Aster, as a rising star in the DEX space, has seen explosive growth in its TGE. We interviewed its sole partner agency in the Japanese market. This agency started from scratch to expand the Japanese community, building a network of top KOLs and trading communities. As of now, it has achieved a monthly trading volume of approximately $6 billion, covering over 24,000 active Japanese trading users.

This article shares:

1. The power of localization: Aster's sole partner agency in Japan
2. The cold start dilemma: Breaking through from $5 million to $6 billion
3. Differentiated competition: The growth logic of DEX in Japan
4. Resource barriers: KOL matrix and customized incentives
5. Future challenges: Aster's future risks and development

The power of localization: Aster's sole partner agency in Japan

Sharing from Ki, Partner at DP Capital:
I am very pleased to be the sole partner agency for Aster DEX in Japan and to have driven its trading volume to exceed $3.5 billion in a single month in just a few months. This is only a phased achievement; our goals are far beyond this. Our team has long been deeply involved in the Japanese blockchain community, focusing on liquidity, staking, and collaborations related to the DEX market.

Why did we choose to bet on DEX?
Last year, many KOL friends in the Japanese community achieved financial freedom through Hyperliquid. Early participants and contributors of Hype have now become the first supporters of Aster in Japan. In fact, the Japanese market ranks 5th in Hyperliquid's global trading volume, and our community's focus is almost entirely around DEX. Looking at the top ten projects on DefiLlama, our team has collaborated with more than half of them.

The emergence of Aster is set against this backdrop. The project was initially recommended by friends in the DEX field. During our first communication, we could feel the team's passion and determination to delve into the Japanese market. Later, at the Dubai 2049 Conference, I spoke directly with the Aster CEO, and his presentation on the BNB ecosystem and the project confirmed several things for me: the team has a solid background, the product has potential, and the CEO is a very serious entrepreneur. Based on my intuition and judgment, I believe Aster is very likely to become the next dark horse in the DEX space.

From May to September, we witnessed and participated in Aster's explosive growth in Japan from zero. This article is a complete review and sharing of my experience in local expansion and DEX market strategies over these four months.

The cold start dilemma: Breaking through from $5 million to $6 billion

Although Aster has gained traction in Chinese-speaking regions, it remains relatively unknown in the Japanese market, where users are almost unaware of Aster as a DEX. We invited well-known trading KOLs in Japan to experience and evaluate Aster's product, but most initially rejected it.

In fact, any new DEX project entering Japan will encounter three major challenges:

1. Language and cultural barriers — Japanese users are extremely sensitive to detail and precision in expression.

2. Difficulty in building trust — In finance and trading, brand endorsement and community reputation are crucial.

3. CEX's absolute dominance — DEX users are very niche; the majority of Japanese users prefer CEX, resulting in limited DEX users and fierce competition.

1. Localization language upgrade

We revised the Japanese version of the platform, especially the Trade (Simple), Trade (Pro), and Earn sections. Unlike the "half-baked" translations delivered by most translation companies, we invited professional editors and experienced traders in the blockchain field to make modifications.
For large traders in Japan, a translation error or improper terminology is enough to determine whether a project is "professional and trustworthy." The upgraded Aster interface finally met the standards of trust for Japanese users.

2. Key SEO and content positioning

We comprehensively covered Google's core search terms to ensure that when Japanese users first search for Aster, they see positive and accurate information.
At that time, we directly extracted Hyperliquid's search terms, aligned with Japan's top ten search keywords, and customized three keywords per month for Aster:

• Asterdex エアドロ（airdrop）
• Asterdex 使い方（how to use）
• Asterdex 仮想通貨（decentralized exchange）

Around these keywords, we continuously published content on multiple SEO platforms and created Japanese registration tutorials, operation guides, and airdrop collection serialized articles, gradually shaping users' cognitive pathways.

3. User experience optimization and community outreach

With every new product development, we shared updates with the trading KOL community immediately. Through this "optimize while disseminating" approach, KOLs and early users gradually felt Aster's growth potential and market maturity.
This step proved crucial: after the Japanese version upgrade, Aster's monthly trading volume surged from the initial $5 million to $20 million in the following two months. This not only brought in the first batch of core users but also laid the foundation for subsequent scalable growth.

In other words, Aster's first step in the Japanese market was not "aggressive marketing," but rather through precise localization + SEO positioning + user experience to convey trust, allowing Japanese users to use it more smoothly and confidently.

Differentiated competition: The growth logic of DEX in Japan

The competition in the Japanese DEX market is fierce. Aster must find a breakthrough under limited resources. In the first two months of entering Japan, Aster's monthly trading volume was only around $20 million, a figure far below expectations, and market spending remained cautious. This also led to our community's resources being unable to quickly open up the market. At that time, other well-known DEXs had stable monthly trading volumes around $500 million.

In this situation, we intervened as an agency to provide support and endorsement for Aster in Japan. We provided Aster with a list of top trading KOLs and closed trading communities in Japan, each channel backed by a large user base with significant real trading volume. After seeing these resources, the team ultimately agreed to gradually establish cooperation in the form of achieving target trading volume bonuses.

Subsequently, we developed a differentiated market strategy based on Aster's phased goals:

• Not relying on large-scale advertising spending;

• Incentive mechanisms focused on KOLs that can bring actual trading volume;

• Using precise channels to drive high-value users, ensuring long-term stickiness.

This approach allowed Aster to establish a unique positioning in Japan: not driven by burning money for short-term volume, but gradually growing through high-quality users + competitive trading.

Competitors entering Japan typically showcase their "muscle": new users are directly given $100; various channels provide large-scale subsidies; frequent trading competitions; and they spare no expense on large screen advertisements and sponsorships for top exhibitions in Japan. Under this strategy, Japanese YouTubers and Twitter KOLs were quickly attracted, easily surpassing $100 million in monthly trading volume.

Resource barriers: KOL matrix and customized incentives

We submitted to Aster a highly scarce list of Japanese community contacts: about 20 top trading KOL community matrices, each controlling thousands of active users and real trading networks.

Based on this, we designed a tiered trading incentive model:

• Set different goals for large, medium, and small communities;

• Evaluate not by "top-tier" fame, but solely based on real trading volume;

• For example, if a top channel wants to receive a higher proportion of incentives, it must meet a basic monthly trading volume of over $30 million, with the highest challenge goal set at $2.5 billion.

This tiered plan made cooperation clear and transparent, avoiding ineffective consumption and providing all participants with clear performance targets.

During execution, the Aster team and CEO visited Japan multiple times. We facilitated face-to-face communication between the CEO and KOLs, greatly enhancing the trust in the Aster platform within the Japanese market. When communicating with the market, we could confidently amplify Aster's differentiated advantages at each stage: multi-chain support; innovative products like perpetual contracts; hidden orders/privacy protection; dual modes for novice and professional users; and capital and institutional endorsements. These highlights became significant support when benchmarking against mature players like Hyperliquid.

With the continuous involvement of key KOLs, market data began to grow exponentially: daily trading volume surpassed $10 million, and new users increased by over 500 daily.

Initially, we expected the monthly trading volume to reach $1-2 billion. With the acceleration of TGE and market promotion, both trading volume and token price skyrocketed, and the community continued to exceed targets daily. Our community mobilized 20 KOL channel groups, continuously producing content: X (Twitter) promotions and tutorials, dedicated Aster Japanese AMAs, Japanese YouTube review videos, and community airdrop content. Combined with CMC and DefiLlama's Perp Volume data endorsement and interactions with industry influencers, these materials became key drivers for secondary dissemination.

To ensure the replicability of explosive growth, we simultaneously organized standardized Japanese tutorials and official market policies, and combined them with high trading volume KOL case studies, continuously spreading through new channels, improving dissemination efficiency and optimizing user education.

This month, Aster's growth curve in Japan significantly exceeded initial expectations. The next clear trading volume target: $10 billion monthly scale.

Future challenges: Aster's future risks and development

Aster's rapid rise in a short time is inseparable from its solid support and unique product strength. The project has received investments from Binance and YZi Labs, providing strong confidence for opening the Japanese market, whether through financial endorsement, market aura, or rapid surges post-TGE. This was also one of the important considerations for our decision to actively invest in cooperation.

From the market landscape, Hyperliquid still holds a leading position in Japan, maintaining stable liquidity due to its long-term technical advantages and professional trader community. Currently, the user structure of our Japanese community is still primarily based on Hyperliquid, with Aster following. But this also means that Aster still has enormous growth potential.

As a "rising star," Aster demonstrates strong explosive power through product innovation + airdrop marketing + skyrocketing token prices, especially successfully attracting a large number of novice users.
Its core competitive advantages include:

• Multi-chain support and innovative features (perpetual contracts, privacy protection, etc.)
• User-friendly for novices while catering to professional traders
• Strong capital and institutional endorsements

However, whether it can truly secure the top position in the future depends on three key factors:

1. Continuous product iteration — Constantly optimizing the trading experience and maintaining technological leadership;
2. Token price and market performance — Sustaining user attraction;
3. Long-term incentive mechanisms — Cultivating user stickiness and loyalty through airdrops and community incentives.

As the sole partner agency in Japan, we will continue to fully support Aster, relaying the latest market demands and feedback to the team in real-time, driving the optimization of its products and services. At the same time, we look forward to Aster collaborating with more excellent projects in the 2025 DEX new season to explore broader blue ocean markets.

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