The Chinese web3 community is reuniting in support of Tencent’s entrance into the blockchain-based world. On Wednesday the gaming and social media company held its first-ever worldwide Web3 Summit in Singapore which is now a haven for Chinese blockchain developers following Beijing has imposed a ban on cryptocurrency in 2021.
It’s hard not to notice the time of the event. This morning, Hong Kong announced plans to allow retail investors to make trades in Ether and Bitcoin beginning in June, an indication of optimism that China may have softened its position on cryptocurrency.
Image Credits: Tencent Cloud
As we predicted, China is likely to not wish to miss out on what might be the next phase of technological disruption which is the digitalization of the transfer of values. While concerns over the volatility of crypto markets are legitimate as evidenced by the chain reaction between Luna’s demise and FTX’s fall It is at the very least keen to play it safe and with a distance.
In fact, Bloomberg reported yesterday that Hong Kong’s plan to become a hub for cryptocurrency has the “quiet support” of Chinese officials.
The support from the top may have encouraged Tencent to stage a well-known web3-related event. Tencent has been experimenting with web3 in the past but was doing it with much greater care. Its projects in the country were largely restricted to government-approved projects which included the development of a blockchain consortium with corporate partners, as opposed to a global, non-permissionless one, like Ethereum.
Similar to its competitors, Tencent branded its NFT platform as a “digital collectors” marketplace. It also prohibited trading in secondary markets following China’s caution of speculation over tokens that are not fungible. Huanhe its digital collectibles platform, shut down in the year that followed it was launch. Outside of China, the company tried to play the game of internet3 by making financial investments. It was a major investor in Australia’s web3 gaming company Immutable For instance.
Tencent’s venture into web3 appears more tangible and definite this time. The conference also revealed that Tencent Cloud, the company’s cloud computing division, Tencent Cloud, revealed that it had signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Ankr, a provider of web3 infrastructure that will work together to develop a set of blockchain APIs. This means Tencent has joined the race against cloud providers such as AWS to draw web3 developers.
Tencent Cloud is also partnering with several other well-known web3 infrastructure builders, such as Avalanche, a blockchain that concentrates on speed and minimal transaction costs; Scroll, a Layer 2 scaling solution for Ethereum and Sui a relatively new Layer 1 blockchain that was created by former Meta employees. It’s a thrilling time for Hong Kong and all the Chinese web3 developers who want to be closer to their homes.
