Huobi () is a

Seychelles Seychelles (, ; ), officially the Republic of Seychelles (french: link=no, République des Seychelles; Creole: ''La Repiblik Sesel''), is an archipelagic state consisting of 115 islands in the Indian Ocean. Its capital and largest city, V ...

-based

cryptocurrency exchange A cryptocurrency exchange, or a digital currency exchange (DCE), is a business that allows customers to trade cryptocurrencies or digital currencies for other assets, such as conventional fiat money or other digital currencies. Exchanges may acce ...

. Founded in

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

, the company now has offices in

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

and the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. In August 2018 it became a

publicly listed A public company is a company whose ownership is organized via shares of share capital, stock which are intended to be freely traded on a stock exchange or in Over-the-counter (finance), over-the-counter markets. A public (publicly traded) comp ...

company. Following a 2017 ban on Bitcoin exchanges by the Chinese government, Huobi stopped Bitcoin withdrawals. Huobi China continues to operate as a blockchain consulting and research platform. , Huobi processed around US $1 billion in trades daily.

History

Huobi was founded in 2013 by Leon Li (). An alumnus of

Tsinghua University Tsinghua University (; abbreviation, abbr. THU) is a National university, national Public university, public research university in Beijing, China. The university is funded by the Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China, Minis ...

, Li was a computer engineer at

Oracle An oracle is a person or agency considered to provide wise and insightful counsel or prophetic predictions, most notably including precognition of the future, inspired by deities. As such, it is a form of divination. Description The word '' ...

before founding Huobi. On May 15, 2013, the Huobi Group (火币集团) acquired the ''huobi.com''

domain Domain may refer to: Mathematics *Domain of a function, the set of input values for which the (total) function is defined **Domain of definition of a partial function **Natural domain of a partial function **Domain of holomorphy of a function * Do ...

. On August 1, Huobi launched a simulation trading platform, and on September 1 the Bitcoin trading platform launched. In November 2013, Huobi received

angel investment An angel investor (also known as a business angel, informal investor, angel funder, private investor, or seed investor) is an individual who provides capital for a business or businesses start-up, usually in exchange for convertible debt or owners ...

s from Dai Zhikang and Zhen Fund. In 2014, Huobi raised a $10 million

venture capital Venture capital (often abbreviated as VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth potential or which ha ...

investment from

Sequoia Capital Sequoia Capital is an American venture capital firm. The firm is headquartered in Menlo Park, California, and specializes in seed stage, early stage, and growth stage investments in private companies across technology sectors. , Sequoia's total a ...

. In August 2014, Huobi acquired Bitcoin wallet provider Quick Wallet. In December 2013, trading volume exceeded 30 billion yuan, making Huobi China's largest digital asset trading platform at the time. In June 2016, its total transaction volume reached 1 trillion RMB, and in November 2016 1.7 trillion yuan, accounting for more than 60% of the global bitcoin exchange market. On December 22, 2016, its daily transaction volume surpassed 200 billion yuan. In September 2014, Huobi announced through its official Weibo account that 920 bitcoin and 8,100 litecoin had been wrongly deposited into 27 different accounts. The firm returned the lost cryptocurrency. In August 2017 Huobi and OKCoin controversially invested 1 billion yuan ($150 million) of idle client funds into wealth-management products. In September 2017, the Chinese government banned

initial coin offering An initial coin offering (ICO) or initial currency offering is a type of funding using cryptocurrencies. It is often a form of crowdfunding, although a private ICO which does not seek public investment is also possible. In an ICO, a quantity of cr ...

s (ICOs) and trading on domestic cryptocurrency exchanges, rendering many people's holdings effectively worthless, including those of users on Huobi's exchange. In response, Huobi adjusted its business and organizational structure to promote global expansion. In October 2017, Huobi officially expanded into

Korea Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel, with North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) comprising its northern half and South Korea (Republic o ...

with a new headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, and opened trading in March 2018. In November 2017, it launched operations in

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

with total volume in the first month exceeding 30 billion RMB. In December 2017, it launched an office in

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, with an estimated 37.468 ...

, Japan and announced that it would set up two crypto exchanges in Japan in early 2018, through a partnership with Japanese financial group

SBI Group SBI Holdings, sometimes referred to as Strategic Business Innovator Group, () is a financial services company group based in Tokyo, Japan. The group's businesses and companies are held primarily at SBI Holdings. The company provides financial ser ...

. In March 2018, Huobi announced that it will be launching in the United States. In August 2018, in a

reverse takeover A reverse takeover (RTO), reverse merger, or reverse IPO is the acquisition of a public company by a private company so that the private company can bypass the lengthy and complex process of going public. Sometimes, conversely, the public compan ...

, Huobi acquired a 74% stake in Hong Kong electronics manufacturer Pantronics Holdings, becoming listed on the

Hong Kong Stock Exchange The Stock Exchange of Hong Kong (SEHK, also known as Hong Kong Stock Exchange) is a stock exchange based in Hong Kong. As of the end of 2020, it has 2,538 listed companies with a combined market capitalization of HK$47 trillion. It is repor ...

. In November 2020, Huobi launches Huobi Labuan to realize regulated crypto exchange in Malaysia. In September 2021, Huobi announced that it would stop serving customers in

mainland China "Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territories within Greater China. ...

due to new regulations. In May 2022, it was announced Huobi had acquired the Latin American crypto platform, Bitex.

Research and partnerships

In April 2015, Huobi partnered with

in a "Digital Asset Research Initiative", and sponsored a "Digital Asset Research Project" at the Internet Finance Laboratory of Wudaokou Tsinghua School of Finance. On July 1, 2016, the Huobi Network Blockchain Research Center published a report, "Blockchain: Defining a New Financial and Economic Future". On December 20, 2016, Huobi joined the Fintech Digital Asset Alliance (Shenzhen) along with the Fintech Research Institute of China under the guidance of the Shenzhen Municipal Government.

References

{{Cryptocurrencies, state=expanded Bitcoin exchanges Digital currency exchanges Bitcoin companies Financial services companies of China Companies based in Beijing 2013 establishments in China