UNICEF Will Receive $100K Donation From Bybit’s World Series of Trading

The biggest winner of Bybit’s World Series of Trading (WSOT) will be UNICEF, it seems. The children’s charity has confirmed that 5% of the total prize pot, worth around $110,000 at current prices, will be donated by Bybit. The money will be used to aid children in countries that have been badly affected by the coronavirus and its after-effects.

UNICEF is no stranger to cryptocurrency, having received a $260,000 donation from the Ethereum Foundation last month, and a similar gift in 2019. Bybit’s decision to donate 5% of the proceeds from its competition to charitable causes will enhance its standing in the eyes of the community, while paying something back to those less fortunate.

“Together with our global community of traders, we would like to use this impetus to help lead positive action in the crypto space and give back to our very own home planet,” explained Bybit CEO Ben Zhou. “With this in mind, we are pledging 5% of WSOT’s final prize pool to UNICEF to assist in their work to save children’s lives, defend their rights, and to help them fulfill their potential.”

Bybit’s 2020 Keeps on Giving

2020 has been a good year for Bybit and its users. The exchange has rolled out a series of improvements to its trading engine, introduced a mutual insurance fund to help traders with risk management, and launched USDT perpetual contracts. It’s seen its user base grow, trade volumes increase, and its reputation enhanced, aided by marquee events such as the World Series of Trading. Bybit is no stranger to trading competitions, having hosted an event last year which carried a 100 BTC prize, and several smaller events since

Interest in WSOT has been strong, with more than 8,000 users having already completed pre-registration. Formal registration is now open until August 10, when the competition will commence. There has even been talk of poker pros entering the event, which draws its inspiration from the famous World Series of Poker, but this has yet to be confirmed. Whatever the case, the field of entrants will face stiff competition if they’re to stand a chance of claiming the top prize, which will be determined by their ratio of winning to losing trades.

Derivatives Market Is Heating Up

The crypto derivatives market is still dominated by BTC, which accounts for around 90% of all futures contracts, followed by ETH. Open interest on institutional platforms such as CME has been reaching record highs, and it’s a similar story on retail counterparts like Deribit. Bybit, Binance Futures, Huobi and Kraken have all recorded an increase in futures volume, while newcomers Poloniex Futures and KuCoin Futures are playing catch-up. Meanwhile, DEXss have been breaking all records and stealing market share from CEXs. For now, at least, derivatives platforms are immune from DEXs, which can’t compete with their lower latency and high liquidity. Nevertheless, more than $1.5 billion is passing through decentralized exchanges on a weekly basis, surpassing even the most optimistic predictions made at the start of the year.