Last Christmas, I Gave You My Trades: 5 Exchange Activities I’m In

As the year winds down, markets don’t fall asleep — they shift into a different rhythm. Holiday volatility, thinner liquidity, and lighter routines give exchanges room to experiment with formats that feel more playful, seasonal, and human, without losing their focus on activity and flow.

1. YEX — Futures Trading Holiday Championship: Christmas Season

Period: December 10, 2025 — December 31, 2025

Type of activity: Futures trading competition

This campaign is built around raw futures turnover rather than strategy diversity or P&L optimization. It rewards traders who can sustain large-scale exposure and consistently generate volume throughout the holiday period. The competitive structure favors execution capacity and balance efficiency, turning seasonal market volatility into a leaderboard-driven liquidity race.

I’m already trading futures here, so participation is automatic — I just keep my usual pace and let volume stack across the leaderboard. No special moves, just consistency through the window.

Conditions: Register for the campaign → trade futures contracts on YEX → generate eligible trading volume → rank on the leaderboard → rewards distributed based on final position.

Link to the activity: https://futures.yex.io/en_US/competition

2. WhiteBIT — Crypto Santa’s Giveaway

Period: December 15, 2025 — January 15, 2026

Type of activity: Multi-product engagement campaign with gamified progress tracking

The campaign is built around a year-in-review entry layer that surfaces personal trading and usage highlights directly across the platform. These highlights transition users from retrospective insights into active participation, encouraging interaction with WhiteBIT products under promotional conditions.

Engagement is accumulated through product usage rather than performance metrics, while an additional hidden reward introduces an exploration-driven mechanic beyond the main prize pool.

I’ve been using WhiteBIT Nova for a long time, so this campaign fits naturally into how I already use the card day to day. I’m paying with the Nova card, trading futures, and using

Convert or Auto-Invest — every action adds entries without forcing extra volume, while the hidden gift mechanic keeps it feeling more like exploration than a checklist.

Conditions: Sign up on WhiteBIT and pass KYC → click “Join now” on the campaign page → complete eligible tasks to receive entries on Santa’s list

Link to the activity: https://whitebit.com/m/new-year-2026

3. BTCC — Christmas Celebration Month

Period: December 10, 2025 — December 27, 2025

Type of activity: Multi-layer trading and deposit campaign with prize draw mechanics

The campaign links deposits and futures trading into a cumulative progression system where completed actions generate vouchers and draw entries. Rewards are distributed through a guaranteed-win prize draw, with an additional hidden gift mechanic designed to extend engagement beyond the core trading flow.

I treat this as a background layer: futures trades and deposits I’d make anyway turn into draw entries. The guaranteed-win structure means I don’t optimize — I just stay active and let participation do the work.

Conditions: Register → complete eligible deposits and futures trades → accumulate entries → participate in the prize draw → unlock the hidden gift by following BTCC’s instructions

Link to the activity: https://www.btcc.com/en-US/market-events/activity/christmas2025

4. KuCoin — Year-End New User Bonus Campaign

Period: December 4, 2025 — December 31, 2025

Type of activity: New user payment activation campaign

This campaign targets first-time KuCoin Pay users and is built around real payment usage rather than trading volume. Rewards are unlocked through a short task sequence that starts with an initial payment and expands into repeated on- and offline transactions.

The structure pushes users to test KuCoin Pay in everyday payment scenarios, with a separate lucky draw layer tied specifically to offline QR payments.

Here I’m not trading at all — I’m testing KuCoin Pay with small, real payments. Once the first payment is done, I just keep using KuCoin Pay for everyday transactions — repetition is what quietly improves your odds here, and offline QR use adds an extra layer through the iPhone draw.

Conditions: Log in to join the event → complete the first KuCoin Pay payment (≥5 USDT) → make additional KuCoin Pay transactions during the campaign → complete eligible offline QR payments to enter the iPhone 17 lucky draw

Link to the activity: https://www.kucoin.com/campaigns/PAYNewUsercampaignDecember

5. CEX.ІO — USDT Margin Trading Competition

Period: December 3, 2025 — December 31, 2025

Type of activity: Margin trading leaderboard with an expandable prize pool

This campaign ranks participants strictly by margin trading volume, with spot activity excluded from scoring. The prize pool scales from $20,000 to $200,000 USDT as cumulative margin volume across all participants increases, linking individual performance to collective trading activity on the platform.

On CEX.IO, I focus strictly on margin trading since spot doesn’t count. I’m keeping steady positions open and letting volume accumulate while the prize pool grows with overall platform activity.

Conditions: Opt in and set a nickname → trade via CEX.IO Margin Trading during the campaign period → generate eligible margin trading volume → rank on the public leaderboard → rewards distributed based on final standings and unlocked prize pool tiers

Link to the activity: https://cex.io/competition-margin-dec-2025

Closing View

These year-end campaigns borrow the holiday mood to soften entry points and invite participation, whether through trading, payments, or simple exploration. Different mechanics, one shared idea: close the year in motion and step into the next one already engaged.

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Last Christmas, I Gave You My Trades: 5 Exchange Activities I’m In was originally published in Coinmonks on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.