Moshe Cohen is the CEO of PriveX, a privacy-focused perpetual DEX and launchpad for AI trading agents. With over 15 years of experience at the intersection of marketing and technology, he excels at bridging Web2 execution with Web3 infrastructure. As a serial entrepreneur, Moshe previously founded and scaled successful companies, including Added.tv and Zippor Media, by building high-performing teams in product, growth, and partnerships.
We connected with Moshe Cohen at TOKEN2049 in Singapore to discuss the critical need for privacy in DeFi, the complexity of AI trading, and PriveX’s unique solutions.
Moshe Cohen is the Co-Founder and CEO of PriveX, a platform at the forefront of privacy-preserving DeFi and AI-driven trading. The company has a dual mission: to provide a perpetual exchange that gives traders an edge through privacy, and to democratize access to sophisticated AI trading tools.
After identifying critical flaws in the on-chain perpetuals market, namely the lack of privacy for traders and the high complexity of existing AI agent platforms, Cohen has led the development of a novel intent-based exchange. His vision is to provide the security of private trading while making advanced AI tools as simple to deploy as launching a meme coin.
Read more about his mission to build a privacy-focused perpetual exchange in the interview below.
In one sentence, what is PriveX, and why is now the right moment for it?
PriveX is a privacy-focused perpetual exchange and a platform for training and deploying AI trading agents. Now is the perfect time for two main reasons: first, perpetual exchanges are the dominant trend in crypto, and users are actively looking for privacy solutions to prevent manipulation and MEV attacks. Second, the future of trading will be driven by AI agents, and our platform is designed to lead that transition.
What specific pain in on‑chain perpetuals convinced you to build PriveX, and what’s the core design insight behind your solution?
The biggest issue is the lack of privacy in DeFi. For a trader, having all your positions, stop-losses, and take-profits visible on-chain is a major disadvantage. The core insight was to solve this privacy problem without compromising on performance or liquidity.
Another pain point was that current platforms for creating and deploying AI trading agents are overly complex for the average user. Our goal was to create a platform where deploying a trading agent is as easy as launching a token on Pump.fun.
Walk us through a trade end‑to‑end on PriveX, from order/intent to settlement, and the biggest performance bottleneck you had to solve.
We use an intent-based mechanism. A user first submits an order intent, for example, to long ETH at $4,000. On the backend, our network of solvers, similar to market makers, compete in an auction to bring the best possible price for that user’s order. The solver who wins the auction provides the quote for the trade. They then hedge their own position on a major centralized exchange, such as Binance.
The two primary issues in perpetual exchanges are privacy and liquidity, with liquidity being the most significant performance bottleneck. AMM-style DEXes hold a large amount of liquidity on-chain, which is highly inefficient, especially for perpetuals settled in USDT. Our intent-based mechanism addresses this by enabling us to source liquidity from centralized exchanges without needing to hold our own liquidity pools.
Against leading DEXs and CEXs, where does PriveX win by design, and what trade‑offs do you intentionally accept?
Our main design win is privacy. Unlike other platforms where everything is public, PriveX offers a “privacy mode.” A user can simply toggle a button, similar to switching on a VPN, and the screen turns green. From that point on, their stop-losses, limit orders, and all trade details remain private. This provides traders with a crucial edge not available on other exchanges.
Where does your liquidity come from, and how do you keep slippage and latency competitive during volatile markets?
Our liquidity is derived from centralized exchanges via our intent-based mechanism. The network of solvers competing for user orders hedges their positions on platforms like Binance and Bybit. This setup enables us to effectively mirror their deep liquidity and wide range of trading pairs, ensuring our users receive competitive prices and minimal slippage, even during volatile market conditions.
Which KPIs matter most right now, and what milestones over the next two quarters will signal product‑market fit for PriveX?
Our most important KPI right now is the number of users, followed by trade volume. We are building a community as the “privacy DEX of the people” through incentives like a points system, referral program, and trading competitions, all leading up to a future airdrop. The key milestone that would signal a product-market fit for us over the next few months is achieving a top-five perpetual exchange in terms of trading volume.