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The "Court Politics" of Crypto Exchanges: Power Struggles and Loyalty Games
2025-05-23 16:36

I have a wild theory that all Chinese exchanges are essentially a "digital version of the Forbidden City". Exchange bosses can be treated as "emperors", and all exchange dramas can be understood as "palace politics".


 Some emperors, like Jiajing, were devoted to cultivating the Tao, proficient in imperial politics, and allowed two groups of subordinates to balance each other. They turned a blind eye to internal corruption and were willing to share some power, so that one person could achieve great success. Some emperors emphasized absolute loyalty, decisive killing, and did not allow anyone to bargain. Once someone tried to seek more benefits or challenge authority, they were all eliminated.

Let's briefly discuss the topic of court politics within the crypto exchange. It's purely made up and for entertainment purposes only.

To understand court politics, we must first get rid of a naive idea that there is no absolute distinction between good and evil, loyalty and treachery. In "The Great Ming Dynasty 1566", although Yan Song was criticized as a treacherous minister by later generations, he relied on his outstanding political skills to sit as the prime minister for many years and safely landed, and to a large extent helped enrich the national treasury. However, after the rise of the Qing Dynasty, the thunderous anti-corruption campaign left the Ming national treasury even more empty.

There are no pure loyal and treacherous ministers in the world? Only those who are useful to the emperor at this moment and those who are useless, as well as those who struggle for power and those who fail.

Where there are people, there is a struggle in the martial arts world. Power requires personnel to be implemented. The core of the struggle between Yan Song and Xu Jie lies in the competition for personnel power in the Ming court. Whoever can place their own people among the six ministries and nine ministers can grasp actual power and influence the actual operation of the court.

The power struggle in the exchange is the same, essentially a competition for key positions. For example, the most core departments such as currency listing, finance, and investment. With too many monks and too little porridge, all parties will inevitably fight.

As a boss, it is often enjoyable to see subordinates fighting each other. When subordinates compete with each other, it is difficult for them to form a strong enough alliance, which eliminates the possibility of challenging authority. The struggle between the two sides motivates each side to provide negative information to the boss, allowing the boss to obtain more comprehensive and multi-angle internal intelligence and also control the subordinates' weaknesses.

Of course, such struggles between subordinates must be kept within a controllable range. Excessive internal struggles can lead to resource waste, low efficiency, and even endanger the overall stability of the organization. When one party has too much power and has even endangered the authority of the boss, the boss will use some "imperial power tactics", such as internal promotion or external introduction of a professional manager and giving them great power to clean up the opponent's personnel.

For Emperor Jiajing, the core problem was: How to choose absolutely reliable officials in the court where "loyalty and treachery are difficult to distinguish"?

Exchange bosses still have this problem. Competitor suppression and regulatory raids are visible dangers, but in the eyes of exchange bosses, the biggest danger often lurks around and is not easy to detect, such as the betrayal of those around them. Therefore, nepotism has become the best solution at the moment - Key positions are often held by the founder's relatives, colleagues, and even family members, even if they lack professional skills.

The fact proves that nepotism or family-run shops are actually the safest in the encryption market.

Corruption and anti-corruption

Power struggle inevitably cannot be separated from corruption and anti-corruption, both of which are means of gaining power. The key to palace politics is how to judge the situation and take the correct stance. To form an alliance, a "bond" is often needed, such as fellow villagers, same school, same professional experience... These can all become a connection point, but more importantly, interests. Regional relationships such as classmates also rely on money to maintain.

How to gain the trust of "big brother"? In addition to providing emotional value, the more important thing is to provide some leverage and actively expose weaknesses. "Big brother, all my problems are here, you can handle them, I will follow you in the future." Therefore, bribery or participating in collective corruption is actually the most effective way to show loyalty and test a person's loyalty. By using money to tie several people together, can we not work together and help each other?

Specifically for crypto exchanges, internal corruption, rat warehouses, and other issues are difficult to eradicate for two reasons.
First, whether it is trading cryptocurrencies or working, the vast majority of people come to the cryptocurrency circle for one purpose: to make money. This is especially true when working in "high-risk companies" such as exchanges. Many employees, especially those who have switched from traditional industries, do not have any sense of identity or belonging to the company, but only think about how to make the most money in the shortest possible time.

Second, crypto exchanges have always been a gray area. Compared with corruption in traditional enterprises, corruption in exchanges is easier to escape legal sanctions, and it is also easier to make a big deal small. If it is a small matter, you can just walk away, but the goal has been achieved. This is also a long-term employment problem for exchanges.

The emperor's weakness

Crypto exchange bosses and emperors share the same tragedy: The higher the power, the harder it is to establish a true relationship of trust.

Everyone who approaches them may have different purposes: some covet certain core powers, some covet wealth, and some have ulterior motives. In such an environment, suspicion becomes instinctive and precaution becomes habitual. This trust deficit ultimately leads to a smaller decision-making circle.

Watching all kinds of TV dramas since childhood, there is always a puzzling question, Why do emperors always have a "treacherous minister" around them, and they are also favored? Emperors are all lonely, they don't lack money or power, what they lack is love and loyalty, which is also the weakness of emperors. Once someone contributes love and loyalty to those in power, making them feel refreshed, even if this person's talent is relatively average, he has value to exist.

In the digital Forbidden City of the exchange, technical talents are not scarce, marketing experts are not scarce, and even funds are not scarce. The only truly scarce thing is true loyalty. Love and loyalty, a simple way to express it is to show support no matter what the emperor does. The more absurd you are, the more you support, and the more you can reflect loyalty.

Running a cryptocurrency exchange is not an easy task. It is physically and mentally exhausting. Not only do you have to participate in peer competition, but you also have to guard against hackers and compete with regulators. At this time, the exchange owners are often exhausted and even self-doubting. Some do not know whether the exchange's development and growth are due to their wisdom or luck. At this time, external emotional support and spiritual healing are extremely needed. They tirelessly tell them, "You are right, it's all thanks to you. We are all grateful to you."

Humans are not plants, who can be heartless? Being recognized, loved, and needed are natural desires of human beings. Ordinary people also desperately need love and loyalty, but they are still at the bottom of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, still struggling for a living, without the time and ability to pursue the value satisfaction of higher-level needs.

The women by the emperor's side

Here, the women around the emperor are not gossiping about the so-called harem, but referring to female executives. Exchanges often have a large number of female executives, which is a very reasonable thing.

A traditional financial boss who dominates the industry likes to use female executives because, in his opinion, women are more loyal than men. No matter how much salary he pays men, he will not be satisfied in the end. Even after many men are promoted and gain a lot of wealth and power, they do not have much gratitude and loyalty in their hearts, but instead have their confidence elevated and think "I can do it too".

The essence of power is the desire for loyalty and the fear of betrayal. In the highly competitive environment of the exchange, bosses are most worried about "cultivating their own gravediggers".

After male executives gain power and wealth, they often see their current positions as a springboard to higher power. They are more likely to attribute their achievements to personal abilities rather than leadership promotions. They are more likely to choose to leave at the appropriate time to start a competing company or seek higher positions.

Female executives often demonstrate stronger organizational loyalty and focus more on long-term stable Career Development rather than taking risks in entrepreneurship. They are more willing to attribute their success to teamwork and leadership training, so they value their current positions and organizational relationships more.

In addition, another major challenge faced by cryptocurrency exchanges is frequent crisis events and communication with users. In this field, female executives often demonstrate unique advantages. For example, women generally perform better in identifying, understanding, and responding to others' emotions, which is particularly important in appeasing angry users, handling complaints, and crisis public relations. In contrast, men are more likely to get emotional and confront users when dealing with related public crisis events.

Therefore, in my opinion, the power of women in the crypto world is far underestimated. It's interesting to look back at history and the present. No matter how technology develops, whether in the traditional business world or the crypto digital world, the essence of power has never changed. Where there are people, there is a society. The moon rises and falls, and the water overflows. This is the ultimate destiny of all power games.


 

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