Bybit CEO Ben Zhou: The major trend in crypto infrastructure will be at the infrastructure level, and it will eventually become the new "back end" of the financial system.

PANews reported on February 12th that Ben Zhou, co-founder and CEO of Bybit, participated in a fireside chat at Consensus 2026, titled "When DeFi Expands into TradFi: Designing a New Financial Platform for the Next Decade," sharing his observations and insights on the maturation of cryptocurrencies. The chat was moderated by Aoyan Ashraf, Global News Manager at CoinDesk, and the discussion covered the complementarity and challenges of decentralized systems and traditional finance at various levels.

Ben stated that over the past decade, cryptocurrencies have gradually evolved from investment products into "pipelines" for the future financial system. From stablecoins to RWA tokenization, cryptocurrencies are characterized by being available 24/7, borderless, and programmable. However, the role of cryptocurrencies is not to replace banks, but rather to reduce the friction coefficient of the financial system.

From a customer's perspective, Ben believes the major trend in crypto orbit will be at the infrastructure level, ultimately becoming the new "back end" of the financial system, silently reshaping the financial landscape. Customers are results-oriented, and so are institutional applications; therefore, the financial system is undergoing a technological revolution, but the innovation in operating logic may not necessarily bring significant differences in the end-user experience. "Just like cloud computing services, users don't say 'I'm using cryptocurrency,' but rather care about 'I can transfer funds instantly' and 'I can access global markets.'"