How AI is deciding which crypto exchange you use

The financial market has changed in immense ways over the course of the past few years, and now, data shows that AI is changing it even further. Financial professionals and investors are gradually moving away from scrolling through pages of blue links to find platforms. They ask an LLM instead and get a single answer. Recent data from McKinsey shows that 50% of consumers use AI-powered search today and 44% of professionals now cite AI as their primary source of insights. This significantly passes the 31% who still rely on traditional search. ChatGPT alone is serving over 900 million weekly active users.AI-mediated search is actively replacing traditional browsing. For the cryptocurrency industry, this structural shift means AI visibility is emerging as a critical new metric that dictates how users evaluate platforms.The new gateway to financial discoveryAI provides direct answers rather than options, altering the discovery process. Projections show AI-driven search will route roughly $750 billion in revenue by 2028. This transition creates new requirements for market participants looking to capture user attention."We're witnessing a fundamental shift in how users discover and evaluate financial platforms," notes Jeff Li, Global Product & Design Leader at Binance. "As AI-powered search increasingly becomes a key gateway to financial services, visibility within AI-generated recommendations is emerging as an important measure of brand trust. Being consistently surfaced by leading LLMs reflects the scale, liquidity, and trust Binance has built over multiple market cycles, reinforcing our position as a leading destination for global crypto users."The tri-pillar hierarchy and the concentration gapDefiLlama Research built its benchmark from 120 AI-generated outputs, using 30 prompts in English and Mandarin Chinese across Claude Opus 4.7, GPT-5.4, Gemini 3 Flash, and Qwen 3.6 Plus. The findings reveal a massive concentration gap between AI recommendations and actual market activity. Three exchanges formed a "tri-pillar hierarchy" as Binance, OKX, and Bybit surfaced in 100% of all 120 outputs. The top three positions go to Binance, Kraken, and OKX. This shows heavy concentration compared to actual 24-hour cryptocurrency trading volume, which spreads across dozens of global venues. Users entering the market through AI receive a relatively narrower view of available options than what exists in reality. AI models operate as mirrors of aggregate attention and historical brand trust rather than real-time volume trackers.The data indicates that visibility is consolidating around platforms with long-established content authority. A brand can hold a solid position in current trading volume but remain entirely absent from the answers AI engines generate.How AI assigns functional rolesAI systems assign functional roles instead of ranking platforms linearly. They trigger different recommendations based on specific user intent.Kraken takes the Top-1 spot in safety and compliance framings across 8 out of 120 outputs. Bybit moves up to Top-2 in derivatives contexts. Coinbase International holds a disproportionate Top-3 share under institutional and dollar-rail prompts. OKX claims Top-1 when prompts specify professional unified-margin derivatives.Discoverability requires owning a specific intent frame within the training corpus. Mid-tier platforms can capture high-intent users by dominating specialized categories in their content efforts, rather than attempting to compete on general breadth. When users ask specific questions, AI models bypass general rankings to retrieve the most contextually relevant platform. Building strong semantic associations with distinct use cases is how smaller players can maintain visibility.Structural blind spots and the language divide Language differences and training lag also shape these outputs. For example, in Mandarin, regional Asian platforms appear more frequently. Geographic and linguistic contexts directly alter the results and can affect who is ultimately appearing in the top spot on an international level.AI outputs reflect training data from roughly 12 to 18 months ago. AI citations often originate from topic-specific sources like earned media and research. This lag means current marketing and content efforts will dictate discoverability a year and a half from now. What platforms publish today shapes the knowledge graph of tomorrow. Delayed investment in this layer creates an authority gap that becomes incredibly difficult to close later.The new strategic imperative for cryptocurrency platformsDiscoverability does not equal current volume. It equals accumulated content presence and established brand trust over long periods. Binance’s position in the data reflects years of steady ecosystem building and global research output. For the rest of the industry, treating AI visibility as a core strategic metric is now required to navigate the current shift in user discovery successfully.Investing involves risk and your investment may lose value. Past performance gives no indication of future results. These statements do not constitute and cannot replace investment advice.VentureBeat newsroom and editorial staff were not involved in the creation of this content.

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