The next cryptocurrency exchange that the Bytwork.com team reviewed was one of the largest exchanges by trading volume - Bitfinex.
Bitfinex is one of the largest cryptocurrency trading platforms. Founded in 2012, Bitfinex was one of the first professional platforms created in response to the strong interest in cryptocurrency trading.
Thanks to the support of the Russian language, the exchange is gaining increasing popularity in Russia and neighboring countries (Belarus, Ukraine, etc.).
Despite the fact that the exchange is registered in Hong Kong (China was one of the first to start mining and trading cryptocurrency), foreigners predominate among its creators.
Bitfinex
Advantages and reviews of the Bitfinex crypto exchange:
- Trading volumes;
- Availability of interface localization;
- Safety of use;
- Mobile application support.
Disadvantages and reviews of the Bitfinex crypto exchange:
- Replenishment cost in dollars;
- A small number of currencies.
Cryptocurrencies have become incredibly popular today, and new tools for trading and working with them appear almost every day. However, there are also projects that have been operating for several years, having managed to gather their audience and earned a reputation in the crypto market. This article will look at the Bitfinex cryptocurrency exchange, one such example. We will find out how to work on it, how to get verified and how to deposit money. Let's look at other questions that relate to interacting with this project and how to get started.
Social media
The broker uses social networks to attract potential clients. The company has 719,200 followers on Twitter. The page is tailored for English-speaking users, as it is not translated into Russian. There are almost 7,000 members on Instagram. There is a similar situation as with the previous social network. On Facebook, 21,088 people subscribed to the public page. Again, due to the lack of Russian publications, it is not interesting to audiences from Russia and the CIS.
Bitfinex Exchange Review
Bitfinex is a company whose cryptocurrency trading exchange was registered in Hong Kong. Team members are also known for their work with the Tether (USDT) project. The platform provides its users with exchange services, margin trading is also present and all major types of coins and tokens are supported. The project was launched in the fall of 2012. The developers took a competent approach to security issues and provided their users with a reliable trading platform. To work with fiat currencies, a trader must enable two-factor authentication.
The country of residence of traders and investors does not matter; the crypto exchange strives to be international. The official website has translations into some languages of the world. English, Russian and Chinese languages are available.
The Russian translation is very high quality, which contributes to the popularity of the platform in the post-Soviet countries. The developers offer an API for webmasters. With its help you can find out the exchange rate and work with your account. Its detailed description, examples of use and code can be found on the official website of the exchange.
The creators also took care of supporting mobile platforms. Applications are available for Android and iOS operating systems. They can be found in the official PlayMarket and AppStore stores.
At the end of 2017, an incident occurred during which the project was blocked by Roskomnadzor on the territory of the Russian Federation. Users are faced with the fact that the site does not work and does not open. Most of the ways to bypass the blocking led to a deterioration in the quality of work, because the exchange simply slows down when using VPN services. The developers did not provide a mirror and traders from Russia must choose how to access the site themselves.
general information
Attention! The minimum deposit to get started is the equivalent of 10,000 USD
Bitfinex was born in 2012. Its creator is IFINEX BVI, a company registered in China. Now it is one of the world's largest exchanges, which, in addition to currency exchange, has already opened access to peer-to-peer financing, the OTC market and margin trading.
The platform supports the Russian language and can be used by Russian users. English and Chinese are also available. Trading volumes on the exchange reach a billion dollars per day. In the fall of 2022, the exchange had 22.5 million users.
Registration and verification on Bitfinex
To start trading, a trader needs to register a new trading account. There should be no difficulties; these instructions describe in detail how to register. You do not need to enter any special data in the registration field. The form requires you to provide your name, email address, and desired password.
The next step is to confirm your email address using the link that will come in the letter. This will open access to your personal account, where basic options will be available, for example, such as making money.
To fully operate and be able to both withdraw money and make a deposit in dollars, you must undergo verification. This will require a number of steps.
The first thing you need to do is fill out a form with detailed information. It should be noted that only adults can trade on the stock exchange. Next, you need to provide scans or high-quality photographs of documents that can confirm the user’s personal data. Documents, by the way, must be translated into English. It is also necessary to present a bank statement from the account from which dollars will be deposited. The last one is address confirmation. To do this, you can present a utility bill, but it should not be older than three months.
Trading commissions
Trading commissions on the exchange are calculated on a Maker/Taker basis . The former place orders, thereby increasing the liquidity of the platform. Therefore, the commission for makers is less than for takers who buy back an open trade.
For the execution of transactions, makers pay a commission of 0.1%, takers - from 0.2%.
Trading commissions on Bitfinex
The more transactions a trader has made over the last 30 days, the lower the commission.
There is another way to reduce trading fees when trading on Bitfinex - pay for purchases and sales with the internal currency of the LEO platform .
More information about Bitfinex trading and other commissions can be found on the website in the Commissions/Fees section.
Deposit and withdrawal of money
Depositing and withdrawing funds on Bitfinex can be done in many ways. The exchange supports the following cryptocurrencies:
- Bitcoin
- EOS
- Ethereum
- Ripple
- Litecoin
- Ethereum Classic
- NEO
- Bitcoin Cash
- IOTA
- Monero
- ZCash
- Dash
- Bitcoin Gold
- Metaverse ETP
- QTUM
In addition to cryptocurrencies, users have access to bank transfers and card withdrawals. To do this, you need to go to the withdrawal section. There are no withdrawal limits.
It will be more profitable to use cryptocurrencies for replenishment, because in this case no commissions are charged. If a transfer through a bank was chosen, the commission is at least 0.1%, but not less than 20 USD. Thus, if the amount is small, the trader loses a lot of money.
Withdrawal of funds
To withdraw funds, click on the “Withdraw” button
Selecting the currency to withdraw
In the window that opens, fill out the form
1 – Enter the address of your wallet to which funds will be withdrawn
2 – Specify the amount required for withdrawal
3 – Select the type of wallet from which the withdrawal will be made (we talked about the types of wallets above)
4 – check the box to confirm that you agree to the terms of automatic withdrawal of funds
5 – click on “Request withdrawal of funds”
Important. If you have enabled two-level authentication (2fa), then the withdrawal of funds will be almost instantaneous, and if you have not enabled it, you will have to wait for confirmation of the withdrawal of funds for some time
How to trade on Bitfinex
Bitfinex supports both exchange and margin trading. The first option involves the use of the trader’s personal funds, and the second uses leverage. In this case, financing is provided by a special platform. This means that anyone can borrow funds from another trader on the exchange and trade them. It should be noted that if the exchange rate drops, the user may lose his money, because the open order will be closed automatically, and the money will be returned to the lender, taking into account all interest.
The exchange supports various types of orders and all of them are available to traders. They allow you to trade more efficiently. Among them there are stop limit, stop loss, stop order, trailing stop.
- Limit allows you to buy and sell currency at a selected price or a more profitable one, if one is present in the order book.
- Market is the simplest solution for beginners and allows you to buy or sell crypto at the current price on the exchange without any extra steps.
- A stop order automatically executes a transaction when the price reaches the price level chosen by the trader.
- The “One cancels other” order is both a stop order and a limit order. If one of them is executed, the other will be canceled immediately.
- A “Fill or Kill” order is the same as a limit order, but with a cancellation function if it is not executed within a selected period of time.
Enter funds
To deposit funds, click on the “Top up account” button in the upper right corner on the main page
The system will immediately warn you that in order to access all the capabilities of the exchange, you need to deposit funds in cryptocurrency or dollars (if verified) equivalent to 1,000 US dollars.
It is worth immediately noting that subsequently you do not need to maintain such a balance; after activating your account, you will be able to reduce the amount of funds entered.
We close this warning and move on. You need to select the cryptocurrency that you will deposit into your account. To do this, find it in the list of all currencies traded on Bitfinex and click on it. For example, you want to enter Ethereum.
Once you click on ETH, another warning will open. This time about the fact that the commission for input exists only if you enter an amount less than that indicated in the list. For example, the minimum deposit amount for Ethereum is 0.0027 ETH.
If the amount entered is greater than the specified amount, no commission is charged.
Next you will be redirected to the page of the selected currency (if this does not happen, click on the name of the selected coin again)
On the page that opens, you will be warned again about the minimum input amount. Here you need to choose one of three wallets:
- Exchange Wallet is a wallet for trading on the exchange using deposited funds
- Margin Wallet is a wallet for margin trading, that is, in order to trade with leverage (borrowed funds), you need to make a deposit - the so-called margin. You enter margin into this wallet.
- Funding Wallet is a wallet for funding other traders.
Margin trading is a type of trading in which a trader (a person who makes transactions on the stock exchange) has the so-called “leverage,” that is, borrowed funds. If on a traditional stock exchange you borrow funds from a broker, then on the Bitfinex exchange you borrow funds from the same traders as you. Moreover, on Bitfinex you agree with your investor on when you will return the interest on the loan: at the end of the transaction or you will transfer it to his account daily. Bitfinex allows you to engage in margin trading in a ratio of 1 to 3.3, that is, with $30, you can trade $100. At the same time, $30 is your margin - a deposit for the investor.
Funds can be easily transferred between these wallets.
After you have selected a wallet and clicked on the button to generate it, copy the wallet address. It must be entered in the “recipient address” column in your cold wallet / wallet on another exchange / in the corresponding column in the exchanger, and so on - depending on where you are transferring funds from.
After the funds have been transferred, trading can begin.
Security and support
The company knows firsthand about problems with intruders and security, because hackers have repeatedly attempted to hack the service. This led to the fact that the developers worked carefully on the security system and continue to refine it to this day. To ensure the safety of saving your money on the exchange, it is proposed to follow certain measures. For example, it is better to enable two-factor authentication, use a special phrase to verify transactions, disable the open session function and limit the ability to access the sessions section. Moreover, the exchange has the ability to block an attempt to withdraw funds when logging in from a new IP address and requires you to prove that you are not a bot.
All these features have been added to reduce the risk of users' trading accounts being hacked. After all, even if attackers manage to gain access to the account, transferring funds will still not be possible.
It should be noted that there were also cases of DDoS attacks on the exchange. The last successful attack took place at the end of 2017. Technical support was then inundated with letters from users who complained that they couldn’t access the exchange and asked to sort out the situation.
In general, according to users on the forums, there are no difficulties in receiving technical support, but sometimes you have to wait too long for a response letter.
In conclusion, it should be said that the Bitfinex exchange will be an excellent choice for those who are interested only in the most popular cryptocurrencies and the highest possible trading volumes. The project is aimed at professional traders and large investors, as evidenced by the presence of serious financial instruments. On Bitfinex you can both short and long-term invest. Despite some incidents in the past, the platform can be safely recommended for use. Have our readers had any experience with this project? We invite you to share it in the comments to the article with other users.
Advantages and disadvantages
Like any active exchange, Bitfinex has its pros and cons. The advantage of the exchange is its huge turnover, large selection of currencies, margin trading with leverage, similar to Forex and the stock market. The number of clients on the exchange is so large that in 2022, registration of new users was even suspended for a year. The creators of the square promised to expand the infrastructure and reopen access. Bitfinex offers a large set of orders (limit, market, stop orders).
The main disadvantage of the exchange is its ban in some regions of Russia. The scandal is related to the actions of Roskomnadzor, which closed the exchange website at the beginning of 2022. Mostly problems with opening a website arise in Moscow. The second disadvantage is the large costs incurred by those users who decide to withdraw dollars from the system. There is a risk of losing funds as a result of a hacker attack. Unfortunately, such cases have already happened on the stock exchange.
According to customer reviews, the trading platform works with varying degrees of success. Some users praise the user-friendly interface, the ability to work in Russian, and the large selection of financial instruments. Others, on the contrary, consider the project unfinished and unsuitable for beginners due to the very high commission (the exchange charges a fee if the deposit amount is less than 1 thousand dollars, but does not charge money for replenishing an account with cryptocurrency). For Euro and Dollar deposits, the user fee is 0.1% (minimum $20).
Users are also confused by the minimum deposit size of 10 thousand dollars for new users (you can deposit fiat or cryptocurrency in this equivalent). Not all traders are ready for such serious investments. But the exchange requirement, which has been in effect since the beginning of 2022, does not apply to old users.
Of the negative reviews, there are mainly complaints about lengthy verification, which involves sending scans of documents. Some traders do not like the size of the commission, as well as disputes between the creators of the exchange and Roskomnadzor (in 2022, the operation of the exchange in Russia was suspended). Users also note that sometimes problems arise with withdrawals (money can take a whole day). However, in general, the exchange has good reviews, although mostly from old users who did not have to deposit large sums.
| Advantages of the exchange | Disadvantages of the exchange |
| large selection of cryptocurrencies | long verification |
| great interface | withdrawal delay |
| no commission for replenishing your account with cryptocurrency | high commission when withdrawing funds |
| sophisticated security system | problems with technical support |
| Russian language | problems with opening a website in Russia |
| good mobile application | the risk of losing money, like on any other exchange |
