Rachel Conlan, the new Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume, has labeled Istanbul as a crypto hub in an interview with CoinDesk Türkiye.

Speaking to Serdar Turan, the Editor-in-Chief of CoinDesk Türkiye, in the lead up to Binance Blockchain Week in early November, Conlan said: “I think we have an enormous potential and opportunity in Web3, and it’s one of the reasons I’ve been drawn to this industry three years ago. The major reason being the penetration. If you look at the global industry, we’re only at 5% penetration globally. I know obviously here in Turkey, it’s at 12%.”

While explaining the significance of Turkey in the global ecosystem, she said, “Turkey is one of the most exciting communities for crypto. That’s not just through the numbers. While you have incredible penetration, we know that’s growing month over month.”

“That’s with not just the crypto exchanges and people holding crypto, that also is the vibrant ecosystem here of startups, investments. It’s very exciting. For us, Turkey represents a market where we can learn a lot. We can learn and take insights from the user base here and how we can apply that to what are our global programs, what we need to be doing better.”

Conlan continued by expressing her satisfaction with Binance Turkey’s achievements, adding: “I think Istanbul is already one of the main hubs. I don’t think it’s about becoming the hub. That’s really one of the reasons that we chose to host our upcoming Binance Blockchain Week here in November. That really is about merging both the local community with the international Web3 community.”

Conlan also emphasized the importance of regulatory compliance and highlighted Binance’s commitment to compliance as one of the key reasons for her joining the exchange. She underscored the crypto exchange holds 18 licenses globally and mentioned there are over 700 compliance officers at Binance working on user security, with an investment of over $80 million in infrastructure. Furthermore, Conlan mentioned this figure could be doubled in pursuit of excellence. She also added “regulations will facilitate people’s adaptation to the industry.”