Bitcoin.com launches a cryptocurrency exchange

As expected, Bitcoin.com, a website that provides news and information about bitcoin cash and bitcoin, opens its new cryptocurrency exchange to the public today. 

To entice traders to the platform, for the next three months, the exchange is offering a variety of promotional benefits, including “negative 0.3 percent trading fees,” in which traders can earn money back on all transactions. Traders who pre-registered get 25 percent off future transaction fees.

A competitive market

Danish Chaudhry, managing director of the exchange, told Decrypt that Bitcoin.com, which has been working on the project for a year, is hoping to compete against the bigger, more established exchanges, such as Coinbase and Binance by catering to its base. “Bitcoin.com is one of the most trusted brands in the industry,” he said.

The current incarnation of the site was launched by Roger Ver in June, 2015, to provide accessible information about the Bitcoin platform. Ver subsequently led a controversial fork of bitcoin to bitcoin cash, which the site is known for advocating, as well.

Early signs are promising

Bitcoin.com is reportedly headquartered in St. Kitts and Nevis, in the West Indies.  The new exchange will cover several base trading pairs consisting of bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), bitcoin cash (BCH) and the stable currency Tether (USDT). Other coins listed upon the launch are Ripple (XRP), Litecoin (LTC), EOS (EOS), Tron (TRX), Stellar (XLM), Dash and Zcash (ZEC). Chaudhry said more coins will be added over time.

 “We’ve had a great reception from the community already with over 11,000 pre-registers,” he said. “Crypto is all about accessibility to the financial system. We’ve been on a mission to make crypto usable for all.”

What’s next

 Chaudhry said the negative 0.3 percent fee process will encourage newcomers to “get paid to trade. The negative-fee promotion is valid on up to $1 million worth of cumulative trades per account.” (If you happen to be a whale, the promotion is also valid on up to $1 billion worth of cumulative trades on the Bitcoin.com exchange. The promotional period will last until December 2, 2019.

 He said the exchange is also offering high-end security features, including cold-storage options, institutional-grade encryption and two-factor authentication.

 Bitcoin.com has slowly been expanding its services beyond being a news and information site. It launched a mobile wallet for bitcoin and bitcoin cash in August, 2017, which the company claims has been downloaded more than 2 million times. And in June, it launched a peer-to-peer, bitcoin cash trading platform.