Coinone Publicly Ranks Staff by AI Token Use in Real Time in Productivity Experiment

Real-time display of token usage by employee

Some employees use billions of tokens a month

Rewards for top AI performers as AX accelerates

A large monitor covering an entire wall stands at the entrance to crypto exchange Coinone’s headquarters at Parc.1 in Seoul’s Yeouido district. At the top of the screen are metrics including total artificial intelligence token costs, application programming interface usage, user numbers and response times. Below that, Coinone employees’ IDs are listed 10 at a time in order of token usage. The display is Coinone’s “AI Token Dashboard,” introduced in February.

Coinone said on November 4 that it is tracking employees’ usage of the generative AI model Claude and ranking them in real time. The company is disclosing AI usage by employee to spur more competitive use of the technology. It also offers separate rewards each month to employees who rank near the top in token usage. One Coinone official said some employees use billions of tokens a month.

Coinone’s AI Token Dashboard is an example of a domestic crypto exchange adopting the “token maxing” culture spreading in Silicon Valley. The idea is to delegate as much work as possible to AI to maximize productivity. Repetitive tasks are assigned to AI so employees can focus on work that requires creativity and judgment.

Crypto exchanges, where repetitive work is common, are considered well suited to improving efficiency through AI. Digital assets can be traded freely by individuals without going through a specific financial institution. Unlike most financial companies, which are limited by business hours, crypto trading runs around the clock year-round. That makes it difficult for employees working under standard labor-hour limits to oversee exchange operations 24 hours a day.

That is why Coinone, led by Chief Executive Officer Cha Myung-hoon, is accelerating its AI transformation, or AX. Since April, the company has been running “Show Me the AI,” an internal presentation event for AI use cases. Employees share examples of how they used AI in their work, along with trial and error and lessons learned. Staff can secure a presentation slot by receiving more than 10 endorsements from colleagues. Presenters receive gift certificates worth up to $362. More recently, the company developed “Coincraft,” a platform that lets employees build apps for work by chatting with AI agents.

The company also reflects how much AI-generated output improves work efficiency in employee evaluations. As more results are shared, more employees are trying to learn how to use AI.

Park Si-on, Hankyung.com reporter ushire908@hankyung.com