How did the first RWA in history fall from myth to the number one unsolved case in the crypto world?

Preface: What are we talking about when we talk about RWA?

In 2024-2025, the RWA sector is heating up. Wall Street giant BlackRock is issuing tokenized U.S. Treasury funds, and tokenized stocks of Tesla and Apple have appeared on platforms like Kraken and Solana. Especially in Hong Kong, which is actively embracing Web3, everything from real estate revenue rights to GCL-Poly’s photovoltaic power stations, and to Longxin Technology’s charging piles, seems to be moving from the concept of RWA to reality.

We are excited that RWA can revitalize real assets, lower financing thresholds, and improve liquidity. But does all this sound a bit familiar?

As early as 2012, a Chinese developer named “Kao Cat” had already fully implemented all of this, even more thoroughly than today’s model, and more RWA, and more “Web3”.

The Birth of Legend

“Fried Cat”, whose real name is Jiang Xinyu, is a name with legendary connotations. At the age of 15, he was admitted to the Young Scholars Program at the University of Science and Technology of China, and later studied at Yale University, marking him as a top genius. In 2011, he keenly captured the potential of Bitcoin and became active in international Bitcoin forums (bitcintalk) under the ID “friedcat”. He was not just talking the talk. At a crucial juncture when Bitcoin mining shifted from CPU/GPU to specialized equipment, his team was the first to achieve mass production of ASIC (Application-Specific Integrated Circuit) miners, known as “the first generation of chip miners”, and at one point, they controlled a significant portion of the global Bitcoin network’s computing power.

The cryptocurrency world in 2012 was a “wild west.” Bitcoin prices were sluggish, the community was small, there was no VC investment, and no regulation. Trust was entirely based on an individual’s reputation on forums.

Kao Cat faces a real problem: mass-producing ASIC miners requires a large sum of money, but the doors of traditional finance are firmly closed to him. His investors can only be those geeks who believe in the future of Bitcoin. Thus, a financial experiment destined to go down in history has begun.

2. The First RWA Issuance Plan in History

To raise funds, Roast Cat did not seek venture capital but instead designed an astonishingly groundbreaking first-ever RWA issuance scheme.

The core of this scheme is to tokenize a profitable company in the real world using blockchain technology, realizing an innovative model for financing, dividends, and trading. Below is a detailed analysis of its specific structure and mechanisms.

1. Physical Assets: A Solid Value Foundation

The underlying asset of this project is Bitfountain Information Technology Co., Ltd. (Bitfountain). This is a legally registered entity in Shenzhen, and its core value comes from its ability to generate continuous cash flow through businesses, including an ASIC mining machine production line, computing power owned by the mining site, and the expected future income from these businesses. This forms the cornerstone of the entire model, ensuring that the issued “stocks” are backed by clear, profitable real-world assets (RWA).

2 Issuing Platform: Decentralized Choices

This issuance is chosen to be conducted on GLBSE (Global Bitcoin Stock Exchange). It is an early virtual stock platform completely built on the Bitcoin network. Its biggest feature is decentralization, allowing the entire issuance and trading process to bypass traditional brokers and securities exchanges, providing a brand new and efficient channel for the global circulation of assets.

3 Issuance Details: Bitcoin-Based Equity Financing

The name of the stock being issued is AsicMiner, and each share represents a portion of ownership in the Bitmain company. Its issuance structure is similar to a typical equity financing:

• Total shares: 400,000 shares
• Public offering: 41% of shares (approximately 163,000 shares)
• Issuance price: 0.1 BTC/share

The uniqueness of this design lies in the fact that it does not use any national fiat currency, but directly uses Bitcoin (BTC) as the unit for fundraising and pricing.

4 Two Core Mechanisms: The Soul of the Model

The most striking innovation of this plan is reflected in its two core mechanisms:

1. Automated On-chain Dividends: This is the soul of the entire model. The company promises to automatically and directly distribute the profits obtained through mining and selling mining machines (in BTC) to their respective Bitcoin wallet addresses according to each shareholder’s shareholding ratio every week. This mechanism perfectly embodies the concept of “Code is Law (Code is Law)”, where the entire dividend process does not require trust in any third-party financial institution, achieving direct clearing and settlement on the blockchain, with a process that is efficient, transparent, and immutable.

2. Around-the-clock global liquidity: AsicMiner stocks can be freely listed and transferred 24/7 on the GLBSE platform. Once the transaction is completed, the ownership of the stocks is immediately transferred, and the new shareholders can instantly receive future dividend rights. This creates a global secondary market for the equity of non-public companies, providing liquidity far beyond what any traditional non-public equity could achieve at the time.

Conclusion: The project created by Roast Cat is not a simple one, but a complete financial closed loop: Invest in equity of real companies with on-chain native assets (BTC), confirm rights through on-chain transparent records (GLBSE), enjoy automatic dividends from on-chain native assets (BTC), and trade freely in the on-chain market (GLBSE).

III. Legal Analysis: Is this really RWA?

From today’s legal and financial perspective, does the AsicMiner stock of Kaomao belong to RWA?

The judgment is: without a doubt, yes. Moreover, it is one of the purest and most original RWA prototypes to date.

1. Real World Asset (Real World Asset): Yes. The stock is anchored to the mining machines, mining sites, and future cash flows of Bitcoin Spring Company, representing one hundred percent of real economic activity.
2. On-chain certificate (Tokenization): Yes. Although there was no ERC-20 token standard at the time, the shareholding records on GLBSE were a form of primitive, centrally recorded “tokens” that represented ownership of assets and dividend rights.
3. The connection between assets and certificates: Yes, but extremely fragile. This connection is not based on modern RWA trust or SPV (Special Purpose Vehicle) legal structures, but completely relies on the “social contract” of the community regarding the personal credibility of the cat roaster. People believe he will keep his promises and distribute profits.

It has an essential difference from later ICOs: most of the tokens issued in ICOs are “air coins” that lack actual asset backing, while the Koi Cat stocks are backed by real, profit-generating mining machines. This is precisely the core distinction between RWA and pure cryptocurrencies.

IV. From Ancient Artifacts to Modern Marvels: Roasting Cats VS Today’s Hottest RWA

The innovation of Kaimao has led the times by a full decade. Comparing the pioneering project “Kaimao AsicMiner” from 2012 with the mainstream RWA (Real World Asset Tokenization) in today’s global market (2024-2025), it is clear to see the significant transformation of this field from a disordered experiment to an increasingly regulated financial innovation track.

1 Underlying Assets: From Singular to Diverse

The most intuitive difference lies in the breadth of assets. The value support of 烤猫AsicMiner is very singular, limited to the equity and future earnings of the mining machine company behind it. In contrast, the asset pool of 现代RWA is extremely rich and diversified, almost encompassing any asset with stable cash flow or valuation potential, such as the tokenization of U.S. Treasury bonds driven by giants like BlackRock, equity stakes in companies like Tesla or Apple, income-generating real estate, charging stations and photovoltaic power plants in the renewable energy sector, and even rare artworks.

2 Technical Carrier: From Centralized Islands to Decentralized Networks

The technical path has also undergone fundamental changes. Kao Cat relies on an early centralized platform’s internal database, GLBSE, which means that the issuance and trading of assets are limited to the survival of this single platform. In contrast, modern RWA is generally built on open decentralized public chains such as Ethereum and Solana, utilizing standardized token protocols like ERC-20 and ERC-1400. This not only enhances the security and transparency of the assets but also lays the foundation for their interoperability across different applications.

3 Compliance and Law: From Lawlessness to Compliance is King

Compliance is the most critical distinction between the two. The Burning Cat project was born in a complete “legal vacuum,” with no KYC (Know Your Customer) identity verification, not subject to any financial regulation, and offering almost zero protection for investors. In contrast, Modern RWA views compliance as a lifeline. Its issuance and trading strictly adhere to the securities regulations of various countries, typically requiring the establishment of trust funds or SPVs to isolate and hold assets, and are issued by licensed institutions, with all investors required to undergo rigorous KYC and AML scrutiny.

4 Sources of Risk: From Personal Credit to Systemic Risk

The composition of risks has also changed. The main risks faced by KaoMao are simple yet fatal: first, there is platform risk, which is the collapse of the GLBSE exchange; second, there is personal risk, where the disappearance of the founder “KaoMao” directly leads to the project’s collapse. The risks associated with Modern RWA are more complex and systematic, including technical risks such as smart contract vulnerabilities, compliance risks arising from changes in multinational regulatory policies, and the potential default risks of the underlying assets themselves.

5 Core Advantages: From Extreme Efficiency to Security and Trustworthiness

Ultimately, the core advantages pursued by both reflect the demands of different eras. The charm of the 烤猫 model lies in its extreme decentralization concept and high efficiency, which eliminates all traditional financial intermediaries, achieving minimal costs. On the other hand, the core advantage of modern RWA lies in its security and trustworthiness. A well-established legal framework provides solid protection for investors, and the authenticity of the assets is audited and endorsed by third-party professional institutions, which enables it to break through barriers and attract mainstream financial institutions and a wider range of conservative investors.

The Essence of Evolution: We have observed a clear evolutionary path - from the barbaric growth reliant on “personal credibility” to the compliant development dependent on “laws and codes.” Cat baking has proven the technical possibilities, and today’s RWA is completing the legal and trust infrastructure that was missing back then.

V. Peak, Collapse and On-Chain Ghosts: The Conclusion and Insights of Roasting Cats

The story of the roasted cat is like a classic Shakespearean tragedy.

At the beginning, AsicMiner was a great success, once occupying 42% of the global hash rate. Its stock price surged from 0.1 BTC to a peak of 5 BTC, and with continuous BTC dividends, early investors received an astonishing return of over 500 times, creating one of the first myths in the cryptocurrency world. However, technological iteration is brutal. With the rise of competitors like Bitmain, the development of the second-generation chips by Canaan Creative faced failures, and market share was quickly eroded. Meanwhile, the closure of the issuance platform GLBSE and internal conflicts within the company worsened the situation. At the end of 2014, after an inspection of the mining site, Canaan Creative’s Jiang Xinyu mysteriously disappeared and has been missing ever since, becoming the largest unsolved case in the cryptocurrency world. His company became empty, and investors’ stocks ultimately became worthless.

Although the ending is lamentable, the legacy left by the roasted cat is profound:

• He has demonstrated through practice that the model of “asset on-chain, on-chain dividends” is completely feasible, directly inspiring later ICOs, STOs, and even today’s RWAs.
• His failure starkly reveals the fatal flaw of lack of legal protection and asset custody. Without compliance, even the most brilliant design is just a castle in the air.
• To this day, the Bitcoin addresses associated with the roasted cat still hold a huge amount of assets, and any small changes will stir up waves in the community. He is like a ghost on the chain, constantly reminding us of this crazy yet enlightening history.

【FAQ】Questions that readers may be most concerned about: Quick Q&A

Q1**: How can Kaomao stocks identify investors? Is real-name registration required?** A: Not at all necessary. Only recognizes Bitcoin addresses, no KYC (identity verification) is required. Dividends and transactions are conducted anonymously on the chain, technically completely transparent, but legally completely ownerless.

Q2**: How is the dividend specifically operated?** A: The Cat Roasting Company consolidates mining profits weekly and automatically distributes BTC to the shareholder wallet addresses recorded on the GLBSE platform according to their shareholding ratio through a program. No banks, no intermediaries, it’s a peer-to-peer value distribution.

Q3: What is the fundamental difference between it and ICO? A: Cat coins are “equity,” backed by tangible assets that generate cash flow; ICOs typically issue “utility tokens” or “air coins,” which are usually not tied to company profits and have no dividend commitments. Cat coins are closer to STOs (security tokens) and are the direct ancestors of RWAs.

Q4**: What happened to the investors later?** A: Early investors made a fortune through dividends and selling stocks at high prices. However, later investors and those who still held shares when the project collapsed lost nearly all their assets due to the disappearance of the cat and the closure of the platform, with no way to recover their losses.

Conclusion: Standing on the Shoulders of History, Where Will RWA Go?

Looking back at the story of the roasted cat, we can’t help but sigh that history always spirals upward in repetition.

The Roasted Cat is a lonely pioneer who, with his genius ideas and tragic endings, has rehearsed everything about RWA for us: huge potential and deadly risks. He proved that merely having decentralized technology is not enough; it must be combined with the legal framework and trust mechanisms of the real world to ensure steady and far-reaching progress.

Today, when licensed institutions in Hong Kong issue a compliant real estate RWA product, and when Wall Street giants move U.S. Treasury bonds onto the blockchain, they are treading on the path that 烤猫 paved with code and credibility 12 years ago.

The future of RWA is undoubtedly a dance between technological innovation and regulatory compliance. Only by understanding the story of “Roasted Cat,” the pioneer of RWA, can you truly grasp the past, present, and future of this trillion-dollar financial transformation.