Table 1 A summary of crypto-exchange CSF... | Emerald Publishing

Table 1

A summary of crypto-exchange CSF based on the expanded LASIC principle

CSF	Description
Low margin	Profit margins remain low at the user level to attract a critical mass of users and, thus, establish a network effect. In turn, profitability may be attained by increased demand for the core services and other channels (Lee and Teo, 2015; Singh, 2020)
Asset light	Asset-light businesses can innovate and scale without high fixed costs. By utilising existing infrastructure, they can develop new revenue streams without significantly increasing fixed or setup costs (Lee and Teo, 2015). This allows FinTech firms to be more agile in response to external changes (Nicoletti, 2017)
Scalable	FinTech startups must be able to scale without significantly raising costs or sacrificing efficiency to harness network externalities. This involves shifting operations online rather than relying on physical outlets (Lee and Teo, 2015), building ecosystems to engage collaborators (Muthukannan et al., 2021) and adopting platform-mediated approaches to manage vast transactions (Bruton et al., 2015)
Variety	When competing with other FinTech businesses, providing a more comprehensive range of product or service options can enhance customers' likelihood of choosing the exchange (Kahn, 1995). In the FinTech context, this can contribute to a thriving ecosystem that helps to meet clients' needs more thoroughly (Leong et al., 2017). In crypto-exchange contexts, product and service offerings can be categorised into three main groups: deposit, wealth accumulation and withdrawal (Shieh et al., 2023)
Innovative	Successful FinTech businesses should innovate in both products and operations (Gimpel et al., 2018; Liu et al., 2020). For example, the proliferation of smartphones and contactless technologies enables more FinTech innovations (Lee and Teo, 2015)
Compliance easy	Businesses not subject to high compliance regimes can focus more on innovations, given that they may face lower capital requirements and spend fewer resources on compliance activities (Lee and Teo, 2015; Bu et al., 2022)
Transparency	Transparency impacts users' propensity to switch to FinTech options (Jünger and Mietzner, 2020; Chen et al., 2022). Additionally, FinTech can mitigate the risk of financial instability through enhanced transparency (Fung et al., 2020)

CSF	Description
Low margin	Profit margins remain low at the user level to attract a critical mass of users and, thus, establish a network effect. In turn, profitability may be attained by increased demand for the core services and other channels (Lee and Teo, 2015; Singh, 2020)
Asset light	Asset-light businesses can innovate and scale without high fixed costs. By utilising existing infrastructure, they can develop new revenue streams without significantly increasing fixed or setup costs (Lee and Teo, 2015). This allows FinTech firms to be more agile in response to external changes (Nicoletti, 2017)
Scalable	FinTech startups must be able to scale without significantly raising costs or sacrificing efficiency to harness network externalities. This involves shifting operations online rather than relying on physical outlets (Lee and Teo, 2015), building ecosystems to engage collaborators (Muthukannan et al., 2021) and adopting platform-mediated approaches to manage vast transactions (Bruton et al., 2015)
Variety	When competing with other FinTech businesses, providing a more comprehensive range of product or service options can enhance customers' likelihood of choosing the exchange (Kahn, 1995). In the FinTech context, this can contribute to a thriving ecosystem that helps to meet clients' needs more thoroughly (Leong et al., 2017). In crypto-exchange contexts, product and service offerings can be categorised into three main groups: deposit, wealth accumulation and withdrawal (Shieh et al., 2023)
Innovative	Successful FinTech businesses should innovate in both products and operations (Gimpel et al., 2018; Liu et al., 2020). For example, the proliferation of smartphones and contactless technologies enables more FinTech innovations (Lee and Teo, 2015)
Compliance easy	Businesses not subject to high compliance regimes can focus more on innovations, given that they may face lower capital requirements and spend fewer resources on compliance activities (Lee and Teo, 2015; Bu et al., 2022)
Transparency	Transparency impacts users' propensity to switch to FinTech options (Jünger and Mietzner, 2020; Chen et al., 2022). Additionally, FinTech can mitigate the risk of financial instability through enhanced transparency (Fung et al., 2020)