PlasmaFinance AMA with the Bittrex Global Community: A Recap

We had an AMA session yesterday with the Bittrex Global community on Telegram, where our CEO Ilia Maksimenka fielded many questions from a highly engaged audience!

We saw a lot of interest in our long-term plans for DeFi and in particular, received positive feedback on the future we envision for a strong Plasma community.

Here is the summary of the questions and answers on the session.

1) Tell us a bit about yourself.

I’m Ilia, CEO @ PlasmaPay and DeFi platform Plasma.Finance. I have a background in corporate finance, stock exchange, and fintech, have worked before as a new tech analyst in government, corporates and as a fund manager in a private investment bank. I was a founder of different startups in the financials and AI space from 2010 to 2016. I came to the crypto space in early 2013 and started the PlasmaPay project in 2017 with a very skilled team in crypto and security space.

2) Can you provide a brief introduction to PlasmaFinance?

PlasmaPay is a global digital payment platform enabling seamless entry into decentralized finance. PlasmaPay provides industry-leading UX, crypto/fiat wallets, and fiat on/off ramp services. Plasma.Finance is PlasmaPay’s yield optimization platform in the DeFi world which aggregates the most popular DeFi protocols from different blockchains. With PlasmaFinance you get all the tools and access you need to achieve the most profitable DeFi yields on any protocol.

Plasma.Finance is designed to make decentralized finance accessible for all, without compromise, for the greater benefit of people just like us. It is the gateway to DeFi on the road to financial liberty. Plasma.Finance offers the freedom to choose how, when, and where to participate in DeFi. It is a toolkit designed to be intuitive enough for everyday users, but with the kind of raw power and flexibility usually only afforded to institutional investors.

3) What was the motivation behind starting this project?

When I first encountered cryptocurrency I immediately realized its potential to even the playing field between big institutions and individuals. From my past entrepreneurial experience, I learned how existing financial systems rarely benefit anyone other than an elite few, but in decentralized finance, I see a means of empowering the many.

Plasma.Finance is the universal platform that combines the most popular DeFi protocols and unites them under one roof. It embodies our belief in better finance and better financial services — that they should be decentralized, transparent, censorship-resistant, and accessible for all.

4) Were there any major milestones for PlasmaFinance this year?

There were many! But perhaps the most anticipated was the launch in Q1 of PlasmaSwap, which is PlasmaFinance’s proprietary DEX but also integrating popular DEXs like Uniswap and Sushiswap in one place. In fact, soon we will be adding even more DEXs, including those on other networks like Polygon (Matic) so you can see ALL the DeFi ecosystem in one place.

We’ve been releasing many new features all year long, including unique tools you won’t find on any other DEX, like:

• the Flash Rebalancer which lets you migrate liquidity between protocols and pools in a single step, saving you a lot of time and gas!
• decentralized Market data, which is like a Coinmarketcap, except using real-time, on-chain data derived from decentralized sources.
• Limit Orders, which allows advanced capital control and loss mitigation — this feature is almost unheard of in a DEX.

We also introduced SpacePort, which is an open democratized IDO launchpad that we believe is going to be a game-changer for IDO projects. Imagine being able to launch any IDO you want without any restrictions. Then being able to fully customize its settings, allowing for features like vesting and locking periods, all on your own, free of charge? That’s what you can do with SpacePort. Alternatively, you can opt to join the incubator program, where you can benefit from our advice and guidance, leveraging our global marketing network to give your IDO the best possible visibility.

5) We’d love to know if there are any short-term, or long-term goals for this project.

The long-term goal for PlasmaFinance is “DeFi for the masses”! This means helping everyone, from retail individuals to professional institutions using decentralized finance the way it was meant to be: easily accessible for all, without compromise, decentralized, transparent, and censorship-resistant.

For the shorter term, we would like everyone to see just how easy and convenient, yet safe, it can be to use DeFi with PlasmaFinance. I believe that PlasmaFinance is really going to do so well when people start finding out about their awesome features, that this community is going to grow so big and the profits will also really grow.

6) What is your project’s business model?

With both the retail consumer and professional institutions in mind, PlasmaFinance has developed financial solutions that defy the DeFi stereotypes while picking the best of centralized finance, resulting in a DeFi platform that is easy to use, safe, and complete, with advanced analytics and tools not typically available on most other platforms in its class.

Our native PPAY token represents efficient utility across unique features never before seen across the spectrum of our products and services. You can use PPAY for:

• gaining entry into new IDOs in SpacePort.
• Voting for decisions when governance features are enabled.
• Paying for gas instead of using ETH once our Gas Station is live.

7) What do you think the development trends in the crypto assets realm will look like in 2021?

I believe that DeFi and crypto are really now in the eyes of the mainstream but many who come for the first time are put off by how complicated and complex using advanced services and products can be.

Crypto has always been somewhat technical and cumbersome to use, but the future products will be friendlier, more convenient, and intuitive, to meet the needs of current users.

At the same time, especially for people who have had little experience in crypto, they will realize the limitations and restrictions of using services that are more centralized and less transparent.

The demand for fairer access, transparency in business models, and the ability to participate democratically will grow over time and we will see more projects strive to really bring truly decentralized aspects into their solutions.

Live Questions

1.Can you tell us about PlasmaPay partnership with payment processing platform? Being the pioneers, how can Plasma Pay improve the Defi payment system using Blockchain?

PlasmaPay is a non-custodial wallet and aggregator of different payment methods covering more than 160 countries worldwide. We work with card processors, banks and ewallets to provide the end-users with a wide range of tools to enter and exit the crypto markets. Together with the development of our DeFi platform PlasmaFinance, we also focus on fiat on-ramp and off-ramp systems and now are integrating our partners' payment methods into the PlasmaFinance infrastructure.

In the future, it will help users to enter DeFi markets with minimal commissions and link their bank accounts with their DeFi accounts through PlasmaFinance.

We want to bring mass adoption to DeFi and compete with traditional banking services.

2. What is your strategy for building a strong community? Do you agree that the power of the community will lead your project to develop globally? What services do you provide to the community?

Our focus will be on building a community of users who are enthusiastic about using PlasmaFinance and its suite of products and services. We do agree that it’s really the community that eventually leads a crypto project to develop globally, and the lesson to learn from many other projects is that it’s not just about the number of users but the quality of the relationship you have with them.

In the near future, we are planning to kick off a type of ambassador program, to enable the community themselves to play a more significant and active role in building and growing this strong community.

In terms of services, for us, the best approach is to build products that solve existing user needs and problems. It isn’t a solution if it doesn’t solve a problem!

3. How many partners currently have trusted $PPAY technology and what benefits do these partners bring to PPAY and vice versa?

We do have a significant number of partnerships in place — right now about 30 of them — and continue to seek out relevant ones who share mutual goals of building DeFi for the masses.

Each partner brings something unique to the table in terms of expertise and experience. For example, an important aspect of PlasmaFinance is to provide more transparency and more assurance in DeFi. One way to do this is to improve the way DeFi market data is extracted, so we have partnerships with smart contract oracle providers to help us ensure the data our users see is real-time, on-chain, verifiable — resistant to manipulation.

Other partners have a good track record of growing successful ecosystems for crypto eCommerce, and their insights help us build useful solutions that reduce the barriers of entry for traditional merchants and non-crypto retail consumers.

4. What is PPAY’s plan to foster developer adoption of PPAY? Are tools on Ethereum network such as Truffle, Infura, Web3.js, Etherscan planned for PPAY ?

PPAY is an ERC20 token and every user can inspect more information about the token from the smart contracts through Etherscan. In the future, we plan to have PPAY on other chains/layer 1 and layer 2 solutions and build the necessary UI infrastructure for those on the PlasmaFinance platform.

5. I think a good project is one that will be of great help to the user. So what differentiated features does the team offer as a solution for users to stay and stick with the project?

First of all, the UI/UX of PlasmaFinance is continually improving to give users the friendliest and easiest look and feel of using DeFi. Anyone who’s ever used DeFi can attest to the fact that they’re usually quite poorly constructed, highly technical, and not intuitive.

We’ve made a serious attempt to reconstruct what a DeFi platform looks like — making it easy and straightforward to swap, stake, migrate liquidity — plus of course, the fact that everything is in one place means you don’t need to move around different wallets and platforms and just have them all in one window.

Add to that the unique features you won’t find on many other DEXs: Limit Orders for example, and a one-step liquidity migration called Flash Rebalancer. Once you’ve used these tools, you’ll wonder why you never used PlasmaFinance before!

6. What do you think is the biggest problem PPAY will solve that no other project is solving now, and why is the problem important to solve?

As I mentioned above, DeFi is not at all easy to access for everyone. It’s technical, clunky, and not intuitive. This means the biggest problem for one side of the spectrum is for newcomers who are retail participants: that they’re faced with a technological hurdle. We solve this problem by making PlasmaFinance the easiest point of entry into DeFi.

On the other end of the spectrum, we also have traditional finance. We’re talking about professional traders, hedge funds, institutionals. They’re used to centralized platforms with Limit Orders. Sophisticated charting tools that are standard features of regular trading platforms. Features that aren’t available on DEXs or DeFi platforms. Asset management tools to manage multiple ownership of a portfolio.

We’re doing our best to make these features available for them on PlasmaFinance: Limit Orders. Advanced analytics. Incoming vault features for multisig wallets to improve asset management.

7. Once the product is developed, one of the main challenges seems to be adoption. What are some of the plans to stimulate adoption and build out the ecosystem around # PlasmaFinance?

Adoption means having as many people as possible using the product or service, and this means reaching out to the mainstream. So for us, educational material to help people learn about and use DeFi safely and comfortably: that’s an important part of our content strategy.

We also see a lot of value in creating partnerships, leveraging existing and mutually beneficial collaborations to provide greater quality in our tech and greater value in our services.

Brand awareness is also really important. Apart from ongoing marketing activities, we believe that this will be driven organically by our community. As mentioned above, an ambassador program to engage existing community members through word of mouth is really what we’re counting on for the long term.

8. Besides transactions and exchanges, can I use PPAY for other things? If I am a PPAY long-term investor, are there any special policies or long-term rewards for us?

Our native PPAY token is already a great utility token and represents efficient utility across unique features never before seen across the spectrum of our products and services. You can use PPAY for:

• gaining entry into new IDOs in SpacePort, since IDO allocations are based on a minimum amount of xPPAY held (which you can get from staking PPAY).
• Voting for decisions when governance features are enabled so you can be a bigger part of the community.
• Paying for gas instead of using ETH once our Gas Station is live, so you never need to worry about having ETH in your wallet to make transactions!

9. COVID 19 has slowed many economies around the world but as a crypto business has it affected you negatively or positively? Secondly, are you still on track to achieve your targets as the road map says?

COVID 19 became a big driver not only for digital businesses but also for crypto business and cryptocurrencies. People who spent a lot of time at home and received financial support from the government were redirecting them into investments. Today, crypto has become a popular investment and we can see an increase in crypto investment and in our market respectively. For us, it has actually become a driver for further development.

10. What are the plans and strategies for Plasma Finance next and can you give an overview on tokenomics on the Plasma Finance ?

PlasmaFinance will be focusing on developing and launching all the new features and services that we’ve been talking about and have been introduced in the roadmap initially. At the same time, we will be working on raising brand awareness and growing the user base of the PlasmaFinance.

Tokenomics related details you can find in this post here — https://medium.com/plasmapay/ppay-token-distribution-and-metrics-567d9d040f5b

11.What is the main difference between Ethereum Blockchain & PPAY Blockchain ? Can you explain the benefits of PPAY over Ethereum ? & why Developers should choose PPAY over Ethereum ?

As mentioned, PPAY is an ERC20 token that is based on the Ethereum blockchain. In the future, it will be using layer 2 solutions for scaling purposes. But at the moment PPAY’s main role is focused on serving DeFi applications.

12. What is the main obstacle to widespread adoption of cryptocurrencies? What measures is Plasma Finance taking to popularize the use of crypto even more, especially in the traditional financial sector?

As mentioned above, the greatest obstacle to crypto widespread adoption lies on two extreme ends of the spectrum: for the complete crypto newcomer who is a regular person, and for the professional trader or institution from the world of traditional finance.

So for newcomers, PlasmaFinance wants to change the DeFi narrative. Instead of being a complicated and complex sector, we build a UI/UX that is easy and friendly, so DeFi becomes so simple to enter.

For institutionals, PlasmaFinance wants to make it familiar for them, and to give them the sophistication and advanced tools they demand for professional trading. Our upcoming Vaults will ensure multisig security that enables secure asset management with shared ownership. Limit Orders now gives you for the first time pro trading options on a DEX, as you would expect for regular trading platforms. And then you have the industry’s most sophisticated analytics tool that is real-time, on-chain, and transparent, to provide assurance that what you’re seeing is really what you’ll get.

13. What would you say are the 3 main advantages of Plasma Finance for crypto traders?

One of the obvious advantages of PlasmaFinance is the fact that one can address all their DeFi needs in one place — it’s all-in-1 platform that provides convenience and a hassle-free experience while dealing with DeFi.

We have also paid attention to UI and UX while building PlasmaFinance to make sure that new users enter the DeFi space and get a user experience similar to that of using centralized exchanges.

At the same time, we made sure that our features answer the demands of institutionals and professional traders and they get the most advanced DeFi tools in the market.

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