Bybit CEO Zhou: Retail Participation Down by About 30%
Bybit CEO Ben Zhou stated in an interview that the participation of retail investors in the cryptocurrency market has likely decreased by about 30% compared to the market peak. He characterized this decline as a normal market cycle phenomenon rather than a signal of structural issues in the industry, indicating that he views the current drop in retail activity as part of the typical cyclical fluctuations in the crypto market, rather than a trend decline. Zhou believes the market is currently waiting for new catalysts to reignite retail participation, attributing the core driving force of the last cycle to the explosive market for meme coins. For the next potential catalyst, he predicts that the driving force of this cycle may come from AI-related narratives, suggesting that AI concept tokens or cryptocurrency projects related to artificial intelligence could become key variables in attracting retail investors back into the market. Mechanically, the decline in retail participation means that the portion of market trading volume and volatility contributed by retail funds is shrinking, and the fee income structure at the exchange level will also concentrate towards institutions and high-frequency traders; if Zhou's prediction of "AI narrative driving the next cycle" comes true, the flow of funds may shift from the current relatively dispersed and defensive allocation state back into AI-related token sectors, benefiting exchanges from the increased trading volume and fees brought by the return of retail investors. Source: Public Information
ABAB AI Insight
Since founding Bybit in 2018, Ben Zhou has continuously built it into one of the leading cryptocurrency derivatives exchanges by trading volume, navigating through the industry trust crisis triggered by the FTX collapse in 2022 and the historic hot wallet theft incident in early 2025 (with losses amounting to approximately $1.5 billion, carried out by the North Korean hacker group Lazarus Group). After the incident, Zhou publicly committed to fully covering user losses and maintaining the exchange's solvency, which has made him highly sensitive to changes in market sentiment and retail confidence. Bybit's core revenue source is trading fees, and retail participation directly determines its spot and derivatives trading volume. Therefore, Zhou's ongoing attention to the "30% loss of retail investors" phenomenon is essentially a barometer of the exchange's own revenue structure. He views meme coins as the core driving force of the last cycle, reflecting how the exchange captured a significant influx of speculative retail funds by listing and promoting high-volatility meme coin trading pairs in the past cycle. This judgment logic of "seeking the next narrative to drive retail back" is highly similar to the historical cycles of narrative rotation in the crypto market—from the 2017 ICO boom, the 2020 DeFi Summer, the 2021 NFT boom, to the 2023-2024 meme coin market, each cycle has been dominated by a new narrative that led to a concentrated influx of funds and retail attention. Zhou's prediction that AI may become the next narrative pivot reflects the exchange executives' path dependence judgment on the unique funding flow pattern of "narrative-driven retail funds" in the crypto market. Essentially, this is a cyclical replay of capital concentration phenomena: retail funds in the crypto market are not continuously evenly distributed across all assets but tend to flow cyclically towards segments that are refocused by market narratives. The mechanism behind this is that retail investment decisions heavily rely on hot narratives and the positive feedback of short-term profit effects. Once a new narrative (such as AI tokens) begins to show significant price performance, social media and exchange traffic recommendation mechanisms will quickly amplify this effect, attracting more retail funds that are currently on the sidelines or allocated to other assets to concentrate back into the market, thereby pushing up the overall retail participation and trading activity. ABAB News · Cognitive Laws
- Retail investors will not disappear; they will only wait for the next narrative.
- Each cycle needs a new story to take over old emotions.
- Hot money lacks direction, but not reasons to ignite.