The Road to Getting POKT Officially Listed on Exchanges and Navigating Exchanges Who are NOT Supported by Pocket Network

As a pioneer in a new era of democratically-governed digital public goods, our Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) means that our community controls all aspects of our protocol and ecosystem. As a result, in March 2021 the Pocket DAO approved pursuing listings of POKT on centralized exchanges (Exchange) as effective on/off ramps to users in order to create an open market for POKT. As directed by the DAO, a committee was formed to deliver on this approved proposal.

The committee follows 4 steps for each and every Exchange it pursues for POKT listing. The most critical tasks during these steps are integration, testing, testing, testing, and testing. (Did we say testing?). The 4 steps to get POKT listed with an Exchange are:

• STEP 1: Pocket Network and an Exchange begin formal communications regarding a listing and process.
• STEP 2: Pocket Network submits to the Exchange its required documentation.
• STEP 3: Exchange accepts documentation and moves to successful technological integration and testing of Pocket Network’s native token, POKT, which also includes arrangement of the payment process for issuance of new tokens.
• STEP 4: ONLY when ALL of the above are successfully completed, an official launch date and joint announcement is coordinated and agreed upon between Pocket Network and the individual Exchange.

After following the above steps, last week the committee announced the DAO proposal has been delivered on by successfully launching official Exchange listings with Huobi, Gate.io, MEXC, XT.com. Shortly thereafter, the DAO announced an Exchange listing with Okcoin was also an officially supported integration with a timeline yet to be determined.

Edited: On January 25, 2022, the DAO announced an Exchange listing with BTCEX was also an officially supported integration.

Edited: On February 1, 2022, the DAO announced an Exchange listing with BTOK was also an officially supported integration.

Edited: On March 7, 2022, the DAO announced an Exchange listing with Bybit was also an officially supported integration.

Edited: On March 11, 2022, the DAO announced an Exchange listing with ZB was also an officially supported integration.

Edited: On March 22, 2022, the DAO announced an Exchange listing with Bitget was also an officially supported integration.

Edited: On July 12, 2022, the DAO announced an Exchange listing with Bitrue was also an officially supported integration.

These Exchange listings were one of many accomplishments. The committee will continue to pursue additional Exchange listings and follow the above summary of steps for each.

IMPORTANT – Not Supported by Pocket Network

As Pocket Network continues its dominance as one of the top 5 revenue producing blockchains globally, there have been a few Exchanges looking to capitalize on our success. Exchanges, such as Hotbit, BKEX, and CoinW to name a few, are not supported by Pocket Network yet these Exchanges had independently launched POKT listings.

They were able to do so because Pocket Network is a permissionless network and by referencing public documentation which we published on December 23, 2021 to support the official Exchanges we had begun working with.

Let’s take Hotbit as an example, and the timeline of their recent unsupported POKT listing.

1. Hotbit completed their initial, independent integration without Pocket’s knowledge, consent, nor at the guidance of any official POKT documentation. Hotbit’s integration did not do any checks confirming that deposit transactions were successful. If they had tested failed deposits, informed our team that they were attempting to integrate, or consulted our public documentation after December 23, they would have discovered this behavior. They did not, which meant that users were going to be able to deposit and trade POKT they did not have.
2. On December 30, 2021 at 11:10pm EST, Hotbit independently announced on Twitter they are listing POKT beginning December 31, 2021. To reiterate, they did this despite not testing failed deposits, informing us of their attempt to integrate, or checking our documentation at any time after December 23.
3. On December 31, 2021 at 2:10am EST, Hotbit launched POKT listing with deposits, withdrawals and trading functionality without the support of Pocket Network.
4. Immediately upon listing, Hotbit accepted deposits from its own investors for POKT.
5. The same day Hotbit independently listed POKT, Pocket Network’s community were communicating publicly that the Hotbit listing of POKT was not officially supported by Pocket Network.
6. On January 4, 2022, Hotbit announced they have suspended the withdrawal, deposit, and trading functionality of their POKT listing.
7. On January 5, 2022, Hotbit contacted the Pocket Network core team for the first time and acknowledged that Hotbit listed POKT without support from Pocket Network because that is their “style to respect freedom of market.” Hotbit asked if they could buy POKT from Pocket Network at a discounted rate and far below what they listed POKT.

At this time, Pocket Network stands firm on not supporting Hotbit and their “freedom of market” business practices.

If you were a Hotbit user that transacted with Hotbit for POKT during the above period of time, please contact Hotbit directly at either https://hotbit.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/requests/new or business@hotbit.io to inquire about your funds.

In Closing

Pocket Network, both the community and the core team led by CEO Michael O’Rourke, are first and foremost built upon trust, transparency, inclusivity and technology. This is the fabric of our DNA and has allowed us to strengthen our protocol and community exponentially over the past year. Through all of our accomplishments, accolades and recognition, we remain focused on fulfilling our mission to coordinate open access to the world’s public data by empowering anyone to provide unstoppable infrastructure. We will continue down this road all done by a team and ecosystem dead set on the betterment of decentralized applications.