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Category: Crypto Trends

Make sense of the news and how it affects the blockchain space as a whole. Crypto trends is a collection of relevant news and insights to help you make an informed decision.

  • Polkadot ($DOT): Everything you need to know about the DeFi darling of China

    Polkadot ($DOT): Everything you need to know about the DeFi darling of China

    Polkadot ($DOT) refers to itself as a next-generation blockchain protocol that connects multiple blockchains into one network. As we’ve seen in a previous article on the hottest blockchain projects in China, Polkadot and its Co-creator Gavin Wood are highly regarded by the Chinese cryptocurrency community, who are heavily invested in this project. Polkadot is also now gaining a lot of interest in the West because of its listing on major exchanges such as Binance, OKEx and Kraken.

    The purpose of Polkadot is to enable blockchain networks to improve scalability, optimise themselves for specific use cases, work and communicate together, self-govern, and upgrade without the need for hard forks. In this article, we look at Polkadot’s current status, its role in Decentralised Finance (DeFi), the $DOT token and more.

    Here’s our video explaining what is Polkadot in less than 2 minutes!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FyLxZezPmk&t=2s

    Background

    Polkadot was launched in 2016 and is run by the Web3 Foundation, which strives to build a free and decentralized web. However, the foundation had made a contract with Parity Technologies to build its protocol. Its Founders are Gavin Wood, Peter Czaban, and Robert Habermeier. Gavin Wood, in particular, is also one of the Co-founders of Ethereum, thus bringing a sense of legitimacy and confidence in the eyes of a lot of cryptocurrency enthusiasts, especially from the Chinese audience.

    The team has extensive experience with distributed ledger systems, blockchain protocols (particularly Ethereum), cryptography, and wallet technology. Despite the lead developer being Parity Technologies, multiple independent teams have contributed to the development of Polkadot.

    What Is Polkadot?

    Polkadot is a sharded bridge-like protocol, which focuses on maintaining communication, value transfer, and pooling the security of blockchains. It allows blockchains to operate with each other in a parallel manner by unifying them into one network. The unification compounds the strengths of different blockchains and mitigates their weaknesses.

    According to the team, Polkadot is a project by developers for developers. It is aimed at connecting public and private chains, oracles, DApps, and services to seamlessly work side by side. And thus, it facilitates the connection of different independent blockchains together into a single Web3 Internet.

    Polkadot’s Building Blocks

    Polkadot is built on Substrate blockchain building framework that is derived from Parity’s experience with Ethereum, Bitcoin, and enterprise blockchains. The protocol’s state machine is compiled with WebAssembly (WASM) – a high performance virtual environment.

    Furthermore, Polkadot uses libp2p for peer discovery and communication. It is coded with C++, Rust and Golang for wide developer accessibility.

    Polkadot Governance Model

    Polkadot governance model is on-chain and well defined. It is designed to include all stakeholders in a governance council. The users can participate in the system’s decision-making by simply holding the native $DOT token. Currently, Polkadot’s Council and Technical Committee are in place, so the project and its direction is completely in the hands of $DOT holders. Governance proposals are submitted by the Council, the Technical Committee or $DOT holders. There are then voted on by the $DOT holding public.

    Status of the Polkadot Network

    Polkadot has been increasing the size of its validator sets. Now there are 274 validators operated by around 200 independant operators and backed by over 7,000 individual nominating accounts.

    This year, Polkadot launched Westend, their main long-term valueless testnet. They have also launched 2 versions of Rococo- which are Polkadot’s short-term parachains public testnets.

    Rococo

    Rococo is a public testnet aimed at testing the parachains consensus process, together with parachains built by the community and their interactions with each other.

    Rococo v1 is the latest version released on 22nd December 2020.

    PolkaBrige

    PolkaBrige is a decentralised application (dApp) platform. It also comes with its own decentralised exchange (DEX) known as PolkaBrige DEX which allows users to directly swap tokens on Polkadot to other tokens on other blockchain platforms such as Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain etc.

    To meet the yield farming craze, Polkabrige also has a smart farming mechanism which allows liquidity providers to earn more rewards.

    Advantages of Polkadot

    The Polkadot project is set to revolutionize blockchain technology by offering a bridge-like framework that provides the following advantages:

    1.       Limitless Scalability – Polkadot can support an infinite number of blockchains and allow them to connect together. These are known as para-chains.

    2.       Adaptable Consensus Mechanism – As different blockchains run on different consensus mechanisms, the Polkadot platform provides an open and adaptable consensus mechanism to host them.

    3.       Cross-Chain Transactions – The framework can support the transfer of value between different blockchains. It’s necessary for interoperability and true integration.

    4.       Defined Governance Mechanism – It has a defined governance mechanism, which eliminates a major problem faced by other blockchains.

    5.       Upgradeability – Polkadot can support upgrades, without having to resort to drastic hard forks to implement change.

    6.       Pooled Security – The blockchains connecting with Polkadot can be secured by a unifying security umbrella. This can help protect small chains that don’t have effective security bootstrapping.

    7. Low transaction fees– Polkadot claims it has lower transaction fees compared to Ethereum.

    Polkadot Token ($DOT)

    The Polkadot token, denoted by the ticker symbol $DOT, is the native asset of the Polkadot platform. It serves three main functions: governance, staking, and bonding. It has a total supply of 10 million DOT.

    Governance

    As mentioned before, DOT holders have the right to govern the platform. When we say ‘right’ it doesn’t mean that they are given privileges by someone. But rather, it is embedded in the protocol of Polkadot that DOT holders inherently have governance capabilities. These capabilities include changing the network fees, auctions, as well as the schedule for adding parachains — parallelized chains that execute parallel to Polkadot’s Relay Chain. Furthermore, holders also have influence over upgrades, bug fixes, and other system maintenance.

    Staking

    Decentralized networks require consensus mechanisms to ensure that only valid transactions are confirmed. Polkadot utilizes NPoS (Nominated Proof of Stake) as its algorithm for validation. And, DOT holders have the option to participate in this essential network operation.

    Basically, holders will be rewarded for staking their DOT in the protocol in exchange for risking their holdings for the validation of the network. This also serves as a disincentive for bad actors to participate in the network, as they are likely to lose their stake if they ‘misbehave’.

    The requirement for participating largely depends on the staking duration and the total number of tokens staked.

    However, it has been discovered by the Polkadot Team that some nominators are not receiving their rewards. The Team is currently working on a solution but this will take time. Meanwhile, the Team recommends those staking with less than 200 $DOT who do not have the opportunity to bond more should move to staking on cryptocurrency exchanges. At present, the following exchanges offer staking-as-a-service for Polkadot: Kraken, Huobi, MXC, and KuCoin.

    Bonding

    The last use case for the DOT token is bonding — this is the process of tying up DOT in order to add new parachains. It is an extension of the functionality of proof of stake.

    DOT 100x redenomination

    After the Council and Technical Committee was put into place, there was a community-run poll to determine how many Plancks should be considered as being one DOT token. Plancks are the smallest unit of exchange in Polkadot, this value does not change, rather it was how many Plancks comprise one DOT which was voted upon. It was decided that one DOT will now be denominated by 1e10 plancks instead of 1e12 plancks. So the new version of $DOT will be 100x smaller than the old $DOT.

    This redenomination will occur on 21st August 2020 at around 13:15 (UTC), specifically at block number 1,248,328. When this occurs, users do not have to do anything because it is only a front-end change. Also, most exchanges such as Binance or Kraken will automatically multiply users’ DOT deposits after the redenomination, i.e. if you deposited 10 old $DOT before the redenomination, you will automatically be credited with 1,000 new $DOT after the redenomination. And to protect users in anticipation of this, users will not be able to withdraw new $DOT until after the redenomination.

    Users have to meantime, bear in mind that some exchanges e.g. OKEx, MXC etc. offer trading pairs in OLD $DOT, whereas others e.g. Binance and Kraken offer trading pairs in NEW $DOT. $DOT holders and traders should check with the exchange they are trading on to see what their policies are for $DOT.

    Projects Built On Polkadot

    The Polkadot ecosystem has an enormous outreach and usage. There are currently 188 projects building on it. This includes crypto-projects related to DeFi, cryptocurrency wallets, infrastructure projects, tokens, Oracle, DAO, privacy, exchange, gaming, IoT, scaling, etc.

    A few well-known projects being built on the Polkadot protocol are Chainlink, Ankr, Celer Network, Akropolis, Ocean Protocol, 0x Protocol, imToken, etc.

    Polkadot’s Role in DeFi Projects

    The Decentralized Finance (DeFi) field relies on composability, cross-chain communication, value transfers, and protocols integrating with each other. It’s practically the entire rationale behind the Polkadot project. And as such many, DeFi projects utilize Polkadot.

    For instance, the DeFi automation and aggregation-based Akropolis project relies on integrations with Maker, Compound, Curve and dYdX,. They have collaborated and contributed greatly to the Polkadot ecosystem.

    Polkadot’s Similarities with Upcoming Ethereum 2.0

    The Ethereum 2.0 Phase 0 mainnet is expected to be launched in November 2020. It will introduce the highly anticipated staking mechanism. However, its full deployment won’t be complete until a few years. Polkadot, as it appears, has an incredible similarity with Eth2.

    For instance, both blockchains support sharding, meaning that they execute processing in parallel by allowing individual shards to divide the workload and communicate with each other. They both also implement hybrid consensus models, staking mechanisms, and state-transition functions.

    Conclusion

    Polkadot is fast gaining traction in the DeFi field and the wider crypto community. Owing to the easy integration, available grants, and wide composability, Polkadot’s projects are rapidly gaining value and the Polkadot association appears to have a positive influence on the project’s token price.

    As the ecosystem further matures, it is likely to become an integral part of the blockchain field and smart contracts platform.

    Decentralised Finance (DeFi) series: tutorials, guides and more

    With content for both beginners and more advanced users, check out our YouTube DeFi series containing tutorials on the ESSENTIAL TOOLS you need for trading in the DeFi space e.g. MetaMask and Uniswap. As well as a deep dive into popular DeFi topics such as decentralized exchanges, borrowing-lending platforms and NFT marketplaces

    The DeFi series on this website also covers topics not explored on YouTube. For an introduction on what is DeFi, check out Decentralized Finance (DeFi) Overview: A guide to the HOTTEST trend in cryptocurrency

    Tutorials and guides for the ESSENTIAL DEFI TOOLS:

    More videos and articles are coming soon as part of our DeFi series, so be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our Youtube channel so you can be notified as soon as they come out!

    Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks and may result in the loss of your capital. You should carefully consider whether trading cryptocurrencies is right for you in light of your financial condition and ability to bear financial risks. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile and can fluctuate widely in a short period of time. As such, trading cryptocurrencies may not be suitable for everyone. Additionally, storing cryptocurrencies on a centralized exchange carries inherent risks, including the potential for loss due to hacking, exchange collapse, or other security breaches. We strongly advise that you seek independent professional advice before engaging in any cryptocurrency trading activities and carefully consider the security measures in place when choosing or storing your cryptocurrencies on a cryptocurrency exchange.

  • Cryptocurrency Exchange News (November 2020)

    Cryptocurrency Exchange News (November 2020)

    Cryptocurrency Exchanges are facing additional regulation and scrutiny around the world. Two key exchanges – OKEX and Huobi are under regulatory scrutiny in China. One of the reasons for the scrutiny is that both these exchanges had a huge footprint in China prior to the 2017 Exchange ban. To find out about top cryptocurrency exchanges, check out our Exchange Tier List. Here are the major changes to the exchange scene in November 2020.

    OKEx Exchange withdraws suspended

    It has been almost a month since Okex Exchange suspended all withdrawals from the platform. This was due to one of their private key holders (Star Xu) being detained for investigation by a “public security bureau”. OKEx has always claimed that Xu is not detained but only actively cooperating with the relevant authorities for something unrelated to the Exchange back in 2019.

    No withdrawal has happened since 16 October 2020; in OKEx’s last Twitter post, dated 9 November 2020, they claim that the function is not yet active but funds are safe and unaffected.

    Withdrawals reopened!

    After more than a month since their suspension announcement, Okex exchange has finally reopened unrestricted withdrawals on November 27. In addition, there will be rewards for active users. Read all the details in our developing article.

    KuCoin recovers around 84% of funds in hack

    As covered in our previous Newsletter, KuCoin had confirmed on 26th September 2020 that they had been hacked, resulting in around USD $236m worth of funds being lost.

    On 11th November 2020, CEO and Co-founder Johnny Lyu confirmed that around 84% of affected assets have been recovered. Several means were utilised to do this, for example on-chain tracking, contract upgrade and through the judicial system.

    Currently, 176 of their listed tokens have resumed full services, and it is expected that the remaining listed tokens will all be re-opened before 22nd November 2020.

    Update from CEO and Co-founder Johnny Lyu on the KuCoin hack situation

    Huobi Rumors go wild

    On 2 November 2020 a few big transactions worth hundreds of millions into Huobi Exchange have been spotted; although this could be routine for a big Exchange like this, users were worried since the issues with OKEx exchange were still ongoing.

    There were also rumours that, similar to OKEx, key executives of Huobi were detained for investigations.

    This created an escalated FUD that ended up with a massive drop in value for $HT (Huobi Token), as well as worried users quickly withdrawing their cryptocurrencies from the Exchange.

    Huobi official account subsequently tweeted denying all rumours and classifying them as false.

    For now, everything seems to be back to normal and no more news have emerged since.

    See our ongoing coverage of the Huobi rumours.

    Binance Exchanges news

    Binance Uganda merges with Binance.com

    A few weeks after Binance Jersey announced that the Exchange, launched in January 2019, will be fully closed by 30th November 2020 (no explanation was given but it’s presumed that it wasn’t necessary anymore, after deposits in EUR and GBP have been enabled directly on Binance.com), Binance Uganda will cease to exist as well.

    Binance Uganda was launched in June 2018 and has been the first fiat-to-crypto Binance platform, even though it had been stated more than once that it was a separate entity capable of independent decisions.

    An explanation was provided by the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Changpeng Zhao:

    “All the features that Binance Uganda provides [are] now covered by Binance.com together with our fiat channel partners. There’s a very minimal number of users on there, so it doesn’t make sense for us to maintain two platforms”.

    The process will consist of three different phases: Closure of Deposits and New Registrations; Closure of all Trading Services, and final Hard Shutdown on the 28 November 2020.

    Users are strongly recommended to transfer their funds out of the Exchange before 00:00 UTC on 28/11/2020.

    Is Binance blocking US-based users?

    Reports are emerging that Binance has started to block users based in the US from accessing the Exchange. According to The Block, emails were circulated to US-based users who were told to withdraw their funds within 90 days.

    This is in any event in line with their announcement back in September 2019 that they will no longer serve customers from the US. They are also likely doing this now considering the ongoing legal actions against BitMEX and its key personnel.

    Binance.com is now giving a 14 days notice to US customers

    As a consequence to what we reported a few weeks ago, it appears that some US customers who are still using the “.com” version of the exchange are receiving a 14 days notice letter. In the email, as they reported, Binance is informing that due to their “periodic sweeps”, US residents are being asked to withdraw all their funds within 14 days or their funds will be blocked.

    It is not clear whether the identification process is only based on KYCs or on IP addresses as well; in the first case, it could be possible that US customers who skip the KYC process accepting lower deposits/withdrawals limits could still use the platform.

    Binance.com has been trying to remove its US customers for a while as the exchange doesn’t have any regulatory standing in America. US customers can use Binance.US, an exchange with far less pairs that is therefore not as attractive to traders as the classic “.com” version.

    Coinbase Pro is disabling Margin Trading

    In a blog post on Nov 24, the Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal announced that customers wouldn’t have been able to place margin trades after November 25, 2PM PT time. The existing positions will remain effective until the last one will have expired; at that moment the product will go offline.

    The decision comes as a consequence to the finalized “Interpretive guidance on actual delivery of Digital Assets” by the CFTC (Commodity Futures Trading Commission) in March. You can read more here. In the letter we can read:

    “We believe clear, common sense regulations for margin lending products are needed to protect and provide peace of mind to U.S customers. We look forward to working closely with regulators to achieve this goal”.

    Australian Exchange BTC Markets exposed users’ data

    On December 1st during a routine marketing round of emails to their users, Australian exchange BTC Markets, one of the most famous in the continent, accidentally exposed their users’ data. Names and emails where all together displayed in the “to” field and sent in batches of 1000 at a time, exposing each personal user’s data to 99 other email addresses.

    Caroline Bowler, the CEO, immediately confirmed the data exposure adding that nothing more than names and emails were exposed, while funds and passwords remained safe. Nonetheless, we know this type of exposure can (and probably will) lead to unwanted campaigns or phishing emails, therefore users should always doublecheck the sender of the emails before clicking anything suspicious.

    The exchange is now working on additional measures and has advised their clients to change email passwords and set up 2 factor authentication on their accounts.

    Final reminder

    Centralised cryptocurrency exchanges do have custody of the cryptocurrencies in your account trading wallets. Therefore if anything happens to the exchanges, your funds can be affected!

    So don’t keep more funds in exchanges than you need for day to day use or trading! Keep your cryptocurrencies safe and under your OWN custody, ideally in a hardware wallet.

    We recommend the Ledger Nano X. Check out our review and set up and installation guide.

    Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks and may result in the loss of your capital. You should carefully consider whether trading cryptocurrencies is right for you in light of your financial condition and ability to bear financial risks. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile and can fluctuate widely in a short period of time. As such, trading cryptocurrencies may not be suitable for everyone. Additionally, storing cryptocurrencies on a centralized exchange carries inherent risks, including the potential for loss due to hacking, exchange collapse, or other security breaches. We strongly advise that you seek independent professional advice before engaging in any cryptocurrency trading activities and carefully consider the security measures in place when choosing or storing your cryptocurrencies on a cryptocurrency exchange.

  • DAO Maker ($DAO): can retail investors become venture capitalists?

    DAO Maker ($DAO): can retail investors become venture capitalists?

    One notable challenge for every startup is finding the required capital to set up businesses. This is where concepts like venture capital help such businesses to meet the required level of capital to help them blossom. However, this has traditionally been a field accessible by funds and institutions with ample resources.

    DAO Maker is here to improve the process for both parties by respectively creating growth technologies and funding frameworks for startups, and reducing risks for investors.

    Background and Team

    The Founder of DAO Maker is Christoph Zaknun who entered the cryptocurrency space in 2017. The idea of private permissionless money and the gains associated with cryptocurrency lured him further into the creation of ICO DOG, a platform that allowed for investing in token presales.

    His Co-founder, Giorgio Marciano, also acts as DAO Maker’s CTO. Marciano has over 16 years of experience in developing software and products.

    Other notable team members include Hatu Sheikh, who has overseen over 35 crypto assets marketing campaigns, and Malte Christensen, who works as the COO and Head of Sales, Dima, who works as the Head of Visual Communication.

    What is DAO Maker?

    DAO Maker is a provider of a participation framework that allows retail investors (small-scale investors) to participate in global retail venture capital. Essentially, the primary goal of DAO Maker is to raise a fundraising platform that would allow for equal participation of crowd equity and tokens.

    The reality is that most of these small-time investors are likely unable to afford to invest large sums of money in venture capital. DAO fills the gap by enabling the average man on the street an opportunity to grow his own capital. This creates a win-win situation, the business is able to effectively provide a new source of funding while at the same time helping to improve the lives of many.

    Achievements of DAO Maker

    The platform has over time proven itself to retail investors. In the last 2 years, over 70,000 unique retail investors were signed up and allowed to participate in the funding of early-stage ventures. Apart from attracting investors, DAO Maker has also been able to attract startups with enormous potential to join the burgeoning ecosystem.

    Advantages of DAO Maker

    One major reason these startups join the DAO Maker ecosystem is simple: it provides them a safe, decentralized, and free environment that allows them to reach their potentials. In addition, the platform also has one of the leading solutions that would allow for the growth of these companies.

    As a result, the ecosystem has seen a marked increase in the demand for its services, which enabled them to begin working on a permission version.

    DAO Maker’s approach to fundraising stands out since not only does it connect startups with funding, it also assiduously works to assist them in facing challenges in the initial stages of their development.

    This is why the track record of the fundraising platform has defied many market cycles.

    DAO Maker’s Venture Bond

    DAO Maker’s new flagship product is Venture Bond. It allows startups to issue bonds that users can access, whilst users benefit from close to zero-risk venture investments.

    Venture Bonds work as follows:

    • startups issue Venture Bonds;
    • users purchase these bonds, giving the startups a principal sum of money;
    • startups then use the principal sum generated by bond purchases to generate interest through insured margin funding activities in decentralised finance (DeFi) or centralised finance (CeFi);
    • the generated interest serves as the funding for the startups;
    • the startup will then deposit tokens/equity to the Venture Bond holders; and
    • when the Venture Bond matures, the principal sum is returned to the buyer, so they are left with both their initial funding and also any newly acquired tokens or equity.
    DAO Maker's Venture Bonds
    DAO Maker’s Venture Bonds (Image credit: DAO Maker)

    Other DAO Maker Services

    Other notable services of DAO Maker are Refundable Strong Holder Offering and Dynamic Coin Offering.

    Strong Holder Offering

    Strong holder offerings are designed to build a community that would actively participate in providing an increased level of awareness for a company, and at the same time, induce confidence by imposing a strict refund policy.

    DAO Maker strong holder offerings
    DAO Maker strong holder offerings (Image credit: DAO Maker)

    Dynamic Coin Offering

    For dynamic coin offerings, 100% of the circulating supply is backed by a notable portion of the funds raised during the sale.

    DAO Maker then escrows this fund through a trusted and insured custodian, allowing the platform users the opportunity to claim a refund within a specified period.

    Social Mining

    One of the earliest offerings of DAO Maker is Social Mining, which has played a pivotal role in the successful launch of some tokens in the space. The software was conceptualized in 2018, and since then, it has seen various upgrades and usage, which made it an essential part of the DAO Maker community.

    What social mining does is simple; it enables any project to create token-based incentives that encourages community members to offer value. In other words, it helps energize a project’s community to participate in its growth and development.

    The first use of this software was with LTO Network, where it served as a core component in the community creation of the project, and subsequently enjoyed tremendous growth despite the bear market of 2018. Despite the notable success of this first project (LTO), there were still some notable lapses like the dependence of the software on centralized involvement, which negated the core idea of building a decentralized and self-organizing community in the first place.

    However, since then, the team of developers have developed the software to allow pluggable DAOs and also allowing for stake-based voting. The voting allowed the community to determine the value each token holder contributed to the project. This voting system became a quite effective distribution network that was decentralized as token holders were the ones in charge.

    As it stands, work has already begun on the two key pathways social mining is being geared to: granting permissionless support for tokenized startups and permissioned access for equity startups.

    DAO Maker Token ($DAO)

    DAO, the protocol’s native token currently allows its holders to stake in the platform and enjoy governance power in submitting proposals, as well as vote on them.

    By participating in governance, stakers would also receive a part of the fee generated from the source. And in order to promote long-term participation, the staked DAO tokens are locked for a period of time.

    As can be seen below, more utilities for the DAO token are in the works.

    DAO token utilities
    DAO token utilities (Image credit：DAO Maker)

    Conclusion

    The idea behind DAO Maker is to create a platform where startups can enjoy early stage exposure from retailers. Thus, DAO Maker could be a single platform that elevates the capabilities of ordinary retail investors. The platform would also enable them to be issued with equity, while others are issued with tokens. All in all, the platform will enable varying levels of downside protection as early-stage startups face inevitable risks in their early days.

    Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks and may result in the loss of your capital. You should carefully consider whether trading cryptocurrencies is right for you in light of your financial condition and ability to bear financial risks. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile and can fluctuate widely in a short period of time. As such, trading cryptocurrencies may not be suitable for everyone. Additionally, storing cryptocurrencies on a centralized exchange carries inherent risks, including the potential for loss due to hacking, exchange collapse, or other security breaches. We strongly advise that you seek independent professional advice before engaging in any cryptocurrency trading activities and carefully consider the security measures in place when choosing or storing your cryptocurrencies on a cryptocurrency exchange.

  • Polygon ($MATIC): can it solve Ethereum’s scaling challenges?

    Polygon ($MATIC): can it solve Ethereum’s scaling challenges?

    The Ethereum network has immensely pushed the boundaries of blockchain technology more than Bitcoin ever had, especially in the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector, where hundreds of different projects have been able to leverage the flexibility and effectiveness of the host blockchain.

    Unfortunately, the slow transaction speeds and high costs are significantly limiting the performance of Ethereum-based projects to the point that some of them are migrating to alternative chains like Solana and Binance Smart Chain. Yet the vast majority of applications still hold on to Ethereum, waiting for Ethereum 2.0 to fully scale the network.

    Ethereum is in dire need of a scaling solution that can speed up the blockchain’s throughput. Thankfully, Polygon is working on one of such solutions that would see the load on the Ethereum blockchain eased on parallel child chains.

    Background

    Polygon started out as Matic Network, a blockchain solution intended to speed up blockchain transactions and make them more accessible to the general public. Later on, the company refocused its objectives on the Ethereum network to furnish it with layer two scaling solutions. The name Polygon came along with the branding.

    The startup was founded by four Indian technologists, Jaynti Kanani, Anurag Arjun, and Sandeep Nailwal, who had a similar vision of a future where machines and humans interacted freely. The three entrepreneurs agreed that blockchain technology is a vital tool for achieving such a society.

    The trio was later joined by a Serbian tech maximalist and Ethereum enthusiast, Mihailo Bjelic. In a seed round announced on the 1st of August, 2019, Polygon received funding from MiH ventures through Crunchbase. Version 1 of Polygon’s SDK was scheduled to be released in March of 2021.

    What is Polygon ($MATIC)?

    Polygon is a framework that allows Ethereum-based applications to bypass the low throughput, high gas fees, and poor interface of Ethereum while still enjoying its support

    Polygon’s main component is its software development kit (SDK). The SDK is a flexible structure that allows projects to develop different sidechains that suit their needs. Necessary support is provided so that the alternate chains can interact effectively with Ethereum’s main chain.

    By arming developers with flexible and easy-to-use tools, Polygon accelerates the transformation of Ethereum into a multi-chain ecosystem. Its users would be able to create Optimistic rollup chains, ZK rollup chains, and other types of sidechains.

    But beyond being a mere framework, the Polygon platform is focused on connecting blockchains with one another, as well as the Ethereum blockchain itself.

    Advantages of Polygon

    The major benefit of Polygon is scalability, which the crypto space is in dire need of today considering that it takes forever for transactions to be verified on the Ethereum network, especially if you try to decrease the gas fees. Dapp developers have to pay so much in gas fees that it curtails their development and affects their offering to users.

    And this is the pain point that Polygon aims to ease, and they are on their way to scale the Ethereum network.

    Polygon Matic solution
    Polygon’s solution to the challenges facing Ethereum (Image credit: Polygon)

    Polygon for Developers

    Developers can build a network of scalable side chains to the Ethereum blockchain through Polygon; one with independent consensus algorithms on a more developer-friendly, Web Assembly (WASM) environment.

    Developers would be encouraged to build more and advance the general direction of the crypto industry, especially the DeFi sector. Polygon’s SDK does not require developers to have blockchain expertise. In fact, knowledge of these protocols is unnecessary in building from its SDK.

    Users would also benefit tremendously with more easy-to-use interfaces, near-instantaneous transactions, and low costs. If well-executed, this will likely propel the growth of Ethereum dapps to astronomical levels and will push the boundaries of crypto to include the masses outside the industry.

    Support, Flexibility, and Security

    Polygon permits incredible flexibility for the development of chains.

    Its modular nature allows developers to assemble products at unrivalled speeds. The easy assembly will also accelerate dapp development, effectively shortening the interval between the conception and deployment of blockchain products.

    Support would also be provided for easy interaction with users, as well as external systems. Token exchange, contract calls, and communication with oracles are also supported on Polygon. Furthermore, the products would be easily upgradeable.

    All these and more will be possible on Polygon without compromising on security. In fact, developers would be free to choose their approach to secure their platforms, using the modular “security as a service” feature on the Polygon framework.

    Above all, all products developed on Polygon would be compatible with Ethereum.

    Polygon Chains

    During the days of Polygon’s Matic network, an Ethereum sidechain that uses the Plasma framework was the landmark of its offering. The Plasma framework allowed sidechains to run independently, only interacting with the main blockchain when it was necessary.

    Polygon’s new platform sees it advance with the demands of the market by offering different chain networks that are attuned to Ethereum’s blockchain. And these are: stand-alone chains and secured chains.

    Stand-alone Chains

    Stand-alone chains have security autonomy, with each chain being responsible for its own security. Such chains have the freedom to choose their own validation methods. They can establish a personal pool of validators who ensure the authenticity of transactions directly on the blockchain.

    Polygon stand-alone chains
    Polygon stand-alone chains (Image credit: Polygon lightpaper)

    Secured Chains

    On the other hand, secured chains involve outsourcing the platform’s security to a third party. The third-party can be Ethereum itself, with its fraud-proof and validity proof pools. There are other independent, professional pools of validators that offer security as a service as well.

    Overall, secured chains often enjoy more reliable and tighter security even if they might have to sacrifice some independence.

    Polygon secured chains
    Polygon secured chains (Image credit: Polygon lightpaper)

    MATIC token

    MATIC is the only native token of Polygon, it is used to pay transaction fees and participate in Polygon’s proof-of-stake consensus mechanism.

    Conclusion

    Polygon’s vision is to launch whole blockchains that are scalable, secure, and have amazing interfaces, allowing decentralized applications to have an alternative platform to carry out transactions while enjoying the security and support of the Ethereum network.

    Meanwhile, the Ethereum dev community is also continuously working on the Ethereum 2.0 project (Serenity), which seeks to ultimately scale its blockchain to unimaginable capacities even beyond Visa and Mastercard.

    Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks and may result in the loss of your capital. You should carefully consider whether trading cryptocurrencies is right for you in light of your financial condition and ability to bear financial risks. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile and can fluctuate widely in a short period of time. As such, trading cryptocurrencies may not be suitable for everyone. Additionally, storing cryptocurrencies on a centralized exchange carries inherent risks, including the potential for loss due to hacking, exchange collapse, or other security breaches. We strongly advise that you seek independent professional advice before engaging in any cryptocurrency trading activities and carefully consider the security measures in place when choosing or storing your cryptocurrencies on a cryptocurrency exchange.

  • OKX Exchange Review (2023): Strong Security, Cheap, and Good Functionality

    OKX Exchange Review (2023): Strong Security, Cheap, and Good Functionality

    OKX is a leading cryptocurrency exchange offering a comprehensive one-stop marketplace for spot trading, derivatives, and other crypto-related services. Offering a wide range of services, from margin trading and mining pools to decentralized options and cloud services, making it an ideal platform for both novice and experienced traders.

    Sign up here to get started

    What is OKX?

    OKX is a popular crypto brokerage and trading platform that provides users with a secure and easy-to-use platform to acquire and trade cryptocurrencies. It supports multiple cryptocurrencies and provides low trading fees, making it a great choice for those looking to invest and make a profit. This OKX exchange review will answer all of your questions about the company and the platform itself, helping you to decide whether or not it’s suitable for you. It is important to pay attention to all the pros and cons to make the right choice, as the number of people investing and trading in cryptocurrencies has been significantly increasing over the last few years.

    Founded in 2017, the platform has grown to become a major player in the crypto space, offering a wide range of services. According to a recent report, OKX has over 20 million registered users and a daily trading volume of over $2 billion. The company has recently rebranded to OKX, but many people still refer to it as OKEx. If you’re looking for alternative exchanges, Binance and Coinbase are considered to be leaders in the space.

    Key Features of OKX

    Option for a decentralized exchange: In addition to standard DEX trading, OKX’s decentralized platform also provides swap trading, liquidity pools, farm pools, a decentralized wallet, and other features for individuals who like to exchange in a decentralized way.

    Enhanced security measures: Security is prioritized by OKX, as evidenced by the requirement for two-factor authentication, smartphone verification, Google Authenticator options, and anti-phishing code.

    Margin trading: There are many tools available for customers to use in order to trade, including margin trading with up to 125x leverage, perpetual trading, futures trading, and options trading.

    Finance options: There are several financial alternatives accessible, some of the broadest in the market, including Earn, which enables you to make passive income on your cryptocurrency holdings, Loan, Jumpstart token staking function, mining pool, OKX bridge feature, OKB utility token, OKX Cloud, and OKX Blockdream Ventures.

    Fiat-to-crypto on-ramp: You can change your fiat currency into cryptocurrency with OKX, which supports 400+ trading pairs and accepts Apple Pay, Visa, Mastercard, bank transfers, Alipay, WeChat Pay, etc. Also, they support more than 30 cryptocurrencies, including the Canadian dollar (CAD), the Chinese yuan (CNY), the euro (EUR), the Japanese yuan (JPY), the Hong Kong dollar (HKD), the Chilean peso (CLP), and many others.

    Key Advantages of OKX

    In order to understand why so many individuals selected OKX over other platforms, I’d like to start my evaluation with its advantages. Maybe OKX is just what you’re looking for, who knows?

    650+ Trading Pairs, 340+ Cryptocurrencies

    OKX is a popular cryptocurrency exchange platform that supports more than 340 cryptocurrencies and offers over 650 trading pairs. It supports multiple fiat currencies, including EUR, USD, GBP, CAD, JPY, and AUD. You can also choose from multiple payment options, including credit/debit card, bank transfer, PayPal, Payeer, Skrill, GooglePay, and ApplePay. With its wide range of options, OKEx is a great choice for those looking to buy, sell, and trade cryptocurrencies.

    Good Functionality

    It has more than 650 pairs to choose from, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Tether. With up to 100x leverage, users can multiply their funds and get more profit. However, it is important to note that options trading and borrowing crypto can be risky and should only be done by experienced traders. OKX is a great platform for those looking for a comprehensive cryptocurrency trading experience.

    When it comes to buying, selling, and trading cryptocurrencies, OKX is not like other exchanges. It also enables:

    • Lending and borrowing crypto
    • Trading on margin
    • Spot trading
    • Options trading

    You probably already know that there aren’t many systems that can give you this capability if this isn’t your first time reading an OKX exchange review.

    Tight Security

    OKX is a secure crypto exchange that provides robust security features. When registering, OKX will recommend you to use multi-factor authentication – 2FA or MFA – for extra security. You can also set an anti-phishing code that will be sent together with all emails from OKX. Furthermore, OKX has its own cold wallet that will keep your private keys offline, providing an extra layer of security for your assets. With these features, OKX ensures that your cryptocurrencies are safe and secure.

    Comes with Mobile App

    The OKX mobile app is a great way to trade on the go. It is compatible with iOS, Android, macOS, and Windows, and can be easily downloaded from Google Play and App Store. With over 264,000 reviews and an average score of 4.5, customers are highly satisfied with the app’s user-friendly design, clear layout, and glitch-free performance. Download the OKX app to manage your account from the palm of your hand and enjoy the ultimate trading experience.

    Friendly Customer Service

    OKX is a crypto exchange platform that provides 24/7 customer support. According to user reviews, OKX customer service is helpful and responds quickly. My personal experience was the same – OKX support provided the information that I was looking for. Therefore, it’s fair to state that OKX has really good customer support, which is not as common as you might think.

    Low Fees

    OKX is a popular cryptocurrency exchange that offers competitive trading fees for both regular and advanced users. For regular users, the maker fee is 0.08% and the taker fee is 0.1%. For advanced traders, the maker fee is 0.06% and the taker fee is 0.08%. VIP members get even lower trading fees. All of the relevant information can be found on the dedicated trading fee page on OKX. This makes OKX an attractive option for crypto-enthusiasts and day traders who are looking for competitive fees.

    Key Disadvantages of OKX

    Despite its attractive features, OKX also has some drawbacks that can affect your trading experience.

    Not Especially Beginner Friendly

    OKX is a great platform for experienced traders, offering a wide range of features such as margin trading, spot trading, options trading, and crypto lending and borrowing. However, these features can be too advanced and risky for newbie traders. To help new users get familiar with the platform, OKX Academy provides tutorials, trading ideas, industry analysis, and a blockchain glossary. With thorough research and practice, newbies can easily get the hang of OKX and start trading with confidence.

    How Can I Start Trading on OKX?

    OKX is a leading cryptocurrency exchange platform that offers a wide range of services and features. It has a user-friendly interface, low fees, and a wide selection of trading pairs. It also provides advanced trading tools and features such as margin trading, futures trading, and spot trading. The platform is highly secure and offers a variety of payment methods. It also has a mobile app for iOS and Android devices. Overall, OKX is a great choice for those looking for a reliable and secure cryptocurrency exchange platform.

    How to Register on OKX?

    • Step 1: Go to the OKX website.
    • Step 2: Click the “Sign up” button, which you’ll find on the top-right of the page.
    • Step 3: Enter your email address and password. Instead of an email address, you can use your phone number.
    • Step 4: Click “Sign up”.

    After creating your account, you will need to fill in additional information to verify that it’s you. To do that, you will only need your ID or passport number.

    How to Make a Deposit on OKX?

    Make a deposit as soon as you register. You only need to buy cryptocurrency to do that. You won’t encounter any difficulties because OKX offers you a variety of payment methods.

    Choose from the payment methods below and deposit credit in your account:

    • Credit/debit card
    • Bank transfer
    • PayPal
    • Payeer
    • Skrill
    • GooglePay
    • ApplePay
    • etc.

    You have a virtually limitless number of alternatives when buying cryptocurrency on OKX.

    Conclusion

    OKX is a Malta-based cryptocurrency trading platform that was founded in 2017 and is now one of the most popular crypto exchange platforms. It offers low fees, supports more than 340 cryptocurrencies and over 650 trading pairs, and provides features such as margin trading, spot trading, options trading, lending, and borrowing crypto. While it is a great platform for experienced traders, newbies may find it difficult to use due to its extensive features. If you are looking for an alternative exchange, ByBit, Binance, KuCoin, and Kraken. are some of the leading cryptocurrency exchanges in the industry, each with its own set of benefits.

    Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks and may result in the loss of your capital. You should carefully consider whether trading cryptocurrencies is right for you in light of your financial condition and ability to bear financial risks. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile and can fluctuate widely in a short period of time. As such, trading cryptocurrencies may not be suitable for everyone. Additionally, storing cryptocurrencies on a centralized exchange carries inherent risks, including the potential for loss due to hacking, exchange collapse, or other security breaches. We strongly advise that you seek independent professional advice before engaging in any cryptocurrency trading activities and carefully consider the security measures in place when choosing or storing your cryptocurrencies on a cryptocurrency exchange.

  • bitFlyer Exchange Review (2023): A Trusted Japanese Cryptocurrency Exchange with Reasonably Low Fees

    bitFlyer Exchange Review (2023): A Trusted Japanese Cryptocurrency Exchange with Reasonably Low Fees

    bitFlyer is an often overlooked cryptocurrency exchange, but don’t be fooled – it could be the perfect platform for you – just read some user reviews to find out! Many digital currency holders who are not Japanese still find a lot of value in this crypto exchange platform. Let us now go into the details.

    Sign up here to get started

    What is bitFlyer?

    bitFlyer is a regulated Japanese cryptocurrency exchange that offers virtual currency exchange and trading services in Japan, the United States, and Europe. With bitFlyer, users can buy and sell Bitcoin, as well as other cryptocurrencies using their preferred fiat currency, such as USD, EUR, or JPY. Additionally, users can make quick crypto purchases using a bank card and other payment methods. bitFlyer is a secure and reliable platform that provides users with a safe and convenient way to trade cryptocurrencies.

    bitFlyer is a popular and secure cryptocurrency exchange that offers low fees, responsive customer support, and an easy-to-use platform. Despite differences in regulation, the exchange remains user-friendly and provides an excellent fiat gateway for all jurisdictions. With its excellent security, low fees, and responsive customer support, bitFlyer is the best-kept secret amongst European and US traders.

    Key Features of bitFlyer

    bitFlyer’s key features include:

    • Purchase and trade Bitcoin and major altcoins. Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Litecoin (LTC), and other prominent cryptocurrencies are supported via the bitFlyer exchange.
    • The fees are really modest. bitFlyer has some of the lowest costs among authorized exchanges, making it an excellent fiat gateway for both beginner and experienced crypto traders.
    • An exchange that is extremely secure. bitFlyer has never been hacked and is the best exchange in terms of regulatory compliance in the crypto-verse.
    • Simple to use. bitFlyer provides two trading options: a simple interface for basic trades and a complex Lightning exchange for experienced investors.
    • Futures trading and margin. Japanese consumers can trade on bitFlyer’s Lightning FX platform, which allows for up to 4x leverage.
    • Account for a corporation. Institutional investors can apply for a corporate account, which has additional benefits and services.

    Key Advantages of bitFlyer

    We’ll begin our bitFlyer review by talking about the best parts of the exchange in question.

    A Safe Cryptocurrency Exchange

    When it comes to finding the best exchange for yourself, security should be your top priority. Exchanges that are regulated and follow all of the necessary rules and laws of their location, as well as comply with KYC norms, are the most secure. While some may consider this an invasion of privacy, it is the norm and necessary to ensure the safety of your crypto assets. Make sure to do your research and find an exchange that is secure and meets all of your needs.

    BitFlyer is a secure and reliable cryptocurrency exchange that complies with all rules and regulations. It has never been hacked and keeps 80% of its users’ crypto assets in cold storage devices. Cold storage refers to hardware crypto wallets that are always offline, meaning no hacker can access them or the assets they contain. BitFlyer is a safe and secure exchange that provides users with peace of mind when trading cryptocurrencies.

    Generally Simple to Use

    Crypto exchanges have become increasingly popular, but many newcomers can be overwhelmed by difficult and confusing interfaces. bitFlyer reviews show that this is not an issue with the exchange, as its interface is not complex and even complete newcomers can use it without any issues. bitFlyer is a great choice for those who are new to crypto trading, as it is easy to use and understand. It also offers a variety of features, such as a secure wallet, low fees, and a wide range of trading options. With its user-friendly interface and features, bitFlyer is an ideal choice for those who are just starting out in the world of crypto trading.

    Supports The Majority of the Cryptocurrencies

    The bitFlyer exchange supports the majority of the “main” cryptocurrencies on the market, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ethereum Classic, Litecoin, Bitcoin Cash, Monacoin, Lisk, Ripple, Basic Attention Token, Stellar Lumens, and NEM. However, the availability of these coins and tokens varies depending on the region. For example, if you reside in Japan, you’ll be able to trade all of the assets, while European traders won’t be able to trade Ripple and BAT, and US-based traders won’t be able to exchange and trade Monacoin, Lisk, Ripple, and BAT. Despite these restrictions, you can be sure that you’ll be able to trade and exchange Bitcoin, Ethereum, and some other more well-known crypto coins.

    Fees are Really Low

    This platform is one of the leading cryptocurrency exchanges on the market, offering some of the best fees that you can find. Depending on your region of residence, you can expect fees up to 0,15% for Japanese traders, 0,2% for European traders, and 0,12% for US clients. Futures trading is completely free of charge for Japanese traders. bitFlyer is one of the lowest fee-providing cryptocurrency exchanges, making it a great choice for anyone looking to trade crypto.

    Reasonable Account Verification Limit

    bitFlyer is a regulated cryptocurrency exchange that allows users to buy and sell Bitcoin without having to verify their identity. This is rare, as most exchanges require full verification before trading. Users can deposit and withdraw up to €249,99 per transaction and €2499,99 per cumulative year without having to provide ID and residential proof. bitFlyer also offers a range of other services, such as margin trading, futures trading, and more. The platform is secure and reliable and provides a great way to get started with cryptocurrency trading.

    Key Disadvantages of bitFlyer

    Let’s take a look at some of the less-than-positive bitFlyer customer evaluations.

    Cryptocurrencies Are Limited

    BitFlyer is a popular crypto exchange, but it has a major drawback – it only offers 11 coins for trading and exchange. This might be fine for beginners, but more experienced traders may find this too limiting. Other mainstream exchanges offer a much wider selection of coins, so if you’re looking for more variety, you may want to consider Binance or Coinbase.

    A Centralized Exchange

    bitFlyer is a regulated, centralized crypto exchange that follows all of the rules and regulations in place. This means that users must identify themselves in full before they can start trading and exchanging. While this is not an issue for most users, it does not suit crypto enthusiasts who believe strongly in the concept of decentralization. This is because bitFlyer, like many other crypto exchange sites, holds users’ private keys, meaning they do not have full control over their cryptocurrency. Despite this, bitFlyer has a professional nature and a spotless track record, so users should not have to worry about any issues.

    How to Register on bitFlyer?

    To begin, there is the registration process:

    • Step 1: Navigate to the bitFLyer website. The site may differ depending on your location; 
    • Step 2: Click the Sign Up for Free button! – Your email address will be requested.
    • Step 3: You must now confirm your email address, create a password, and enable two-factor authentication. Given that an SSL certificate is also involved, the platform’s security is quite solid!
    • Step 4: Once you have completed the 2FA and agreed to all of the documentation, your account has been activated! You can now opt to verify your identity right now or at a later time.

    The signup process is quite straightforward and quick!

    How to Add Funds to bitFlyer?

    After you’ve registered your account, you’ll most likely want to fund it and begin trading. The procedure is straightforward.
    You’ll want to go to the left side of your screen and select Account Funding. You will then be routed to a new page on the site.

    Now that you’ve validated your account, you’ll be able to contribute funds with ease. However, if you haven’t yet completed verification, you must do so by providing the site with your name, surname, and all other essential information.

    The funding process takes very little time and is quite simple – once you have your funds set up, you can start purchasing and trading the crypto-coins of your choice right away!

    Conclusion

    bitFlyer is a reliable and secure cryptocurrency exchange that allows users to purchase and trade a variety of main crypto assets. The exchange is praised for its simplicity and user-friendliness and is considered safe and secure. However, the available cryptocurrencies may vary depending on the region. If bitFlyer doesn’t meet your needs, there are other alternatives, such as Binance and Coinbase, that may be worth considering.

    Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks and may result in the loss of your capital. You should carefully consider whether trading cryptocurrencies is right for you in light of your financial condition and ability to bear financial risks. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile and can fluctuate widely in a short period of time. As such, trading cryptocurrencies may not be suitable for everyone. Additionally, storing cryptocurrencies on a centralized exchange carries inherent risks, including the potential for loss due to hacking, exchange collapse, or other security breaches. We strongly advise that you seek independent professional advice before engaging in any cryptocurrency trading activities and carefully consider the security measures in place when choosing or storing your cryptocurrencies on a cryptocurrency exchange.

  • Linear Finance ($LINA): The future of synthetic exchange platforms?

    Linear Finance ($LINA): The future of synthetic exchange platforms?

    Linear Finance ($LINA) understands that decentralized finance (DeFi) has opened new possibilities for derivative offerings and that many exchanges have the apparent problems of front-running, expensive gas fees, and liquidity issues. Linear Finance seeks to go around those issues with its cheap, quick, and transparent synthetic asset exchange platform. With Linear, users can simply make a synthetic asset that contains a portfolio of different underlying tokens based on the exposure that they are willing to take. This presents new yield-making opportunities for anyone based on their customized financial goals.

    Check out our interview with Linear Finance!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JcXsEwj5hpI

    Background

    Drey Ng and Kevin Tai, Co-founders of Linear Finance, built the project with a vision of an inclusive and more democratized access to investment opportunities. By their team’s expertise in different crypto initiatives and financial instruments, Linear made a cross-chain, Ethereum-based protocol that seeks to fulfill their vision.

    With Linear, users can make their own portfolio exposures and manage them on their own. This initiative enables investors to easily invest, save, and earn efficient profits from their assets.

    What is Linear Finance?

    Linear Finance is a decentralized delta-one asset protocol where users can make, manage, and trade synthetic assets. This gives users exposure to different kinds of assets without having to actually own their underlying assets.

    An additional feature that Linear Finance has introduced is a cross-chain compatible and decentralized protocol that can support a faster, more affordable, and secure exchange of synthetic assets.

    Linear Finance’s platform is powered by its native token, LINA. It can be used for many purposes such as payments, staking, liquidity mining, governance, and investing in “Liquids.” Liquids are Linear’s synthetic assets composed of different underlying tokens or investment options.

    LinearDAO

    LinearDAO is the governance community who controls important platform designs and system parameters including pledge ration, LINA inflation reward and frequency, transactions fees, proposal implementation, and many more. Furthermore, they also regulate the profit and loss regarding liquidation.

    Perks and Special Features

    The project promises infinite liquidity and no slippage. Here are some of the perks users can find with Linear Finance:

    • Convenience: The protocol promises quick transactions with low transaction fees. Any kind of user can enjoy the platform as well, whether they are a market maker, staker, or trader.
    • Transparency: To prevent front-running, every transaction made within the exchange is made transparent to all users. This also reduces systemic risks on the part of each network participant.
    • Ethereum-based: Because it is built on the Ethereum network with cross-chain compatibility, it can work alongside other DeFi projects too.
    • User-tailored options: There are different exposure options that users can freely choose from, such as other tokens, commodities, or market indices.

    The whole Linear platform is built on two different blockchains but they complement each other thanks to cross-chain compatibility. For users, they only need to open an Ethereum-based wallet and an EVM-compatible wallet.

     Linear automatically links these two together through smart contracts. Here are some of the advantages of an infrastructure modeled around that concept. They are:

    • Maximized DeFi support: While LinearDAO and LINA tokens are based on Ethereum, its use of EVM and smart contracts make it easy for the platform to interact with other DeFi protocols.
    • Affordability: Buildr and Exchange function through smart contracts on top of EVM-compatible blockchains. This enables Linear to support the building and trading of Liquids at very minimal gas fees.
    • Fewer risks of front-running: The block time confirmation for other EVM-compatible blockchains are much faster than Ethereum. This allows users to create their own Liquids at more updated prices through the help of oracles. This way, the risk of users front-running the exchange becomes much lower.

    LINA Token

    LINA can be used for payments, staking, and governance participation. But mainly, LINA functions as the base collateral needed to mint Liquids through Buildr, the decentralized application (dApp) designed to manage synthetic assets.

    To create Liquids, users have to “pledge” 100% of their digital assets, which also means collateralization. This is to ensure that Liquids are fully-backed by an underlying asset, saving the stability of the system from the volatility of synthetic assets. The pledge requirement can be reduced eventually if the LinearDAO deems it necessary.

    Collateralization

    Buildr takes a hybrid approach in terms of collateralization. For Liquids, users need to deposit a mixture of LINA and other cryptocurrency tokens to generate a synthetic asset. The ratio is 80:20, where at least 80% of the collateral must be in LINA and 20% can be in other cryptocurrencies.

    Staking

    Staking LINA offers users many incentives. These are the following rewards that users can receive by doing so:

    • Exchange Fee Reward: The transaction fees collected from users of the Linear.Exchange platform, currently set at 0.25%, is redistributed weekly to LINA stakers on a pro-rata basis. For non-LINA stakers, these rewards can also be provided too but it will depend on the decision of the community governance council.
    • Inflationary Reward: LINA has a starting inflation rate of 75% which decreases on a weekly basis. The inflation reward is given to LINA stakers on a pro-rata basis as well.
    • Yield Farming: Yield farmers help maintain Linear’s debt pool and the whole platform. For the first two years of the project, users who actively use the exchange can receive token bonuses. These token bonuses can then be deposited by yield farmers in other liquidity pools such as Balancer, Curve, and Uniswap.

    Where can I buy/sell/trade $LINA?

    $LINA is now tradable on other exchanges as well like Bitmax, MXC, Bilaxy, Bibox, Hotbit and Hoo.

    Linear.Exchange

    In facilitating faster trade activities with almost unlimited liquidity, Linear is building their own exchange. As of now, Liquid is collaborating with other public blockchains to reduce transaction settlement timeframes to as quick as one second every transaction coupled with instant finality.

    With a plan of partnering with oracles, Linear also believes that they can solve problems with front-running as they gain the capability of refreshing prices on a frequent and quick basis at much lower prices for the underlying assets.

    Linear Finance ($LINA) token public sale

    The token public sale took place on 14th September 2020. A total of 47,222,222 LINA tokens were sold in 2 rounds. The first round had 25mil tokens at $0.00400 per token. The second round, 22,222,222 tokens at $0.00450 per token.

    The sale was 40 times oversubscribed and closed earlier than expected (it was supposed to last for 24 hours). Each participant in the sale had to purchase 500 USDT/USDC worth of LINA. Hence only 400 participants were able to get the allocation on a FIRST COME FIRST SERVED basis. This was determined by the time/date stamp on their Google Form submission. The first 200 users were allocated LINA tokens from round 1, and the remaining 200 participants from round 2. This was however subject to the registrants completing the KYC process in a period of 24 hours.

    $LINA was first listed on Uniswap and reached more than 20x from public sale price (and around 60x from private sale round 1). It is now stabilized at around $0.005 (as at 3 November 2020).

    Linear pre-staking platform

    Immediately after listing, Linear Finance has launched its staking platform. Holders can participate in the 8 weeks pre-staking program and get rewarded. The APY has been around 600% for weeks and has now decreased around 370%. All the earnings will be claimable 6 months after mainnet launch but users can withdraw their staked funds at anytime.

    Partnership announcements

    In the weeks following the launch, Linear has announced partnerships with Nervos, Moonbeam and Hex Trust.

    Nervos is an open source blockchain that offers security and trustlessness without compromising on scalability and performance with its unique layered architecture. The collaboration is focused on improving Linear’s cross chain capabilities and penetration of the Chinese market.

    Moonbeam, an Ethereum ($ETH) compatible smart contract parachain, is a strategic partner to help set the feet into the Polkadot ($DOT) ecosystem and level up Linear’s interoperability. Finally, the partnership with Hex Trust as a custody partner, will give Linear the chance to offer secure, institutional grade custodial services for institutional investors.

    A next announcement has revealed a new partnership with 3Commas, a cryptocurrency trading platform that helps users build automated trading bots. The investment is meant “to include future integration of the platforms and tools, streamlining operations and allowing for a greater range of features and offerings”.

    Testnet is live

    On 16th October 2020, the first testnet for Buildr has been released. Buildr is one of the core dApps of the Linear suite, where users can stake their $LINA (and soon more collaterals) to build ℓUSD, the base currency of Linear Exchange. Stakers are entitled to rewards and to a part of the transaction fees generated by the exchange. ℓUSD tokens can be minted to purchase synthetic assets within the exchange itself and can be moved to other protocols.

    The last testnet update has just come out allowing users to purchase “Liquids” with ℓUSD on Linear.Exchange. Meanwhile, mainnet launch is allegedly happening in a couple of weeks.

    If you want to read more and discover how to contribute to the testnet, please have a look at the articles here and here.

    More than 222 million of $LINA tokens are staked, for a total value of more than USD$1 million.

    New Partnership with Band Protocol

    In this article dated November 16, Linear Finance has ufficially announced their partnership with Band Protocol, cross-chain decentralised oracle.

    The biggest problem this collaboration is trying to solve is front running. As Drey Ng, Co-Founder at Linear Finance said: “Front running is a fundamental problem not just for current synthetic asset trading but all trading in general”. Not solving this problem would jeopardize all “the benefits of cross-chain compatibility (such as speed and cost), and a superior creative selection of synthetic assets”.

    How Band Protocol Oracle works with Linear
    How Band Protocol Oracle works with Linear

    Other reasons why Band Protocol was chosen are the minimized network risk., end-to-end customizability for real-time data and truly decentralized oracle mechanism. The partnership will start securing the Linear Protocol on Binance smart Chain, the first project’s cross-integration, where the BEP token has just been created (the common $LINA we see on exchanges is an ERC-20 token).

    The team is now working on features to allow users to seamlessly swap chains.

    Linear Finance road to mainnet
    Linear Finance road to mainnet

    Mainnet Buildr Launch and new staking program

    The Linear Mainnet Buildr v1.0 went live on December the 21st, after months of extensive testing. The Buildr dApp is the heart of Linear’s decentralised application suite. Users can stake $LINA tokens to build ℓUSD and earn rewards. Here is a complete and detailed guide on how to use Buildr to the fullest.

    Linear's Buildr
    Linear’s Buildr

    All of the $LINA from the pre-staking program were migrated seamlessly to the mainnet and while previously earned rewards will be blocked until next June, new mainnet staking rewards will be locked for 1 year from launch. They will count towards the P-Ratio and can be used to build $LUSD. It is important to note that in order to be eligible for rewards, users are required build ℓUSD or any subsequent Liquids.

    Binance Smart Chain’s Buildr v2.0 launch

    As anticipated, Linear wants to bring Cross Chain compatibility and ease of use to Defi and Ethereum users. The team had, in fact, previously declared that “Linear was designed for all users (no matter how much LINA you hold) and transaction costs will not become a barrier to entry. Nobody will get left behind”.

    The promise has been kept and Linear.Builder Mainnet v2.0 with full Binance Smart Chain (BSC) integration and swap has gone live on January the 15th, 2021. Users can now enjoy almost gasless fees when interacting with the platform.

    The transaction was seamless and old stakers only have to connect to Buildr via MetaMask using the BSC Mainnet (they can also use Binance Chain Wallet) and they will see their Lina tokens and rewards already there. For new holders who would like to stake for the first time, there is an internal ERC-20 -> BEP20 swap whithin Buildr itself. More info and complete instructions can be found on the Medium article.

    Be careful!: There are now two versions of the $LINA token. If you send the Etherum version to a BSC wallet or vice-versa (whether it is a custodial or non-custodial address) you will lose your tokens! If in doubt on what to do, contact the support team via the official channels which you can find on their Website.

    Linear will be listed on Binance Innovation Zone

    Binance has announced it will list Linear Finance’s $LINA token on its Innovation Zone. Trading for $LINA/$BTC, $LINA/$BUSD and $LINA/$USDT trading pairs will start at 12:00pm (UTC) on 18th March 2021.

    Furthermore, Binance Launchpad is offering 21,084,000 LINA tokens for sale at at 0.00031044 BNB for 1 LINA. Subscription has already ended at 1:00p.m. (HKT) on 18th March 2021 and tokens will be sent to successful applicants at 6:00p.m. (HKT) on the same day.

    Conclusion

    With the rising gas prices in Ethereum, as well as the emerging trend of yield farming, the DeFi space is presented with new financial opportunities but is discouraged by its costs. Projects such as Linear is a promising addition to the space as it seeks to go around these problems.

    With Linear as a platform to easily build and manage investments, users can now enjoy quick and affordable profit-building opportunities. And in recognition of the real purpose of decentralization, Linear appears to be on the right track after putting in the pipelines a roadmap for a planned transition to community governance.

    Linear is certainly on the radar of a lot of renowned investors in this space. They have recently completed a USD$1.8m seed round with notable backers in the investment space such as NGC Ventures, Hashed, CMS Holdings, Genesis Block, Kenetic Capital, Alameda Research, Evernew Capital, Soul Capital, Moonrock Capital, Black Edge Capital and PANONY. According to Linear, this funding will go towards accelerating the development of their testnet and mainnet, as well as promoting their platform. It will certainly be exciting to see what the Linear Finance team will be releasing in the months to come.

    Decentralised Finance (DeFi) series: tutorials, guides and more

    With content for both beginners and more advanced users, check out our YouTube DeFi series containing tutorials on the ESSENTIAL TOOLS you need for trading in the DeFi space e.g. MetaMask and Uniswap. As well as a deep dive into popular DeFi topics such as decentralized exchanges, borrowing-lending platforms and NFT marketplaces

    The DeFi series on this website also covers topics not explored on YouTube. For an introduction on what is DeFi, check out Decentralized Finance (DeFi) Overview: A guide to the HOTTEST trend in cryptocurrency

    Tutorials and guides for the ESSENTIAL DEFI TOOLS:

    More videos and articles are coming soon as part of our DeFi series, so be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our Youtube channel so you can be notified as soon as they come out!

    Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks and may result in the loss of your capital. You should carefully consider whether trading cryptocurrencies is right for you in light of your financial condition and ability to bear financial risks. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile and can fluctuate widely in a short period of time. As such, trading cryptocurrencies may not be suitable for everyone. Additionally, storing cryptocurrencies on a centralized exchange carries inherent risks, including the potential for loss due to hacking, exchange collapse, or other security breaches. We strongly advise that you seek independent professional advice before engaging in any cryptocurrency trading activities and carefully consider the security measures in place when choosing or storing your cryptocurrencies on a cryptocurrency exchange.

  • The Graph ($GRT) – The Next Level of Decentralized Apps

    The Graph ($GRT) – The Next Level of Decentralized Apps

    What is The Graph?

    The Graph ($GRT) is a decentralized and open-sourced indexing protocol for blockchain data. Developers can build and publish different APIs, which are referred to as subgraphs, and perform queries through the GraphQL.

    The platform can easily be used to look for any Ethereum data conveniently through simple queries. This addresses the common problem faced by a lot of other blockchain indexing platforms.

    Blockchain applications face difficulties in keeping properties like finality, chain reorganization, and security in their process of fulfilling query tasks. These are also potential complications that applications usually address, but unfortunately make the process of querying time-consuming. The Graph has a workaround for this, and it is built exactly for that purpose.

    Through “subgraphs,” The Graph indexes blockchain data, which users can access via the GraphQL API. According to the team, they will make it fully decentralized in the future, where more nodes will be involved and made responsible for maintaining the index.

    The interest for the platform is steadily growing. In fact, they hit over a billion queries last June 2020. This was right at the time when decentralized finance was also gaining much institutional attention.

    The Graph’s Daily Query Volume (Source: ‘1 Billion Monthly Queries’ medium articles)

    Background

    Yaniv Tal, co-founder and CEO of The Graph, together with his team, has created an indexing protocol meant to ease the process of accessing blockchain data. Tal and his co-founders had personally witnessed themselves how difficult it was to actually create new applications on the Ethereum blockchain.

    Thanks to their experience on applications, they have found out that there is actually no decentralized indexing and querying softwares yet for blockchain. The problem back then was that developers had to come up with their own method to gather data and transform them from different sources.

    The mission of the platform, which Tal and his team developed, is to help create applications that require no servers and make Web3 accessible to everyone.

    How Does The Graph Index Data?

    To index Ethereum-based data, The Graph uses the “subgraph manifest.” This refers to the description of a subgraph containing data about smart contracts, blockchain events, and the procedure in mapping event data with one another, before they are all kept in the platform’s database.

    The flow of the data from transactions, subgraph manifests, and the database follows a particular structure. All of it begins with decentralized applications that are adding data to the Ethereum blockchain through the help of smart contracts.

    All of that data will contain a record of all events and transactions up until the point that they have achieved finality. Then comes the Graph Node, which scans the whole blockchain database, gathers new data, and filters out those that are relevant to the queries that users make. To make the indexing much easier, it identifies every information that answers the questions from subgraphs.

    GraphQL is the link between blockchain data and the application that a user wants to provide it with. But then again, it is through the Graph Node that users can deliver searches to the platform. After the whole process, users can finally look at the results of their query from their applications.

    Basically, this is how the cycle of data query and indexing works in the platform. Users can refer to the Graph Explorer to scan through the subgraphs that are already in the platform. Each of these subgraphs have a playground where users can perform queries through GraphQL.

    How the Graph Works? (source: https://thegraph.com/docs/introduction#how-the-graph-works)

    As of latest, The Graph can support the indexing of data coming from Ethereum, IPFS, and PoA networks. There are more networks that the platform will support in the future. But right now, they already have more than 2,300 subgraphs deployed, which developers for applications utilize. Some of these applications are AAVE, Aragon, Balancer, DAOstack, Uniswap, Synthetix, and many others.

    There is a lot of institutional support for The Graph network. Michael Anderson of Framework Ventures, said in a press release that they “couldn’t be happier to back Yaniv and the team, and we look forward to helping grow the decentralized network when it launches.”

    Hayden Adams of Uniswap also shared how useful the platform was for their analytics needs: “As a company we don’t manage or run our own databases. … Right now it’s pretty difficult to get historic data from the Ethereum blockchain in an efficient way.”

    Their plan, apart from expanding to other blockchains soon, is to make it community-owned and governed in the future. This is also in response to the shift of many blockchain applications to a decentralized model of governance.

    Key Roles

    The platform’s whole ecosystem is composed of the following:

    The Graph’s Protocol Roles (source: The Graph Network In Depth)
    • Consumers – These are the users who pay indexers for their searches. It could also be web services or any other software linked with The Graph.
    • Indexers – These are the nodes that maintain the indexing function of the platform.
    • Curators – Using GRTs, curators identify to the subgraphs the information that is valuable for the platform’s index.
    • Delegators – These are other stakers who delegate their GRT to existing indexers and earn a portion of the rewards run by nodes.
    • Fishermen – They check whether the network’s response to queries is accurate.
    • Arbitrators – They decide whether an Indexer is malicious or not.

    The Graph Council

    The Graph plans to decentralize its governance in the future. This will most likely be similar with MakerDAO and Compound. At the point of the protocol’s maturity, the team plans to launch a Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAO) that would allow core interest groups to participate in important protocol decisions.

    Similar to other DAOs, the Graph Council, which will be the governing body for the technical parameters of the protocol, is also in charge of how The Graph Foundation allocates its native, utility tokens.

    Among their basic functions include decisions on allocating grants and ecosystem funding, protocol upgrades, protocol parameters, and other emergency decisions.

    GRT Token ($GRT)

    The Graph Token, or $GRT, is its native ERC-20 based token, which can serve as a medium of exchange and the reward distributed to community participants who function as Indexers, Curators, and Delegators.

    GRT token distribution
    GRT token distribution (Image source: The Graph)

    GRT also has a vesting and distribution schedule ranging between 6 months to 10 years depending on the bucket. Around 12.5% of the total token supply (i.e. 1,224,999,438 GRT) is expected to be in circulation at launch. However this figure is exclusive of stakeable but locked tokens.

    GRT token distribution at mainnet launch

    The Graph launched its mainnet at 9:00a.m. (PT) on 17th December 2020. Upon launch, GRT has been distributed to all of the participants of the public sale. Members of The Graph’s Curator Program also received an initial USD $1,000 worth in rewards, with the remainder to be distributed to them on a quarterly basis based on their contributions to the Program.

    The Graph Foundation also received around 20% of the supply for the future development of The Graph. In particular, contributors who want to help building on The Graph can apply to their Grants Program, around 1% of the total supply of GRT will be allocated to support these participants in 2021.

    Here’s a graph showing the GRT circulation over the course of 5 years from the date of launch (i.e. 17th December 2020 at 9:00a.m. PT)

    5-year GRT circulation schedule by Bucket
    5-year GRT circulation schedule by Bucket (Image source: The Graph)

    Indexers that assisted during the Testnet phase have also ben rewarded between USD$10,000 to USD$100,000 in GRT as a reward for their contributions.

    In addition, around 2% of the total GRT has been granted to several Education Programs and loans totalling around 2.5% had been made to independent ecosystem partners.

    Indexer Staking

    In order for users to stake in the nodes that operate the whole platform and sell their services in the query market, they have to lock their GRT. In return, they are given financial rewards. If the indexers work maliciously, like altering data intentionally, the GRT that they staked will be slashed.

    Mainnet now live!

    The Graph Network launched its main net on 17th December 2020 after 3 years of development! According to the team the mainnet launch includes the following components: Deployment of The Graph Network contracts on Ethereum mainnet, deployment of the GRT contract, distribution of GRT to takeovers, launch of the Bug County Program and new docs for network roles.

    With the mainnet launch, Indexers will first stress test and improve performance before supporting real query volume, which will be upwards of 5,000 queries per second. Of course, there will be rewards for Indexers who will now begin earning on-chain indexing rewards and query fees.

    Graph Roadmap: What’s next?

    Now that mainnet has launched, The Graph will continue building. The Team has stated that the Graph Foundation will work on building a production-ready Graph Explorer dApp and Gateway that will support all network contributors.

    The Graph is also open to any individuals or third-parties that want to build for the network and as mentioned previously, they an apply to the Grants Program or collaborate with other community contributors.

    Conclusion

    Looking at the current boom of the DeFi space, we can see how important it is for developers to be able to freely access blockchain data. Making the process faster and less difficult for everyone could potentially influence the growth of the space as well as its reliability, security, and capacity.

    Everyone saw the need to create a bridge of information between applications and blockchain data. The Graph sought out to answer that.

    And with the deployment of smart contracts that depend on user data, The Graph has proven itself to be easy to use, cost-efficient, and fast. The platform is seen as a promising tool to empower everyone in the community, especially those who are developing more use cases for the blockchain.

    Decentralised Finance (DeFi) series: tutorials, guides and more

    With content for both beginners and more advanced users, check out our YouTube DeFi series containing tutorials on the ESSENTIAL TOOLS you need for trading in the DeFi space e.g. MetaMask and Uniswap. As well as a deep dive into popular DeFi topics such as decentralized exchanges, borrowing-lending platforms and NFT marketplaces

    The DeFi series on this website also covers topics not explored on YouTube. For an introduction on what is DeFi, check out Decentralized Finance (DeFi) Overview: A guide to the HOTTEST trend in cryptocurrency

    Tutorials and guides for the ESSENTIAL DEFI TOOLS:

    More videos and articles are coming soon as part of our DeFi series, so be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our Youtube channel so you can be notified as soon as they come out!

    Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks and may result in the loss of your capital. You should carefully consider whether trading cryptocurrencies is right for you in light of your financial condition and ability to bear financial risks. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile and can fluctuate widely in a short period of time. As such, trading cryptocurrencies may not be suitable for everyone. Additionally, storing cryptocurrencies on a centralized exchange carries inherent risks, including the potential for loss due to hacking, exchange collapse, or other security breaches. We strongly advise that you seek independent professional advice before engaging in any cryptocurrency trading activities and carefully consider the security measures in place when choosing or storing your cryptocurrencies on a cryptocurrency exchange.

  • Coin DeFi($COIN): Cross-chain P2P DEX powered by AI?

    Coin DeFi($COIN): Cross-chain P2P DEX powered by AI?

    Coin DeFi ($COIN) aims to disrupt finance services by democratizing the industry, returning financial sovereignty to the people via decentralized Finance (DeFi). Through Coin Protocol, anyone can make cross-border and peer-to-peer transactions with ease and convenience, without incurring expensive fees. It also offers greater profit-generating opportunities through its stake-based incentive program.

    Background

    Coin DeFi is a project founded by Damon Nam (also the project’s CEO), who worked with Microsoft for 16 years, and has more than 20 years of experience in the tech industry. The team’s CTO, Byron Levels, also worked with Microsoft for 8 years.

    A group of advisors coming from different fields of expertise is supporting the development of the platform. These are professionals who have been known to work on blockchain, artificial intelligence (AI), and marketing initiatives, such as Christina Apatow, founder of FetchyFox, Pete Cashmore, founder of Mashable, Alex Mashinsky, founder of the Celsius Network, and Jeremy Gardener, founder of Augur.

    What is Coin DeFi?

    Coin DeFi is an Ethereum-based DeFi platform designed to facilitate a peer-to-peer transaction system that implements a community-based governance model. Through the platform, users can conveniently conduct cross-border money transfers, purchase cryptocurrencies, and earn additional profit from their assets through staking.

    Coin Defi Ecosystem (Source: coindefi website)

    There are two main components to the Coin ecosystem, namely, the COIN protocol and COIN token.

    COIN Protocol

    The COIN protocol is the project’s blockchain platform powered by smart contracts. The deployment of smart contracts enables the network to achieve greater performance and scalability while facilitating peer-to-peer transactions without the need for any third-party oversight.

    The COIN token is the backbone of the protocol’s economy. It is the platform’s native cryptocurrency asset that primarily functions as a medium of exchange as well as a staking token. It is also required for the execution of smart contracts on the platform and in backing the incentive scheme for the protocol’s liquidity providers. More details on this later.

    COIN Exchange

    The platform also features a non-custodial, peer-to-peer crypto-assets exchange. COIN Exchange is a cross-chain, decentralized wallet and exchange supported by smart contracts that enable atomic swaps complemented with AI technology.

    Some of the digital assets that can be traded in the protocol are Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and a selection of ERC-20-compliant tokens. Since the platform features cross-chain atomic swaps, a user can trade any token with another digital asset through the platform, even if they belong to different chains.

    To facilitate these peer-to-peer trustless, and cross-chain swaps on the exchange, it utilizes Hashed Timelock Contracts (HTLC). Basically, this is a system that requires transaction recipients to first acknowledge payments by way of a cryptographic proof within a defined time period, which is also the same technical framework implemented in Bitcoin’s Lightning Network.

    Liquidity

    Liquidity is a common concern amongst many decentralized exchanges (DEXs). To address this, COIN partnered with Coinbase to leverage their order books. This is facilitated by a matching algorithm that combines the liquidity in COIN and Coinbase order books.

    What the platform earns from transaction fees, they use for their COIN buyback programs and pool deposits. Here, half of what they earn is redistributed to liquidity providers and market makers as a reward. The rest is allocated to buy COIN tokens back to support its supply of liquidity and staking reserves.

    Governance Model

    The governance of the platform follows the Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) model, one that is community-driven.

    In this framework, COIN holders are considered the protocol’s stakeholders. Developers on the platform can propose protocol amendments, upgrades, features, and other changes, which stakeholders have to vote on before they are deployed. If the community doesn’t agree with any proposed modification on the protocol, it can be rejected by the community if it doesn’t garner enough votes.

    Coin DeFi’s Native Token ($COIN)

    COIN is the platform’s native utility token. Apart from functioning as a medium of exchange, the token can be used to pay for the platform’s transaction fees, staking, and voting. The incentive system of the platform also utilizes COIN tokens as its rewards.

    COIN is also a network access token, which means that the token is required to execute smart contracts, represent their voting rights, and compensate liquidity providers.

    $COIN Buybacks (Source: CoinDefi Pitch Deck)

    Staking

    $COIN can be used to supply liquidity to the platform. Furthermore, there are smart contracts designed to enable staking functions on the protocol. COIN holders only need to deposit their tokens and lock them in smart contracts. In return, they can earn additional COIN tokens as a reward.

    The reward for stakers is in proportion with the amount that they staked, prevailing interest rates, and the duration of their stake.

    A portion of the COIN tokens deposited on staking smart contracts goes to the platform’s staking reserve. This is used to supply funds that are redistributed to long-term COIN stakers. Around 25% of all COIN tokens in circulation fills the supply of this pool.

    $COIN Distribution (Source: CoinDefi Pitch Deck)

    Coin DAO

    The protocol also enables the implementation of a DAO, through a stakeholder model represented by COIN tokens, which enables the community to gain better control over the direction of the platform, including the introduction of new products, amendments to the existing protocol, and other forms of protocol modification, through a stake-based voting system.

    COIN holders can deposit tokens in the governance smart contract within the platform. The amount of tokens that holders lock in these contracts guarantee them an equivalent voting power on the platform. For example, a user who has locked 100 COIN tokens gains an equivalent of 100 votes as a consequence.

    Conclusion

    There are a lot of DeFi projects in the cryptocurrency space today. While Coin DeFi’s objective is a promising alternative away from the traditional financial system, it certainly comes with a lot of other competitors in DeFi offering the same financial products and services as well.

    From where the project stands today, it still has a lot to prove when compared with the more prominent DeFi platforms and exchanges. Perhaps its biggest strength is its AI assistant implementation to support platform users, but we have yet to see how that will be developed for the benefit of its user base. As a relatively young DeFi project, how it will grow its own community in the months ahead is going to be a significant factor in assessing how successful the project can be.

    Decentralised Finance (DeFi) series: tutorials, guides and more

    With content for both beginners and more advanced users, check out our YouTube DeFi series containing tutorials on the ESSENTIAL TOOLS you need for trading in the DeFi space e.g. MetaMask and Uniswap. As well as a deep dive into popular DeFi topics such as decentralized exchanges, borrowing-lending platforms and NFT marketplaces

    The DeFi series on this website also covers topics not explored on YouTube. For an introduction on what is DeFi, check out Decentralized Finance (DeFi) Overview: A guide to the HOTTEST trend in cryptocurrency

    Tutorials and guides for the ESSENTIAL DEFI TOOLS:

    More videos and articles are coming soon as part of our DeFi series, so be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our Youtube channel so you can be notified as soon as they come out!

    Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks and may result in the loss of your capital. You should carefully consider whether trading cryptocurrencies is right for you in light of your financial condition and ability to bear financial risks. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile and can fluctuate widely in a short period of time. As such, trading cryptocurrencies may not be suitable for everyone. Additionally, storing cryptocurrencies on a centralized exchange carries inherent risks, including the potential for loss due to hacking, exchange collapse, or other security breaches. We strongly advise that you seek independent professional advice before engaging in any cryptocurrency trading activities and carefully consider the security measures in place when choosing or storing your cryptocurrencies on a cryptocurrency exchange.

  • InsurAce Protocol: Insuring decentralised finance?

    InsurAce Protocol: Insuring decentralised finance?

    The cryptocurrency industry has enjoyed rapid growth and adoption thanks to its accessibility and open-source nature. Different people from all over the world can participate freely in crypto projects, with the option of anonymity. And thanks to this ease of access, the total locked value (TVL) in DeFi grew to over $3 Billion in 2020 and $44 billion in 2021, according to DeFi Pulse.

    However, as an industry based majorly on the internet with trillions of liquid digital assets, it is no surprise that it makes the perfect attraction for hackers hoping to run off with a score.

    Luckily, in the decentralized finance (DeFi) corner, liquidity providers (LPs) can still protect their investment through insurance protocols, each of which is armed with their unique solutions – one of the more promising ones is InsurAce.

    Background

    InsurAce was created by Oliver Xie, a cryptocurrency enthusiast and computer programmer. The decentralized insurance protocol was developed during the peak of DeFi growth in the third quarter of 2020, launching officially in October of the same year.

    The protocol is headquartered in Singapore, led by Oliver’s vision and steadfastness. After just two months of existence, the protocol was able to raise $1 Million in seed funding, from renowned institutions such as DeFiance Capital, Signum Capital, and Parafi Capital. Later, in February 2021, and an additional $3 Million was raised during its strategic round.

    They currently run a tight team, with a few experts and professionals at the helm of affairs, most of which are based in Singapore.

    What is InsurAce?

    InsurAce is an insurance protocol that offers DeFi assets a reliable, decentralized, and flexible coverage. Users are also able to enjoy low premiums and a sustainable investment return.

    InsurAce’s flexibility is its major highlight as it gives users the ability to cover their assets with a portfolio-based product design that optimizes cover cost. Users would also benefit from their cross-chain coverage and wallet accessibility, along with the protection of their assets and investments.

    How Does InsurAce Protocol Work?

    As both a DeFi and Insurance protocol, InsurAce runs two different arms that work synergistically to benefit all parties involved. As a decentralized platform, each role is filled by its users, each of which are rewarded with the INSUR token.

    The protocol also offers a more streamlined experience with its permissionless feature, where users can enjoy full anonymity without the KYC process that complicates other DeFi Insurance platforms.

    The Two Arms of InsurAce Protocol

    The first part of the investment arm involves contribution by a first-party known as the investor. As the name suggests, investors finance portfolios, each portfolio with its own risk/reward ratio which investors can choose from.

    The next party is the insurer, and these are participants that stake assets in the mutual insurance pool created by investors. The more direct class of users are the “insured” – they are the insurance customers, and they get the benefit of buying insurance covers, either in single or multiple pools.

    2 Arms of InsurAce Protocol (Image credit: InsurAce whitepaper)

    Features

    The InsurAce protocol will be responsible for providing a supporting architecture for the smooth operation and integration of the arms. To start with, the protocol will function to ensure adequate evaluation of risk to manage losses.

    Two risk assessment procedures exist. One with experts analyzing potential assets and pools with thorough auditing and code analysis. After which, a community assessment is carried out by volunteer members for further analysis and to come up with a risk score.

    It will also be in charge of claim requests, for insurers to check out their buys.

    More important, however, is the availability of liquidity for all users. To ascertain this, InsurAce plans to develop an enriched product line that is capable of covering a diverse number of DeFi protocols. By providing insurance services to multiple DeFi projects the platform retains its flexibility, remains open to opportunities while keeping tokens moving.

    The insurers would enjoy access to a wide range of asset pools in addition to considerably reduced cover costs and zero premium protection.

    SCR Mining and Governance

    When users bring in capital to stake into different mutual pools, they are rewarded with INSUR tokens as incentives. This process is known as Mining, and it offers rewards based on the magnitude of user contribution to the platform.

    As with most other DeFi projects, a Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) would be responsible for managing and regulating the activities of InsurAce protocol. To be eligible to become a member of the DAO, users must own INSUR Tokens.

    An advisory board made up of InsurAnce employees and independent experts will oversee the affairs of the DAO community, provide guidelines for its operation, and provide a contingency plan if the decentralized voting mechanism should fail.

    INSUR Token

    The INSUR token is the standard token on the InsurAce platform. It is based on Ethereum’s ERC20 standards and serves a variety of utility functions.

    As a governance token, it confers voting rights on its holders. Users who have the INSUR token can propose changes, vote on issues and proposals, and participate in claim assessments on the protocol. When a token holder participates actively in governance, he becomes entitled to a share of the fees generated on InsurAce.

    The token also incentivizes involvement in all the different roles available on the protocol. It serves as the reward for mining through capital provision, liquidity support, staking in investment pools and products.

    There will be a total of 100 million INSUR tokens in supply. And it is planned to be launched through a Liquidity Bootstrapping Pool (LBP) on Balancer from March 15th to March 17th, 2021. The proposal would see a total of 6,675,000 tokens vested after the LBP ends – with about 45% of the total token distribution kept in SCR mining reserves.

    Conclusion

    The sheer amount of fortune going into DeFi project and associated mining mechanisms is too much to leave to the whims of hackers and project developers. The impressive progress made by pioneer insurance projects like Nexus Mutual and Augur should not be taken for granted either.

    However, these insurance protocols are still scarce in numbers and hardly enough to cover the ever-growing need of the DeFi sector.  Which makes it difficult not to root for a platform like InsurAce that puts everything in place, taking the best out of existing protocols and adding a fresh detail.

    Decentralised Finance (DeFi) series: tutorials, guides and more

    With content for both beginners and more advanced users, check out our YouTube DeFi series containing tutorials on the ESSENTIAL TOOLS you need for trading in the DeFi space e.g. MetaMask and Uniswap. As well as a deep dive into popular DeFi topics such as decentralized exchanges, borrowing-lending platforms and NFT marketplaces

    The DeFi series on this website also covers topics not explored on YouTube. For an introduction on what is DeFi, check out Decentralized Finance (DeFi) Overview: A guide to the HOTTEST trend in cryptocurrency

    Tutorials and guides for the ESSENTIAL DEFI TOOLS:

    More videos and articles are coming soon as part of our DeFi series, so be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our Youtube channel so you can be notified as soon as they come out!

    Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks and may result in the loss of your capital. You should carefully consider whether trading cryptocurrencies is right for you in light of your financial condition and ability to bear financial risks. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile and can fluctuate widely in a short period of time. As such, trading cryptocurrencies may not be suitable for everyone. Additionally, storing cryptocurrencies on a centralized exchange carries inherent risks, including the potential for loss due to hacking, exchange collapse, or other security breaches. We strongly advise that you seek independent professional advice before engaging in any cryptocurrency trading activities and carefully consider the security measures in place when choosing or storing your cryptocurrencies on a cryptocurrency exchange.

  • BitStamp Exchange Review (2023): Well-established Exchange on Security and Regulation

    BitStamp Exchange Review (2023): Well-established Exchange on Security and Regulation

    Bitstamp is a Luxembourg-based cryptocurrency exchange that offers users a secure platform to trade Bitcoin (BTC), XRP, Ether (ETH), Litecoin (LTC), and Bitcoin Cash (BCH) against fiat currencies (USD, EUR, GBP) and deposit/withdraw fiat currencies using credit/debit cards. In this Bitstamp review, we’re going to share how Bitstamp works, its fees, who it works best for and whether or not it’s safe. What is more, you’ll know if Bitstamp is the right exchange for you.

    Sign up here to get started.

    What is BitStamp?

    Bitstamp is one of the oldest and most trusted cryptocurrency exchanges in operation. It is registered in Luxembourg and headquartered in the UK, and caters to both beginner and experienced traders. Customers can exchange bitcoin (BTC), XRP, ether (ETH), litecoin (LTC), and bitcoin cash (BCH) with each other and against fiat currencies (USD, EUR, GBP). They can also deposit and withdraw fiat currencies using their credit and debit cards. The trading and currency dashboards are clearly laid out and easy to use, making it a great choice for both novice and experienced traders.

    Bitstamp was founded in 2011 as a European alternative to Mt.Gox. Bitstamp offers a secure and accessible middle ground between advanced trading and trading for beginners. With its user-friendly interface, advanced security measures, and a variety of trade types, it is a great choice for both experienced traders and those just starting out in the world of cryptocurrency.

    Bitstamp offers users the ability to deposit and withdraw funds using their credit and debit cards, although this is usually more expensive than using a bank transfer. It has a solid security record, although it was subject to two cyberattacks in 2014 and 2015. Since then, it has managed to operate without incident and has been fully regulated by the Luxembourg government in 2016, making it a reliable and secure platform for users.

    The BitStamp Team

    The exchange company is led by CEO Nejc Kodric, with CTO David Osojnik, CFO Edward Kemp, and COO Vasja Zupan as key team members. Bitstamp offers a secure and reliable platform for customers to buy and sell digital assets, with a focus on providing a safe and secure trading environment. The company is committed to providing customers with the best customer service and support, and is constantly innovating to ensure customers have the best experience possible.

    Key Features of BitStamp

    BitStamp key features include:

    Trusted Crypto Exchange for Global Traders: Bitstamp is a leading cryptocurrency exchange that offers traders from around the world a secure and reliable platform to buy and sell digital assets. With high liquidity and a fiat-to-crypto gateway, It is one of the most trusted and established exchanges in the industry.

    Regulated Exchange: Bitstamp is the world’s first fully-licensed European cryptocurrency exchange, regulated by the Luxembourg Financial Industry Supervisory Commission (CSSF). It is a secure and reliable platform for trading digital currencies, offering users a safe and compliant way to buy and sell cryptocurrencies.

    Buy cryptocurrencies with a bank card: Bitstamp offers a convenient way to purchase Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies with a bank card. Customers can instantly buy digital currencies with their bank cards, making it easy to get started with cryptocurrency trading.

    Low SEPA transfer fees: For Europeans, SEPA transfers are a low-cost way to deposit and withdraw cash directly to and from their bank accounts. SEPA transfers are more affordable than wire transfers, making them a great option for those looking to buy or sell cryptocurrency.

    Mobile Application: Bistamp’s mobile app allows users to trade cryptocurrencies on the go, with support for both Android and iOS devices.

    Perfect for Beginners: Bitstamp is a user-friendly cryptocurrency exchange that offers both beginner-friendly and advanced trading interfaces, making it easy for anyone to buy and sell digital currencies.

    In summary, Bitstamp is a secure and reliable cryptocurrency exchange, offering a wide range of trading options for both novice and experienced traders. With over 9 years of experience, Bitstamp has proven its security and high liquidity, making it a great choice for those looking to buy and sell digital assets.

    Key Advantages of BitStamp

    Fiat Trading

    Bitstamp is a cryptocurrency exchange that allows users to buy and sell cryptocurrencies with fiat currencies. It supports USD, GBP, EUR, and Swiss Francs, making it a great option for beginners who are just getting started in the crypto world. It also offers a secure platform and low fees, making it a great choice for those looking to buy and sell cryptocurrencies. With its easy-to-use interface and wide range of fiat currencies, Bitstamp is a great choice for those looking to get started in the crypto world.

    Payment Methods

    Bitstamp makes it easy to get started with cryptocurrency trading, offering users the ability to fund their accounts with credit cards and bank transfers. This makes it simpler than ever to buy and sell digital currencies.

    Security

    Bitstamp is one of the most secure cryptocurrency exchanges on the market, with almost all of its funds kept in cold storage and fully insured. In 2015, Bitstamp was hacked and 19,000 Bitcoins were stolen, worth around 5 million USD. However, no customer funds were lost and the platform was completely rebuilt to prevent future hacks. The exchange has worked hard to ensure customer safety and security, and is now one of the most trusted exchanges in the industry.

    Finally, it also offers its users two-factor authentication, text message alerts, and PGP encryption to keep user information private.

    Fees

    Bitstamp offers some of the lowest fees in the market, making it an ideal choice for new traders. Fees vary depending on the payment method and location, but are generally low and easy to understand.

    Customer Service

    Bitstamp is committed to providing excellent customer service, with a UK-based helpline for emergencies and a detailed FAQ page. They respond to user emails within three days, ensuring traders are kept happy and satisfied.

    Reputation

    Bitstamp is a reliable and professional crypto exchange, with links to financial institutions worldwide and full licensing. It has been audited by Ernst & Young, one of the Big Four accountancy firms.

    Mobile App

    Bitstamp’s mobile app has been highly rated by users, receiving an impressive 4.8 out of 5 stars on the Apple Store. This is a testament to the quality of the app, which provides users with a convenient and secure way to access their accounts.

    Key Disadvantages of BitStamp

    Coin Selection

    Bitstamp is a popular cryptocurrency exchange that offers a limited selection of around 70 digital assets for trading. These include Bitcoin (BTC), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Litecoin (LTC), Ethereum (ETH) and Ripple (XRP). While this selection is suitable for beginner traders, more experienced traders may prefer an exchange with a larger selection of trading pairs, such as Binance, which offers more than 1400.

    User Friendliness

    Bitstamp is a professional trading exchange that can be difficult for new users to understand. For those with no trading experience, Coinbase may be a better option as it is simpler and easier to use.

    BitStamp Fees

    Bitstamp is a cryptocurrency exchange with a competitive fee structure. Cryptocurrency deposits are free, while withdrawals incur a fixed network fee which differs per cryptocurrency. An exception to this is when customers withdraw bitcoin using BitGo Instant, which costs 0.1% of the amount being transferred, and when they withdraw Ripple IOUs, which costs 0.2% of the transferred amount. Bitstamp’s fees are cheap compared to many rivals, making it an attractive option for those looking to buy and sell cryptocurrencies.

    Currency/Withdrawal FeeBitstampKrakenBitfinexCoinbase Pro
    Bitcoin (BTC)
    		0.0005 BTC0.0005 BTC0.0004 BTCFree
    Ethereum (ETH)0.001 ETH0.005 ETH0.00135 ETHFree
    Litecoin (LTC)0.001 LTC0.001 LTC0.001 LTCFree
    Ripple (XRP)0.02 XRP0.02 XRP0.1 XRPFree
    Bitcoin Cash (BCH)0.0001 BCH0.0001 BCH0.001 BCHFree

    International wire transfers have a deposit fee of 0.05% (minimum of €7.50) and a withdrawal fee of 0.1% (minimum of €25). European customers making a SEPA bank transfer deposit funds to Bitstamp free of charge, while SEPA withdrawal costs €3.00. Bitstamp offers customers a secure and convenient way to buy and sell digital currencies with competitive fees. The platform is designed to make it easy to buy and sell cryptocurrencies with fiat currencies, with no hidden fees or charges. Customers can also benefit from the low fees associated with SEPA transfers, making it an attractive option for those looking to buy and sell digital currencies.

    Any amount purchased directly with a bank card comes with a 5% fee on Bitstamp’s behalf, and may have additional fees charged by the card issuer. Bitstamp offers a secure platform for users to buy and sell digital currencies, with a range of features and tools to help them manage their investments. 

    It offers competitive trading fees, with a starting rate of 0.50% for users with a 30-day trading volume of less than $10,000. This rate is lower than many other exchanges, making Bitstamp an attractive option for traders.

    The minimum trade amount at Bitstamp is 25 EUR/USD or 0.001 for BTC-denominated pairs. Bitstamp charges a 0.50% fee for any trader whose 30-day volume is less than $10,000. Other exchanges like Kraken and Bitfinex tend to charge less per trade, with Kraken offering a 0.16% fee for market makers and 0.26% for takers, and Bitfinex charging 0.1% for market makers and 0.2% for takers. Bitstamp is a reliable and secure platform for traders looking to buy and sell digital assets.

    It offers low-cost SEPA deposits and withdrawals, and discounts for high-volume traders. Although it is not the cheapest option out there, it is still a cost-effective choice for low-volume traders. The platform is secure and reliable, and offers a wide range of trading options. It is a great choice for European traders looking for a secure and cost-effective trading platform.

    Is BitStamp a Wallet?

    Bitstamp is an online platform for buying and selling cryptocurrencies, but it is not a wallet. Wallets are used to store and access cryptocurrency codes, and they can be either hot (online) or cold (offline). Bitstamp is not a wallet, but it does provide a secure platform for buying and selling cryptocurrencies. It also offers a range of features such as two-factor authentication, multi-signature accounts, and a variety of payment methods. Bitstamp is a reliable and secure platform for buying and selling cryptocurrencies, but it is not a wallet. To store and access your cryptocurrency codes, you will need to use a wallet.

    It is important to never keep all your cryptocurrency online, and a combination of hot and cold storage is the best way to ensure your funds are secure. For added security, a hardware wallet such as the Ledger Nano X is recommended. This device is similar to a USB stick and provides an extra layer of protection for your crypto assets. With Bitstamp, users can rest assured that their funds are safe and secure.

    Who Is Bitstamp Best For?

    Bitstamp is a secure and reliable platform with millions of satisfied users. It offers a professional design and features that are ideal for experienced users, but may be confusing for beginners. The platform is easy to use and provides a safe and secure environment for users to buy, sell, and trade digital currencies. It also offers a variety of features, such as low fees, fast transactions, and a wide range of payment options. Bitstamp is a great choice for those looking for a reliable and secure platform to buy, sell, and trade digital currencies.

    This exchange is a great choice for beginner crypto traders who want to get started quickly and easily. The exchange offers fiat trading and credit card purchases, making it easy to get started. Bitstamp is a perfect choice for users who don’t want to wait to start trading. The exchange also offers a range of features and tools to help users make informed decisions. 

    Conclusion

    Bitstamp is a trusted crypto exchange, renowned for its security and customer-focused team. With a user-friendly interface, it’s becoming one of the world’s most popular crypto exchanges. If you’re looking for a secure and reliable platform to trade cryptocurrencies, Bitstamp could be the perfect choice for you.

    Sign up here to get started today!

    Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks and may result in the loss of your capital. You should carefully consider whether trading cryptocurrencies is right for you in light of your financial condition and ability to bear financial risks. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile and can fluctuate widely in a short period of time. As such, trading cryptocurrencies may not be suitable for everyone. Additionally, storing cryptocurrencies on a centralized exchange carries inherent risks, including the potential for loss due to hacking, exchange collapse, or other security breaches. We strongly advise that you seek independent professional advice before engaging in any cryptocurrency trading activities and carefully consider the security measures in place when choosing or storing your cryptocurrencies on a cryptocurrency exchange.

  • Bibox Exchange Review (2023): More for Trading Cryptocurrencies

    Bibox Exchange Review (2023): More for Trading Cryptocurrencies

    Bibox is the world’s first AI-powered digital asset exchange with a Swiss VQF license. It offers robust security, a wide range of trading options, innovative listing programs, and top-notch customer service. This exchange review will include both pros and cons of Bibox, including information about the company, the main features and even more.

    Sign up here to get started.

    What is Bibox?

    Bibox, the pioneering AI-powered digital asset exchange, has been providing robust and secure systems. Moreover, it also provices a wide range of trading options, innovative listing programs, and top-notch customer service since 2017. As one of the few blockchain enterprises with a Swiss VQF license, Bibox has earned the admiration and trust of cryptocurrency experts and traders around the world.

    Bibox offers daily trading services trusted by over 1 million cryptocurrency traders and investors from 160 countries, particularly in Asia, Europe, and North America. With 579 tokens and 826 trading markets, Bibox’s spot daily trading volume exceeds 1 billion US dollars.

    Bibox offers a variety of products. Bibox CopyTrading is a pioneering cryptocurrency trading platform that allows traders to share in the profits of fund management strategies. Additionally, Bibox’s AI-powered Trading Bot helps users maximize their trading profits through advanced quantitative analysis. Furthermore, Bibox’s SELECTED service offers a unique line of listing and trading services. It includes Super Start, Pre-taste, and S-POOL, which only feature high-quality blockchain projects. Bibox users can take advantage of discounted prices and near-zero risk of loss when purchasing project tokens.

    Key Features and Advantages of Bibox

    Low Trading Fees

    When selecting the best crypto exchange platform, it is essential to consider trading fees as they can significantly impact your profits. To maximize your earnings, it is wise to opt for a platform that offers low trading fees. Bibox offers some of the lowest trading fees in the top-tier crypto trading platform industry, with takers paying 0.20% and makers paying 0.075%. This is lower than the industry standard of 0.25% – 0.15%.

    Makers are those who create an order to be filled by someone else, while takers are those who place an order to buy cryptocurrencies at a specific price. Generally, makers pay lower fees than takers. Bibox does not charge any fees for deposits, however, a 1% fee applies for withdrawals. The minimum withdrawal amount is $15.

    Decentralized Exchange

    Bibox is a popular decentralized exchange, allowing users to directly trade cryptocurrencies without any controlling institutions. This type of peer-to-peer (P2P) trading is becoming increasingly popular due to its lack of centralized control. Decentralized exchanges make registration quick and easy, allowing you to start trading without having to provide your personal information.

    Decentralized exchanges such as Bibox offer users more freedom, but they often have lower liquidity than centralized crypto exchanges, resulting in less stable prices for assets. Additionally, there are some issues that people distinguish when discussing decentralized crypto exchanges, which will be discussed further in this Bibox exchange review.

    Easy to Use

    It’s essential to select a platform that makes it easy to buy and sell cryptocurrencies if you’re into daily trading. Fees and security measures are important, but usability should not be overlooked.

    Bibox offers a user-friendly interface, making it ideal for beginners. The exchange provides all the necessary information to make informed decisions. These includes the current value, lowest price per day, fluctuations in the trade, and the highest price for 24 hours. Additionally, Bibox has a mobile app available for IOS and Android devices, which can be downloaded from the App Store and Google Play.

    Very Secure

    Bibox ensures the highest level of security for its users with SSL encryption technology, multi-factor authentication and Google 2-Step Verification.

    For maximum security, it is recommended to store the majority (if not all) of your cryptocurrencies in secure wallets such as Ledger (Nano S and Nano X) and Trezor (One and Model T). These cold wallets keep your private keys offline, ensuring your assets are kept away from prying eyes.

    Key Disadvantages of Bibox

    Despite all the positive aspects of Bibox exchange, there are some drawbacks that should be taken into consideration. For those looking for a reliable cryptocurrency exchange platform, Binance, Kraken, and KuCoin are more suitable options.

    Doesn’t Support Fiat Currencies

    One of the biggest issues with Bibox is that it does not support fiat currencies, meaning users must first purchase cryptocurrencies on another platform and then transfer them to Bibox. To make this process easier, we have provided a step-by-step guide on how to make a deposit at the end of this Bibox review.

    Bibox offers a wide selection of over 50 cryptocurrencies to trade against Ethereum or Bitcoin, including but not limited to:

    • BTC
    • ETH
    • LTC
    • EOS
    • BIX
    • NEO
    • QTUM
    • etc.

    After buying cryptocurrencies, you can choose from a wide range of available options, so you don’t have to worry about the supported coins.

    Negative Reviews Online

    When conducting research for this Bibox review, I encountered a large number of negative reviews. Despite not having any issues when using this platform, I paid close attention to what other customers had to say. It’s wise to be cautious when reading online reviews about any company. Many customers have reported that they were unable to delete their accounts, as well as claims of fake volume and hidden fees.

    Decentralized = Not Controlled

    Bibox is a decentralized exchange, meaning that it operates without a central authority. This is beneficial as it allows users to trade directly with each other, without their personal information being stored on the platform. However, this also means that there is no central authority to provide oversight or protection.

    Since there is no central authority controlling the platform, it is vulnerable to hacking. If the platform is hacked, users will not be able to recover their cryptocurrencies.

    How to Use Bibox Cryptocurrency Exchange?

    How to Create an Account on Bibox?

    Create your account on Bibox quickly and easily by following these simple steps:

    1. Create an account on Bibox by clicking the “Sign Up” button on the homepage.
    2. Sign up with your email and password, and enter a referral code (if you have one) to get started.
    3. Click “Receive SMS” to get a 6-digit code for verification.
    4. Create an account now by adding the code to access our services.

    The Bibox registration process is quick and easy, as it is a decentralized crypto exchange.

    How to Make a Deposit on Bibox?

    Make a deposit to your account quickly and easily with this step-by-step guide. Follow these simple steps below:

    1. Access Funds Quickly by Clicking the “Funds” Button at the Top Right Corner of the Page.
    2. Deposit funds quickly and easily by clicking the “Deposit” button at the top of the page.
    3. Choose the currency you wish to deposit and get started now.
    4. Copy your deposit address by clicking “Click to copy” after selecting the asset.
    5. Transfer your cryptocurrencies from your trading platform or wallet to your deposit address by selecting “Withdraw” or “Transfer”.

    Scan the QR code to quickly and securely transfer your assets.

    If you’re looking for the simplest way to purchase cryptocurrencies, Binance is the perfect choice. This digital currency exchange allows you to easily buy the most popular coins with your credit card. Unfortunately, Bibox does not support fiat currencies, so you cannot purchase BTC, ETH, or any other cryptocurrency on the platform with your credit card.

    Choose reliable wallets like Ledger and Trezor to protect your assets from theft. These hardware wallets will ensure your assets are secure.

    Conclusion

    Bibox is a Singapore-based decentralized cryptocurrency exchange that offers low trading fees, good security measures, and an easy-to-use platform. However, it does not support fiat currencies, is not regulated, and has received multiple negative reviews online.

    It is essential to keep your cryptocurrencies secure at all times when using this platform. To ensure the safety of your digital assets, we recommend using a reliable hardware wallet such as Ledger or Trezor. These wallets are also known as cold wallets as they store your private keys offline.

    This Bibox review should have answered all of your questions and prepared you to join the crypto world. If you prefer exchanges that support fiat currencies and have a better reputation, there are plenty of options to choose from.

    Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks and may result in the loss of your capital. You should carefully consider whether trading cryptocurrencies is right for you in light of your financial condition and ability to bear financial risks. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile and can fluctuate widely in a short period of time. As such, trading cryptocurrencies may not be suitable for everyone. Additionally, storing cryptocurrencies on a centralized exchange carries inherent risks, including the potential for loss due to hacking, exchange collapse, or other security breaches. We strongly advise that you seek independent professional advice before engaging in any cryptocurrency trading activities and carefully consider the security measures in place when choosing or storing your cryptocurrencies on a cryptocurrency exchange.