Unlock the Value in Your Crypto Without Selling It

By Erald Ghoos, CEO, OKX Europe

Throughout their lives, people have three fundamental financial needs. To pay, or get paid. To grow their wealth. And to borrow, when they need to.

Borrowing is one of the biggest businesses in finance. Almost everyone needs to access money beyond their savings at some point in their life. Households in the euro area owe their banks more than €7 trillion, most of it in mortgages. Worldwide, loans backed by crypto add up to about $56 billion. That enormous gap tells you how early crypto still is when it comes to loans.

For a crypto holder in Europe, this gap can be a big source of friction. Say you've held bitcoin for 5 years and need cash for a few months. Until now, the usual way to get it was to sell to unlock your personal liquidity at the cost of your long-term holdings. Yet access to crypto-backed borrowing has remained limited on major crypto platforms in Europe.

So what will people use it for? I think mostly the same things they already borrow from banks or other lenders for. A renovation you don't want to put off. A new car. A tax bill that lands before the cash does. A freelancer covering the weeks between finishing a job and getting paid. A shop owner buying stock ahead of a busy season. Maybe your washing machine broke down and you'd rather not sell bitcoin to replace it.

In the real world, you convert the USDC to euros and withdraw it to your bank, or spend it with OKX Card. And you keep your position.

Some people will use their loan on OKX too, to trade or to grow it with Earn*. Some of the most interesting use cases happen off the platform, where the loan becomes a financial tool you can use in everyday life. That's where crypto starts to work like a home or a traditional investment portfolio: something you can borrow against.

We want to keep widening what OKX offers. Yes, you can trade crypto, traditional assets and commodities, and put your money to work with Earn. But our ambition is to provide an all-in-one app that covers your financial needs.

In Europe, you could already pay with OKX Card and Pay, and grow what you have with trading and Earn. Now you can borrow too.

*Trading/Earn losses can occur while the loan and interest remain repayable.

Disclaimers

This is a marketing communication. OKX is the trading name of OKX Europe Ltd, a Malta registered company licensed by the MFSA as a CASP. This is not investment advice or an offer or solicitation to buy, sell or hold crypto/digital assets, which are subject to volatility and involve risk.Flexible Loan is not a regulated crypto-asset service under MiCA and does not benefit from the protections applicable to MiCA-regulated crypto-asset services.