作者 | WuBlockchain WuBlockchain 播客的这一集通过 G98 首席执行官兼 Ninety Even 创始人 Thanh Le 的视角探讨了越南加密货币市场的长期演变。 Thanh 借鉴 2017 年进入该行业以来的经验，讨论了越南的加密生态系统如何从早期的高风险阶段发展成为由零售参与、开发人员人才和新兴监管形成的高度活跃的市场。Ninety Even 构建了实用的 Web3 产品，包括来自越南的多链钱包和 DeFi 工具。通过与 G-Group 合资的 G98，利用国内基础设施对这些技术进行本地化和部署，以支持越南市场的数字资产相关产品和服务。免责声明：本文内容仅代表受访者个人观点，不代表 WuBlockchain 的观点，也不认可任何代币。音频转录由 GPT 完成，可能包含错误。请收听完整的播客： YouTube：https://youtu.be/qDLKIRTn03ESpotify：https://open.spotify.com/episode/3uNIRwH2PkpnePJhC07Hxv?si=wEqKkL9_Sf2PIUU5N8ES6w越南的加密货币：从早期的炒作和欺诈到 Nat
Ivan：今天，我们非常荣幸邀请到 G98 首席执行官、九十八创始人 Thanh Le，从长期实地角度讨论越南加密货币市场的演变。那么，第一个问题，Thanh Le，是什么首先吸引您进入加密货币领域的？公开信息显示，您早在 2017 年就进入了这个行业。从您的角度来看，过去十年越南加密货币市场最重要的转变和痛点是什么？ Thanh Le：这是一个非常好的问题。我很幸运能够相对较早地进入越南的加密货币领域。虽然很多人比我更OG，但从2017年开始仍然意味着近八年的第一手学习。在那段时间里，我目睹了越南的加密货币格局发生了巨大的演变——从早期的主导地位
Author | WuBlockchain
This episode of WuBlockchain podcast explores the long-term evolution of Vietnam’s crypto market through the perspective of Thanh Le, CEO of G98 and Founder of Ninety Eight. Drawing on his experience since entering the industry in 2017, Thanh discusses how Vietnam’s crypto ecosystem has matured from an early high-risk phase into a highly active market shaped by retail participation, developer talent, and emerging regulation.
Ninety Eight builds practical Web3 products, including multi-chain wallets and DeFi tools, from Vietnam. Through G98, a joint venture with G-Group, these technologies are localized and deployed using domestic infrastructure to support digital-asset-related products and services in the Vietnamese market.
Disclaimer: The content of this article is only the personal opinion of the interviewees, does not represent the views of WuBlockchain, and does not endorse any tokens.
The audio transcription is done by GPT and may contain errors. Please listen to the complete podcast:
YouTube: https://youtu.be/qDLKIRTn03E
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/3uNIRwH2PkpnePJhC07Hxv?si=wEqKkL9_Sf2PIUU5N8ES6w
Crypto in Vietnam: From Early Hype and Fraud to National Strategy
Ivan: Today, we’re very honored to invite Thanh Le, CEO of G98 and Founder of Ninety Eight, to discuss the evolution of Vietnam’s crypto market from a long-term on-ground perspective. So, first question, Thanh Le, what first drew you into crypto? Public information suggests you entered the industry as early as 2017. And from your perspective, what have been the most important shifts and pain points in Vietnam’s crypto market over the past decade?
Thanh Le: That’s a very great question. I feel fortunate to have entered Vietnam’s crypto space relatively early. Although many people are more OG than I am, starting in 2017 still means nearly eight years of firsthand learning. During that time, I’ve watched Vietnam’s crypto landscape evolve dramatically — from an early phase dominated by scams and widespread skepticism, when crypto wasn’t even seen as an asset and Bitcoin was often dismissed as a fraud, to today, where crypto is increasingly recognized globally as a new asset class, and Bitcoin is viewed as digital gold.
What’s equally striking is how Vietnam itself has changed. Over the past one to two years in particular, the country has begun to openly support crypto, with clear shifts in regulatory thinking. I see 2025 as a key inflection point: policy documents such as Resolution 05 signal a move toward a more explicit and supportive regulatory framework. Within just eight years, the space has gone from broad misunderstanding to Vietnamese founders building products for global users, and now to a stage where national policy is actively engaging with crypto. For me, that transformation has been an extraordinary journey.
A High-Participation Market Profile: User Scale, Activity, and Entry Paths in Vietnam’s Crypto World
Ivan: At a high level, how big is Vietnam’s crypto market today — roughly how many users are there, how active is trading, and how mainstream is crypto adoption? What does the competitive landscape among exchanges in Vietnam look like right now?
Thanh Le: I don’t have exact figures on hand, and different research reports do show slightly different numbers, but overall, the data is fairly consistent and makes sense. If we look at reports from Chainalysis, Vietnam has ranked among the top five countries globally in crypto adoption over the past three years. Crypto ownership rates are consistently estimated at over 20%, indicating strong and sustained demand for crypto as an asset class among Vietnamese users.
Other studies suggest that around 20 million people in Vietnam currently hold cryptocurrencies, which is a very significant number in terms of market activity. This is also reflected in exchange data: whether you look at Binance, OKX, Bybit, or other major centralized exchanges, Vietnam consistently ranks among the top five most active countries by trading traffic.
These figures align closely with what we see on the ground. There are large retail communities actively opening accounts and trading on centralized exchanges. Over the past three years, we’ve also seen a clear increase in Vietnamese users adopting DeFi protocols, not just trading but actively engaging with on-chain products.
Another visible trend is that many of the world’s leading blockchain projects now have local representatives in Vietnam and are investing heavily in education and community outreach, especially at universities. This further reflects how active and strategically important the Vietnamese crypto community has become.
From the builders’ side, more notable projects are also emerging from Vietnam. Overall, in recent years, we’ve seen the ecosystem mature across multiple layers — developers, startups, and retail users — with Vietnam contributing meaningful user growth and traffic to both centralized exchanges and DeFi protocols.
Ivan: So, from your perspective, the whole country is quite supportive, and where do Vietnamese users typically first enter the crypto world — through exchanges, wallets, communities/KOLs, or friends? And what are their most common use cases?
Thanh Le: From my observation, people enter crypto through very different paths, often shaped by their generation. For my generation, many first learned about crypto through Bitcoin — either by mining it, holding major coins, or using Bitcoin as a payment method for early “make money online” businesses. That was a common entry point at the time. Later on, especially around 2021, I saw a large wave of new users entering crypto through GameFi and DeFi. In the past one to two years, another noticeable group joined primarily because of meme coins.
So in every cycle, the entry narrative changes. But there is one constant pattern: crypto adoption still spreads largely through word of mouth. People are introduced to crypto by friends, by the KOLs they follow, or through intense discussion in communities and media. This social and community-driven transmission remains a core growth engine even today.
As in many other countries, most users in Vietnam typically start with centralized exchanges. That’s also why, when the Vietnamese government began building a regulatory framework for crypto, it logically started by regulating centralized exchange businesses first. From my perspective, that approach makes a lot of sense.
Ivan: So, how would you describe the Vietnamese crypto user profile — age distribution, risk appetite, how quickly they adopt new narratives, and whether they tend to be more CEX-oriented or on-chain? What stands out across these dimensions?
Thanh Le: Around four years ago, Vietnamese crypto users were far more familiar with centralized exchanges. At that time, if you wanted to introduce a new coin or token to users, it almost had to be listed on a major exchange where they already held funds. Otherwise, adoption was very difficult.
In recent years, however, I’ve seen a clear shift. More users are actively learning how crypto works and how different protocols function. They’re no longer just learning how to use these tools, but also how to leverage them to build their own strategies and generate returns. Vietnamese users, in general, remain strong risk takers and are still willing to experiment.
Many people I know continue to prefer high-risk, high-return strategies over more conventional, low-risk investments. One important reason is that, before clear regulations were introduced, Vietnam’s crypto market operated largely as a high-risk environment. As a result, larger and more conservative pools of capital stayed on the sidelines, waiting for regulatory clarity before entering the space.
With the new regulatory framework coming into place, I think we’ll start to see a more diversified user base in Vietnam, including participants with different risk profiles. That said, if we look back at users who entered crypto in 2017 or even earlier, many of them are still risk-takers today, and they are generally very familiar with centralized exchanges. The difference now is that their overall level of understanding has improved significantly. They are no longer only trading on centralized platforms; more and more of them are also starting to use DeFi protocols and explore more advanced strategies.
Regulatory Logic in the New Crypto Era: Cautious but Supportive Progress
Ivan: So, talking about the current regulations, what does the current regulatory situation in Vietnam look like? Is the government’s overall stance more supportive, restrictive, or neutral? Looking ahead, what key developments should we pay the closest attention to?
Thanh Le: From my personal perspective, the regulatory framework recently introduced in Vietnam is being developed under a conservative but fundamentally supportive approach.
At a strategic level, the government has already classified blockchain as one of the key technologies under its “Fourth Industrial Revolution” with a national focus spanning from 2025 to 2030. This signals that blockchain is viewed as a core technology the country intends to invest in long-term. That’s why I believe the overall regulatory direction is supportive — its goal is not to suppress the industry, but to help it scale and reach broader adoption in Vietnam.
That said, because crypto and blockchain are still relatively new and the associated risks are not yet fully understood, regulators are taking a cautious approach in the early stages. Initial implementation is likely to be limited — for example, issuing only a small number of exchange licenses, restricting services to spot trading, and requiring tokens to be quoted in VND. Over time, as regulators observe how the market operates and assess risk management outcomes, more services are expected to open up gradually.
Overall, the core motivation at the national level remains clear: to develop blockchain into a critical technology that can empower Vietnam’s broader economy. This has consistently been the government’s stated focus, and it aligns with what we’ve been told through official channels.
Projects and the Ecosystem in a New Cycle: Has Vietnam’s Crypto Market Gone Quiet in the Bear Market?
Ivan: And in terms of preferences, what projects or sectors do Vietnamese retail users gravitate toward (BTC/ETH, various L1s, memes, DeFi, GameFi, etc.)? What do you think drives these preferences — culture, distribution channels, profit-chasing dynamics, product supply, or the way information spreads?
Thanh Le: From my observation, Vietnamese investment strategies have clearly evolved over time. At the current stage, many investors are shifting back toward Bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies. At the same time, there is growing interest in on-chain tokenized assets beyond crypto-native tokens. We are seeing increasing attention toward tokenized gold, silver, metals, and other commodities. Many users now view these assets as more “serious” and, in some cases, easier to understand and invest in than purely crypto-native projects.
That said, Vietnamese users remain highly open to new opportunities. Almost every emerging trend or narrative still attracts a meaningful number of participants from Vietnam. Whether it is memecoins, AI-related tokens, or other narratives, there is always a segment of users actively following and engaging.
Overall, however, from what I can see, the majority of capital and attention is gradually rotating back toward majors rather than speculative assets.
Ivan: I agree with you. From this cycle, we are also witnessing a combination of TradFi and crypto. And in the 2020–2022 cycle, a number of Vietnamese projects gained visibility — especially in GameFi. But in this cycle (since 2024), we’ve heard much less about Vietnamese projects. Do you share that impression? If so, what do you think explains it?
Thanh Le: We are still seeing many Vietnamese teams building across different sectors and blockchain ecosystems. I know this firsthand because Coin98 also operates as a venture investor, and we continue to support Vietnamese founders and their projects that are actively developing.
The reason we haven’t seen many Vietnamese projects truly stand out over the past one to two years comes down to several factors. First, the broader market environment. Since entering the bear market around 2022, very few projects globally have achieved breakout growth. In such conditions, it’s naturally harder for new projects — Vietnamese or otherwise — to gain significant visibility.
Second, this trend is not unique to Vietnam. Across the entire crypto industry, we’ve seen a slowdown in new standout projects. One key reason is that talent and attention have shifted toward other emerging sectors, especially AI, where companies are seeing faster growth and higher valuations. Meanwhile, crypto has remained in a downturn, making it less attractive for some builders in the short term.
Third, as crypto matures, founders increasingly need clear legal guidance to understand what is permitted and what is not. In this regard, Vietnam’s newly introduced regulatory framework is important, as it provides greater clarity and confidence for builders.
Overall, it’s a combination of market cycles, talent migration, and regulatory uncertainty. That said, with clearer regulations now in place, I’m optimistic that we’ll see more crypto projects emerging from Vietnam over the next few years.
Ivan: What is the developer ecosystem in Vietnam really like today? Which areas are builders focusing on most? Which cities are crypto startups concentrated in, and what does the typical team size and maturity level look like?
Thanh Le: In Vietnam today, there is a strong pool of developers mainly focused on two tracks: EVM/Solidity and Rust. Rust developers are now largely concentrated around the Solana ecosystem, which has been growing very quickly in Vietnam. A major reason for this growth is the long-term effort by Superteam, which has been highly active in the local market over the past three years. They’ve focused on building developer communities, helping developers find jobs, and supporting them in launching their own projects. Those efforts are now starting to pay off.
On the user side, Vietnam already has a sizable Solana user base. On the developer side, more teams are prioritizing Solana because the ecosystem itself has been very active over the past few years. This is visible across multiple metrics: many high-revenue applications used by Vietnamese users are built on Solana, meme activity has been particularly strong there, and trading activity consistently leans toward the Solana ecosystem. With continued local investment, Solana has now formed a meaningful and relatively mature developer community in Vietnam.
At the same time, Ethereum continues to hold its position as the foundation of the EVM ecosystem. We still see a loyal and growing group of developers deeply experienced in EVM and Solidity. Many Vietnamese developers have chosen to join overseas crypto companies, both to improve their technical skills and to contribute to major open-source protocols.
Because relatively few large Vietnamese-native projects have emerged in the past one to two years, many developers seeking long-term growth have naturally looked for roles in international teams. From my perspective, this has positioned Vietnam as an increasingly important talent pool for the global crypto industry, especially across ecosystems that continue to show strong momentum.
Ivan: How interested are local and international investors in Vietnamese projects today? And back when Coin98 raised funding, was the fundraising process smooth for you?
Thanh Le: Looking back, I do think we were fortunate in 2021, both in terms of timing and the level of support we received from global investors. One key reason was that, at the time we raised funds, we were among the very few projects in the region that already had a live product running for one to two years. We had gone through the full progression — from fundraising with just a whitepaper, to an MVP, and eventually to a product with real users and meaningful usage data. That put us well ahead of many projects that were still purely conceptual, and it made a big difference for fundraising.
Another factor was the broader market environment. The market was very strong in 2021, which naturally made fundraising easier. Of course, that success also rested on years of work by the team — we had been building intensively for nearly four years before that moment. So for us, it was really a combination of long-term effort, favorable timing, and some luck. And I think this applies not only to Vietnamese projects, but to startups everywhere.
Today, fundraising has clearly become much harder. This is not necessarily because projects are worse, but because the overall market has declined. Venture investors are under pressure; many have suffered losses in previous deals, and their available capital and risk mandates have tightened. As a result, venture fund sizes are shrinking, and investment decisions are far more cautious. From what I can see, this has affected not just Vietnam but the entire Asian region, significantly reducing the ability of projects to raise capital.
Ivan: The last question: What do you see as the core strengths and distinctive traits of Vietnam as a country — and of Vietnamese people within the crypto industry? I’ve noticed that Vietnamese talent shows up frequently in community and growth roles across many projects — why do you think that is?
Thanh Le: Under the new regulatory framework, market participants will need to adapt to a different way of trading. For example, if you want to trade assets, you will likely need to deposit them into regulated centralized exchanges and trade within those platforms, rather than using unregulated venues as before. So the trading process itself will change to some extent. However, I don’t think this will reduce local interest, especially within the developer community.
On the contrary, I believe the regulatory framework actually gives developers and founders much greater confidence to build in this space. From that perspective, the new rules are clearly a positive development.
At the national level, I think Vietnam is moving in the right direction. The country is seriously exploring how blockchain can be used as a core technology to support and drive the growth of the digital economy in the coming years. Of course, there is still a lot of work to be done, and more detailed policies and guidance will be needed. But overall, it’s clear to me that the government is investing significant effort into making this work and is genuinely committed to developing blockchain into a key industry for Vietnam’s economy.
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