Dave Lee is an entrepreneurial expat making waves in Mongolia. He is the CEO and Chairman of X-Meta exchange and IHC E-Sports team, boasts over a decade of global experience that spans commodities trading, business development, startup investments, and much more.

A strong advocate for technologies enhancing quality of life, Lee co-founded Singapore's first electric vehicle company, AVEVAI, and has contracted millions of carbon credits to combat climate change. His involvement in the Asia Pacific's blockchain and green energy sectors is well noted, as is his founding of a digital technology company leveraging blockchain and AI.

Since 2016, Dave Lee's expertise in crypto arbitrage trading has fostered relationships with industry heavyweights like X-Meta, Binance, Chainalysis, Huobi, Gate.io, Kraken, and KuCoin. An authoritative voice, he has shared his insights at international conferences, including Binance, Blockchain Week 2022, Chainalysis Links Conference, and Crypto Asia 2022. As Chairman of IHC Esports, a top-tier E-Sports team based in Mongolia, he fervently promotes Mongolian Esports on the global stage. Dive with us into Dave Lee's remarkable journey in this exclusive interview.

- Can you tell us about your background and what led you to create X-Meta Exchange?

- I always loved helping people. So I studied and graduated in the medical field. And my first job was working in a hospital before quitting, because I figured there's a better way to help people through other positive ways.

I think as an exchange, regulation is good. Since the crypto industry is very new in Mongolia, the regulation process was a little complicated. But it provides a sense of security.

What inspired me to create X-Meta? I saw the whole shift booming in the crypto sector, but these exchanges lacked the most important factors, which are security, liquidity, and transparency. So, I thought, why not leverage my network, bring the biggest players, work with the biggest player in the exchange and provide global standard exchange for the Mongolian users because it is a very sensitive sector.

People think crypto is a wild wild west, and I wanted to break that barrier and let them know that no one can be very systematic that provides the number one security, the biggest liquidity, for Mongolian users. The idea is - everything that I do in Mongolia - if I can't bring Mongolia to them, let me bring the world to Mongolia. This is what inspired me.

- How has your experience living and working in Mongolia influenced your perspective on the global cryptocurrency industry?

- The Mongolian community is extremely strong and extremely rare versus other global markets. A lot of the global industry is more of pump and dump. When they think of crypto, they think more of how to get rich. They think that they buy their first Bitcoin and they're millionaires. Mongolia did have that as well, but looking back now at the community and the support and the love I think the Mongolian community - investors, users , crypto traders, holders - are much more loyal and supportive. So there's a lot of upside potential to bring these projects overseas.

- How has the regulatory environment in Mongolia affected the growth and development of X-Meta Exchange?

- I think as an exchange, regulation is good. Since the crypto industry is very new in Mongolia, the regulation process was a little complicated. But it provides a sense of security. And I think the beginning is tough, but it's part of the learning curve. Again, one of the main inspirations that I brought to X-Meta was for these reasons. Transparency, security, safety.

I think blockchain can be an extremely valuable asset that the government as well as the private sector should explore and develop. And I believe that there's a huge amount of potential in that sector.

- Mongolia is known for its rich mineral resources, but how do you see the country’s potential in the blockchain and cryptocurrency industry?

- Not necessarily crypto, but I believe blockchain as a technology can be utilized in many ways for Mongolia, from government level to private sectors. What is blockchain? Something that cannot be copied. It's done on a contract basis between peers, without requiring any third party, etc. Utilizing blockchain in a lot of natural resources from import-export, from the mining process, from refining the goods, value-added products and exportations and so forth, brings transparency. Regulation from the government's point of view on, you know, how much tonnage has actually been mined and has been processed. I think blockchain can be an extremely valuable asset that the government as well as the private sector should explore and develop. And I believe that there's a huge amount of potential in that sector.

In terms of the cryptocurrency, sure, there can be an exchange that is a commodity exchange that's run on its own cryptocurrency, hedging, etc. But before that, I believe in order for it to become highly successful, focus on the technology, build around it before linking it with these business models. I think it's very critical. As long as they do it that way and do it properly and built around it - a system, rather than a business - it has a huge upside. That's very important, not as a business but actually utilizing the technology to build its core operation.

- Can you share your thoughts on the future of cryptocurrency adoption in Mongolia and the surrounding region?

- It's been a tough year in the crypto sector. But I think definitely what blockchain and crypto offers, it's here to stay. It's not going to go away, that's for sure. In terms of adoption, like I said, Mongolian community members, holders, traders, people that are adapting to crypto are none like I've seen in different countries. So as long as a lot of these projects are actually utilizing its benefits rather than for getting rich, scheme fast kind of thing, I am very positive on the future of adoption in Mongolia. And I believe Mongolia could be an extremely great hub, kind of like what I advocate in a lot of the speeches that I gave overseas, why I believe in the transformation of Mongolia. And I believe that it'd be a great proof of concept country to be able to affect all the other surrounding regions

My conviction is to make X-META into the best, most reliable, and the most trustworthy exchange in Mongolia.

- How do you maintain a work-life balance as an expat in a new country, and balance your hobbies with a busy schedule?

- It's very difficult. Technically, it's one or the other. But as a startup, leading the new generation, my life has been all work, mostly, which forced me to give up my hobbies and give up a lot of things. But I believe that in order for you to become the top 1%, 10%, and as a leader, and owning and running the top exchange in a country, comes with responsibilities and consequences. And especially as a startup, I believe that everything in my life is negotiations. There's never a right or wrong. Yet, there's one thing I never negotiate, which is my conviction. And my conviction is to make X-META into the best, most reliable, and the most trustworthy exchange in Mongolia. And throughout that process it's not a balance. For me, it was to give up certain things to be able to provide that.

- What is one piece of advice you wish someone had given you before moving to Mongolia?

- Spend more time with your family. Being overseas, the toughest part is I was already born in a family where my parents were not so young. Living abroad and so busy, you're lucky if you could go back to the States, because it's so far, its once a year. If I have 15 years left with them, that equates to I have 15 more times to be able to see my family, my parents. Only 15 more. So one true advice that I wish someone gave me before moving is to spend more time with your family before you go or manage your time is my biggest regret that I have.

- Given the limited availability of food options in Mongolia for people with specific dietary needs, how do you manage your diet as a diabetic while still being able to enjoy a variety of foods? Are there any specific diabetic-friendly recipes or restaurants that you particularly enjoy?

- I'm extremely poor at managing my diabetes, so I'm always on medicine, but I started working out, going to the gym to offset that. It's very difficult to find the proper foods for someone like me, especially in Mongolia. I'm Asian but I'm American and I grew up on pasta pizza burgers, so that's something that I just can't give up; Mongolia is big on bread and big on pasta, right? So it's very difficult, but nowadays a good thing is there are good keto restaurants popping up. There are a lot of these food delivery services for keto and the good thing is Mongolians are becoming extremely healthy, a lot of them are going to the gym. A lot of them are living this healthy lifestyle.

So that kind of helped me manage it, I guess. And how am I able to enjoy a variety of foods? Cheat day. Are there any specific diet-friendly recipes? So I love tofu. So I'm actually not a big meat eater. So I actually love tofu. I could eat tofu and seafood. I'm a big seafood eater. So my best is just tofu, and eggs are where my sweet spot is. And when I go to restaurants, anything Japanese, sushi, sashimi, there are a lot of good places, but in particular, I enjoy dining in Ikigai for their fresh sashimi.

- You’re interested in extreme sports. Can you tell us about a particularly memorable experience you had while participating in an extreme sport?

- Broke a few bones. So I love skydiving, I love scuba diving, I'm both certified. I have been a heavy snowboarder since high school. Middle school, I was a big skateboarder. And then in high school, college, I started to ride motorcycles. I was a big racer. So a particularly memorable experience, just adrenaline. I just love the adrenaline. And where in racing, the speed. And in the sky, it's just your world. Scuba diving in particular, being able to wake up in the middle of the ocean watching the sunrise, sunset, on a boat and there's nothing to do but scuba dive. When you're below water, it's the most amazing feeling because there's so many undetected, unexplored things that you get to see. It's one thing I love about going underwater.

The idea is - everything that I do in Mongolia - if I can't bring Mongolia to them, let me bring the world to Mongolia. This is what inspired me.

- Can you tell us about a person who has had a significant impact on your life or career?

- That's my father, by far. What my father has taught me to be where I am is, since a young age, making me do that one extra hour to surpass my peers. 10 years later definitely set a different tone in my life.

The sense of responsibility, never giving up, to stay positive, from these roles to leadership skills to problem solving I had to learn from someone, and everything is all from my father. He is my biggest hero, for my mom he gave up his entire career. For his family, every day for him was about sacrifice not taking, but giving. I wish I could become half the man that he was, I think I would be pretty happy too, especially now that I'm a father.

- How do you effectively lead and motivate a team of mostly young individuals at X-Meta to achieve their full potential and meet the company’s goal?

- By sharing your goal and the vision and the plan, it allows them to understand that. With the new generation, the new young individuals with lack of experience, even if they have the heart, if you don't understand it, it's extremely tough. By giving all the resources, from supporting them to materialistic things to all the above. That's how you offset the young individuals with lack of experience again, by giving that. And motivation and being able to reach those goals, potential. And the third thing is getting out of the way, giving them the trust and allowing them to reach their potential.

And I believe how you earn that respect is by allowing them to understand the goals and the vision. And throughout the way, supporting them and teaching how to achieve those things with the resources that they need. And it balances out the trust and the respect to ultimately bring up the full potential as a team, but also allows us to reach those goals. And it's not just the company, this three-rule applies with personal relationships with them as well as the company.

Rio Tinto Group intends to invest about $920 million at its Kennecott copper operations in Utah as part of a plan to increase its supply in North America. Demand for the material is set to surge in the coming years due to the global energy transition.

The company said it will invest $498 million to develop an underground mine and infrastructure in an area known as the North Rim Skarn, which will deliver about 250,000 tons of additional mined copper over 10 years next.

Production from the additional operation will begin in 2024 and will ramp up over two years, the company said in a statement.

“We are investing to build a world class underground mine at Kennecott and strengthen our processing facilities to meet the growing demand for copper in the United States,” Clayton Walker, the chief operating officer of Rio Tinto Copper, said in a statement.

In addition to the new supply, Rio said it will invest $300 million to rebuild the smelter, including a furnace, and another $120 million to upgrade Kennecott’s refinery tank house structure and to update its molybdenum flotation circuit.

(By Joe Deaux)

Prime Minister of Mongolia L.Oyun-Erdene will pay official visit to China next week. He will take part in the 14th Annual Meeting of the New Champions in Tianjin at the invitation of PM of China Li Qiang.

Previously, L.Oyun-Erdene visited in China in February, 2022 and held official talks with Chinese government officials including President Xi Jinping.

In the past two years, China and Mongolia reported remarkable cooperation in combating the pandemic, particularly including the widely praised “gifting one another with sheep and tea”, which built up the friendship ties.

Petro Matad, the AIM quoted Mongolian oil company, has announced its audited final results for the year ended 31 December 2022. All monetary values are expressed in United States dollars unless otherwise stated.

2022 Operational Highlights

The Company continued to push the Mongolian government and authorities to register Block XX Exploitation Area as special purpose land.

Negotiations with DQE Drilling entered their final stages for a multi-well development drilling contract with the Company securing cost reductions that can make a real difference to project cash flows and asset value.

Block V project readiness continued with a cost-effective drilling solution found for Velociraptor.

MRPAM announced an Exploration Licensing round covering 14 blocks in the prospective fairways of the southern half of the country.

Petro Matad continued to explore opportunities in the Mongolian renewables sector following Board approval to do so.

Current situation

On Block XX, the Company continues to push government on certification of the Exploitation Area as special purpose land and finally conclude the process. The Ministry of Construction and Urban Development has completed its internal work and has submitted the documentation to all other government ministries for comment prior to submission to Cabinet.

The Velociraptor-1 exploration well in the Taats Basin of Block V located in central Mongolia spudded on 13 June, targeting an inversion anticline prospect estimated to have 200 million barrels (MMbo) of Mean Prospective Recoverable Resource potential. Encouraging results in the Velociraptor prospect would significantly de-risk two adjacent prospects on the Raptor Trend which together have Mean Prospective Recoverable Resource potential of an additional 375 MMbo.

The Company raised US$6.6 million through a capital raise that will allow the Company to test the low-cost, high impact Velociraptor exploration prospect, evaluate new areas offered for licencing by the Mongolian government in the 2022/23 tender round and explore renewable energy projects.

The Company formed a joint venture (JV) with a very active and successful Mongolian renewable energy project developer called SunSteppe Energy ("SunSteppe"). This JV will give the Company an opportunity to compete in Mongolia's growing renewables sector.

2022 Financial Highlights

As of 31 December 2022, the Group's cash position was $5.1 million (Financial Assets) (31 December 2021: $8.2 million)

The Group's net loss after tax for the twelve months ended 31 December 2022 was $2.95 million (31 December 2021: loss $2.1 million)

Mike Buck, CEO of Petro Matad, said:

'2022 saw an easing of Covid-19 related delays that had impacted service providers and cross-border activity. We were pleased that we were able to progress our preparations for Heron development, our negotiations with DQE Drilling and to continue our investigations on the Block V Exploration PSC.

This year we hit the ground running and set to work on a capital raise to allow Petro Matad to move ahead with testing the low-cost, high impact Velociraptor exploration prospect and evaluate new areas offered for licencing by the Mongolian government. We have also ventured into the renewable energy sector in Mongolia through the SunSteppe Renewable Energy joint venture which we hope will generate near term opportunities for us and our partner.

We continue to push forward with our 2023 work programme which of course includes urging the government to certify Petro Matad's Block XX Exploitation Area as special purpose land. Meanwhile we are delighted to have spudded Velociraptor-1 which we have wanted to drill for some time. Encouraging results here would significantly de-risk two adjacent prospects on the Raptor Trend which together have a resource potential of an additional 375 MMbo.

I would like to thank our loyal shareholders for their continued support and hope that the recent spudding of the Velociraptor well demonstrates our firm commitment to our work programme. I very much look forward to updating you in the coming months with our progress on multiple workstreams that are now in play.'

Source: Petro Matad

Large parts of Mongolia are now experiencing an intense heatwave that is expected to last until the end of this week, the country's weather monitoring agency said Tuesday.

Air temperatures are exceeding 30 degrees Celsius in large parts of Mongolia, especially in eastern steppe and southern Gobi provinces, the agency said, warning the public to avoid heatstroke.

The highest temperature of this summer so far is expected to reach 38 degrees Celsius on Thursday, in the Khanbogd soum (administrative subdivision) of the southern province of Umnugovi, it said.

According to the agency, temperatures will be higher than average across large parts of the country this summer, and less precipitation is expected.

The FIBA 3×3 Nations League will be hosted in Ulaanbaatar 2023 on 13-15 September.

This will be the latest with the Nations League showcasing the best young talent in the U21 and U23 categories. U21 players are born between 2002-04 and U23 players born from 2000-04.

The two U23 teams of the hosting National Federation (MGL) and the winners of each conference (including the U21 conferences) will qualify to the Final.

In case one of the Mongolia U23 teams wins its conference, the next-ranked team of this conference will then qualify to the Final.

There are a record 13 conferences this edition, including the new Asia-Oceania conference.

Events will be played in June and July with destinations including Doha, Rizhao and Handan in China, and 3×3 fan favorite location Voiron in France.

Final dates and venues of the competitions will be announced at a later stage.

The FIBA 3×3 Nations League was launched in 2017 as a development program for men and women under the age of 23 to develop their skills in preparation for the open category.

The opening ceremony of the electronic library of textbooks, implemented by the National Digital Library of Mongolia at the initiative of the State University of Mongolia, took place at the library of the University on June 15.

Rare math and science textbooks written by more than 30 scientists and educators are now available online for free.

Professors, researchers, and education experts believe that the electronic textbook project will have a number of benefits, including increased accessibility, increased collaboration, reduced learning costs, and increased quality of education.

On June 19, the opening ceremony for the 19th annual “Khaan Quest” multinational peacekeeping exercise was held at the Five Hills Training Area. President of Mongolia and Commander-In-Chief of the Mongolian Armed Forces Khurelsukh Ukhnaa delivered the opening remarks.

In his opening remarks, the President highlighted the Mongolian pursuit of peace-keeping, open, independent, and multi-pillar foreign policy and its ever-growing friendship and cooperation with countries around the world and the United Nations.

“As one of the five major measures to increase the capacity of peace support operations in the Asia-Pacific region, the “Khaan Quest” peacekeeping exercise has been making a significant contribution to increasing the peace support capacity of participating countries and strengthening their friendship and military trust”, the President noted.

In total, 26 countries are taking part in the 19th annual “Khaan Quest” multinational peacekeeping exercise, including the Lao People's Democratic Republic for the first time and the Republic of Türkiye with a full team.

Since it dispatched two military observers in 2002, Mongolia has sent more than 21000 troops to over 20 UN peacekeeping operations around the globe.

Moreover, Mongolia hosted the first-ever international conference of female peacekeepers in support of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1325, “Women, Peace, and Security,” which urged all actors to increase the participation of women and incorporate gender perspectives in all United Nations peace and security efforts last year.

Over 18 thousand military personnel from 67 countries have participated in the “Khaan Quest” multinational peacekeeping exercise, which has been jointly organized by the Mongolian Armed Forces and the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command since 2003.

Within the bounds of the "Years to Visit Mongolia,” the Mongolian Economic Forum - 2023 will be held for the 10th time on July 9-10. Approximately 1,500 participants are expected to participate in this conference to take place in five different locations at the same time. Prime Minister L. Oyun-Erdene will open the Forum and Chairman of the State Great Khural G. Zandanshatar will deliver the main speech.

"Sustainable development policy of Mongolia" and "Mongolian economy and sustainable development" will be the themes of the general session of the first day of the Forum. The panel sessions will be organized on the following topics:

Labor Market

Digital Transition and E-business

Trade Opportunities - Free Economic Zone

New Industry - Food Factory

Agricultural Investment

New Opportunities - Tourism

Prime Minister of Mongolia L. Oyun-Erdene will present the main speech of the second day, and the general session will be held under the themes "New Future - New Opportunities" and "Infrastructure". On this day, there will be the following panel sessions:

Investment Environment

Future Development - Rare Earth Elements, Copper, Uranium

New Energy Sources - Sun, Wind, Hydrogen

Mineral Sector, Room for Improvement

Bank and Finance

Opportunities for Regional cooperation - Landlocked Country

Stock Market

Mining Transport and Logistics

Green Development - Green Financing

Senior Executives of the Asian Development Bank and Rio Tinto Group will attend the Mongolian Economic Forum - 2023 and deliver speeches as honorable guests.

On July 11, the guests of the Forum will enjoy the opening ceremony of the National Festival Naadam, Cultural Festival, Horseracing, and Archery.

The World Export Development Forum (WEDF) will take place in Ulaanbaatar, capital city of Mongolia 26-29 on June.

This year’s WEDF, marking its 20th edition, will be hosted by the government of Mongolia and promises to be a significant platform for global trade discussions, business opportunities, and sustainable development initiatives.

WEDF aims to facilitate meaningful conversations and collaborations that address the challenges faced by the global trade community, including conflict, climate change, the ongoing impact of COVID-19, and rising costs.

As partners of the event, TFG will be addressing MSME finance shortfalls, speaking on topics around emerging and developing markets access to finance, particularly in landlocked countries such as Mongolia, bringing trade development and development finance actors together at the forum.

The theme for this year’s WEDF is “Diversify with Green Trade,” emphasising the importance of organic, digital, and sustainable solutions in overcoming multiple crises. The conference will bring together a diverse range of participants, including small business owners, women entrepreneurs, young innovators, policymakers, and representatives from international organisations.