to St. Kitts and Nevis. Their local population is largely unbanked, experiencing many issues with opening bank accounts, withdrawing money, and high transaction costs. The island, renowned as a popular crypto destination, is the perfect use case for introducing crypto payments and decentralized finance in general. This is why we have partnered with local partners with whom we have started introducing a solution that will serve all the islands where the official currency is the Eastern Caribbean Dollar (XCD).
We have established a company in St. Kitts and Nevis for this purpose and have already filed for a crypto license which will be the first of its kind in the Caribbean. Our infrastructure will in the first phase involve a holistic POS solution that will be able to process card payments and crypto payments on the same terminal. At a later phase, we plan to introduce the first version of the so-called crypto scheme, where people will be able to pay from their decentralized wallets in any currency they select to any merchant no matter what the merchant’s preferred currency will be.
Infrastructure built in the Caribbeans will also enable the unbanked population access to funds other than cash as well as serve as a vehicle for remittances with countries abroad.
GoCrypto in the Caribbeans will be the enabler of Finances 3.0 and with that will be laying down the foundations for disruption of the payments and P2P money transfers globally.
BitcoinCash22
In November, the Bitcoin Cash community invited us to participate in our partner’s BitcoinCash22 event. The BCH community created an amazing vibe, sharing with us their vision and ideas for pushing crypto adoption to the next level.
While presenting the GoCrypto solution, our CEO Dejan Roljic, highlighted: “We are building a decentralized payment scheme that will result in considerably lower transaction fees and instant transfer of funds. Our goal is to make crypto usability on the client’s and merchant’s side as easy as with any other traditional card payment.”
We enjoyed the BCH conference and discussed crypto payments adoption in length. Participants greeted our initiatives with excitement and were eager to see them come to life at St. Kitts.
Manager 2.0
We successfully launched the upgraded merchant dashboard Manager 2.0 which boasts a set of wonderful new features. Elly Manager and GoCrypto Manager have now been merged into one comprehensive analytical tool which enables our merchants to overview payment data of all their companies and stores.
Among other improvements, the new dashboard now includes Transaction volume comparison, Payment method percentage, Average purchase value, and Transaction heatmap.
Understanding payment history and analytics will improve the business flow of our merchants and increase their revenue.
GoC on DEXes and CEXes
GoC token saw a few DEX listings as well as additional DEX collaborations such as yield farms in 2022. Yield Farms were set up for the GoC sBCH token on TangoSwap and MistSwap DEXes. Trading for GoC sBCH was opened on the Verse DEX. The GoC BSC token also started trading on the RadioShack, a decentralized exchange by the 100 years old brand with the same name, well known as a major tech retailer in the US. Centralized exchange FMFW ceased support for the SLP tokens and added BNB Smart Chain support. All GoC SLP tokens were automatically migrated to the BSC for the users of the FMFW platform. In 2023, we will continue to work towards getting GoC listed on a major exchange which is something our community has been asking for for a long time.
GoC Staking
This year, the GoC token staking went live on the RBX Launcher. Users have the option to stake their GoC in three different pools: Stake GoC/Earn GoC; Stake RBX — Earn GoC; and Stake GoC/BNB LP — Earn GoC. At its peak, we saw over $700,000 worth of GoC staked in the mentioned staking pools combined.
GoC in Metaverses
We are thrilled to be a member of the Metaverse together with Bloktopia, which will house GoCrypto’s first metaverse office, and we can’t wait for it to open. GoCrypto will be situated on the 3rd floor, lot 44, showcasing GoCrypto products and hosting community events. As Bloktopia evolves, we will integrate more advanced features, such as merchant onboarding, GoC token trading & staking, and more. We eagerly anticipate your visit to the Bloktopian offices, where you will have the opportunity to partake in a ground-breaking VR experience that will unite cryptocurrency users in an engaging setting. Already in design, our Blocktopian headquarters ought to be ready soon.
We are happy to add Ariva Wonderland to the roster of GoCrypto’s meta-locations. Gocrypto will coexist in Ariva Wonderland with several well-known worldwide participants. Our 6x6 land (732, 456) will be used as an extra platform to advertise our products and the services we provide in conjunction with payments and tokens. We are looking forward to opening our Ariva Wonderland offices, making GoCrypto truly all-encompassing!
Our biggest learnings
Crypto payments will flourish when more users are willing to spend their crypto!
Even though working in the cryptocurrency market might be difficult at times, we value the lessons we learn from each difficulty. The foundation of the business is relationships, and this year we have been driven and determined to push crypto adoption to a worldwide level. We discovered the importance of valuing and appreciating partnerships.
The intriguing aspect of cryptocurrency is that initiatives must originate from all directions. Thus, having clients who are willing to spend their cryptocurrency is just as important as having merchants accepting crypto.
On the merchant side we got covered because even for those merchants that do not want to have direct contact with crypto we have a solution, our settlements in fiat. But the final user side is changing.
Because end users will ultimately make or break this industry, our partnerships with major exchanges and crypto projects during this year have helped us understand the true challenges in motivating users to spend cryptocurrency. We have also learned that it is much simpler to enter a market with a partnering project that can push crypto adoption with us. The users must be encouraged to utilize cryptocurrency as a payment method in addition to using it to earn as we believe that 2023 is the year of mass adoption of crypto as a payment method.
Regulatory aspect of the crypto business
In terms of regulation, one of our bigger lessons this year was connected to the Virtual Asset Service Provider (VASP) regulatory regime, based on the 5th Anti‑Money Laundering Directive (Directive (EU) 2018/843).
The VASP regime has been implemented by every EU member state individually. The approach where countries individually regulate a specific area, which is a cross-border issue, doesn’t align with the spirit of the EU legislation.
GoCrypto believed that the VASP regime should only be applied in the principal place of the relevant business entity, which is why we registered as a VASP in Slovenia only. Our opinion was confirmed by multiple lawyers and experts from the field, while at the time the EU has never shown a clear position on the topic.
We have later observed multiple indications which suggest that the current regulatory framework is in fact very particular and is being applied in each member state separately. From our business point of view, we could interpret this as being required to apply for VASP registration in every country, where we have GoCrypto locations. This approach seems rather unreasonable, time-consuming, and burdensome both for smaller companies and larger corporations. For example, none of the bigger centralized crypto exchanges has applied for registration in all member states despite having users in all of them.
What is more, sources from the European Commission shared their opinion on the topic, stating that after the regulation on Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) comes into action, all individual VASP regimes should and will become irrelevant, which might occur at the end of 2024 or at the beginning of 2025 at the latest.
The local regulation concerning the VASP regime proved to be very challenging for us and has created many obstacles in accessing new markets and closing deals with business partners. We were also unable to promote certain partnerships and projects, even though we complied with the very essence of the said directive and the relevant AML legislation. In any case, we are determined to overcome this challenge in the upcoming year, 2023.
Crypto adoption in the bear market
The year 2022 has proven that no one in the crypto community is too big to fail. Actions from some of the biggest names in crypto led to the market crash and thus we entered the bearish period. Events like this have a strong negative effect on all crypto stakeholders despite the reliability and fair play of individual projects. While some state that the end of crypto is approaching, others believe that we are just clearing the field of untrustworthy actors and in the long term creating a better and safer environment for the end users.
While crypto regulations slow us down and often create barriers for us as a company, we can safely say that they also protect us from many implications that can occur in the crypto space and build trust among our users. GoCrypto merchants can rest assured that all their crypto-related business is fully regulated and complies with relevant legislation.
Trustworthy partners give an extra layer of trust, which is why we don’t take partnership deals lightly. Lugano is the perfect example of how reliable partners can push crypto adoption even further. Together with the City of Lugano and Tether we have successfully built trust among merchants and spread our infrastructure across the city. By spreading crypto awareness and including crypto giveaways we are promoting crypto payments among users as well.
Tokenomics should focus on utility
In terms of tokenomics, this year has taught us a lot. The benefit of the bear market is that it presents us with more opportunities than ever to learn. We have invested a lot of time and resources researching different topics since we wanted to know the best strategy to push a token with real utility to final users.
The events of this year have made it more obvious than ever that the emphasis should be on the users rather than chasing after price benchmarks. Projects now have to rely on user-driven growth to reach milestones and not so much on speculative trading. A project needs to be useful to users in order to be successful.
We want to focus on encouraging the users to use the token and with it get to the actual financial advantages of crypto payments adoption. The goal is to spend and earn at the same time, and the best means to accomplish this will likely be determined in detail over the course of the following year. We believe that all we have learned in regard to this, will help us with the tokenomics of GoC and give benefits to the users that go beyond payments.
First teaser covering GoCrypto 2.0 — Web3 payments
Open letter from Dejan
Dear GoCrypto Community, I am proud to say that for us 2022 was a successful year. Even though the crypto market was all but stable we managed to grow our business and come out stronger than ever.
A big thanks goes out to our amazing partners. We were all exposed to the dramatic consequences that a few crypto players brought to the entire industry. And it saddens me deeply to see how a handful of dishonorable actions can cast a shadow over all other trustworthy projects. However, I am a firm believer that honest and reliable businesses will prevail and that our partners and we are entering the New Year stronger than ever.
An important thing to point out… GoCrypto and I personally would not be where we are today if it wasn’t for my extraordinary team who has been working tirelessly through each GoCrypto success and learning lessons. I would like to give a shoutout to every single member of the GoCrypto team — each and every one of you has contributed tremendously to the success of our company. And I appreciate it! We may not be the biggest team, but our skills, resourcefulness, and dedication outreach any other project out there. I hope I did my part of the job, motivating you and emphasizing our end goal throughout the year so you were able to trust the process and persist through every challenge that we faced.
Last but not least, I would like to thank our Community. You are the other half of the GoCrypto story, pushing crypto adoption forward, and putting our products to real-life use. You are our gasoline, making the GoCrypto engine run. There aren’t enough words to express our gratitude for staying by our side throughout the journey. GoCrypto Community, thank you!
I am excited about 2023. All our hard work this year laid a strong foundation for numerous new markets and partnerships that we will soon be able to announce. So, I guess there’s nothing left to say, but 2023 here we come. GoCrypto, full speed ahead!
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