Key highlights from CryptoCompare’s April 2019 Exchange Review
Top crypto-to-crypto exchanges – Monthly volumes increased by 57%. Fcoin topped the rankings at $37.1 billion (up 300%), followed by OKEx and ZB at $35.1 billion (up 12.4%) and $32.4 billion (up 18.8%) respectively.
Top fiat-to-crypto exchanges – Monthly volumes increased by 85%. Bithumb was the top exchange at $17 billion, despite a 47% drop in volumes, followed by Upbit and Bitfinex at $8.7 billion (up 20%) and $6.7 billion (up 114%) respectively. Coinbase, Kraken, Bitstamp and Coinsbit also enjoyed a surge in volumes in April, while Liquid experienced a decrease.
Decentralized exchanges – While Ethereum once again attracted the greatest volumes at $194 million, these were down 42%. WavesDEX was at $32.5 million (up 3.5%) followed by IDEX at $31.4 million (up 15.9%). DEXs represent only 0.1% of the global spot market.
Transaction fee mining exchanges – There was a sharp increase in TFM volumes, led by FCoin at $37.1 billion (up 300%), followed by CoinBene at $27 billion (up 51.5%) and ZBG at $16 billion (up 37.2%).
Crypto derivatives – bitFlyer Lighting (XBT-JPY perpetual futures) saw the highest daily average volumes at $1.6 billion, followed by BitMEX (XBT-$perpetual futures) at $1.1 billion and OKEx Futures at $1.1 billion (several futures products). In comparison, regulated futures exchanges represented a very small proportion of volumes with CME trading a daily average of $0.3 billion and CryptoFacilities trading $36.9 million.
Institutional Bitcoin derivatives – CME continues to dominate with average daily volumes of $256 million (up 263%), followed by Grayscale’s Bitcoin trust product (GBTC) at $29.7 million (up 239%). Despite having chosen to cease listing additional Bitcoin futures products, CBOE’s Bitcoin futures traded a daily average of $9.9 million (up 109%).
Crypto-to-crypto vs fiat-to-crypto – Once again, April saw a significant increase in volumes across exchanges offering only crypto pairs with $396 billion traded (up 49%). Crypto-to-crypto volumes represented 84.5% of total spot volume in April. Trading on exchanges also offering fiat pairs increased to $72 billion (up 25%).
Bitcoin-to-fiat – The USD accounted for 60% of all Bitcoin trading into fiat, at BTC 1.6 million (up 74.7%). BTC-JPY volumes continued to decrease, coming in at BTC 0.3 million (down 40%), accounting for only 10% of all Bitcoin to fiat trading (vs 24% in March). BTC-KRW volumes continued to increase, accounting for BTC 0.3 million (up 17.6%).
Bitcoin-to-stablecoin – BTC-USDT trading represented 78.9% of total volume (across fiat or stablecoin), at BTC 10.3 million (up 15%). The BTC-USDT pair accounts for 97.9% of Bitcoin-to-stablecoin trading, followed by PAX, USDC and TUSD.
Predominant fee type? – Exchanges that charge taker fees traded $352 billion (up 30%), representing 75.1% of total volume. Those charging transaction fee mining traded $115 billion (up 124%), accounting for 24.6%.
Disclaimer: Opinions expressed at The Daily Hodl are not investment advice. Investors should do their due diligence before making any high-risk investments in Bitcoin, cryptocurrency or digital assets. Please be advised that your transfers and trades are at your own risk, and any loses you may incur are your responsibility. The Daily Hodl does not recommend the buying or selling of any cryptocurrencies or digital assets, nor is The Daily Hodl an investment advisor. Please note that The Daily Hodl participates in affiliate marketing.