While I have invested in real estate and dividend stocks for years and traded options for quite some time as well, I decided to apply my experience and skill set to the cryptocurrency world. I started with algorithmic trading through Cryptohopper and started trading initially on Binance as the trading commissions seemed to be very low if you held the Binance Cryptocurrency Coin, BNB. Earlier this year, Binance decided to no longer allow investors from the US to trade on their platform. My overall experience with Binance was pretty good. They had a lot of altcoins to explore, plenty of volume and liquidity, low fees, and a good API for the Cryptohopper trading. After their discontinuation of allowing US investors on their exchange, I looked for a new exchange. I changed to Kraken, which is a US based exchange, but their were not as many currencies available, the fees were higher, and the API was terrible. I was rarely able to get an automatic trade in as their API was constantly producing errors. In researching the situation, I found that this was common with the Kraken exchange.
Cryptohopper had just become a premium partner with KuCoin so I decided to check it out and here’s what I found.
KuCoin – The People’s Exchange
KuCoin‘s considers itself to be the People’s Exchange. I have been very impressed with what I’ve seen here.
Availability
As a US Citizen, the IRS has put pressure on many of the cryptocurrency exchanges to do special reporting for US customers to track the trades and ensure that they are reported for taxes. Many of the exchanges are no longer allowing US citizens to have accounts on their exchange. While US citizens are not able to have KYC (Know Your Customer) verified accounts at this time, they are not blocking US citizens from trading on their exchange. While I am not a tax professional and not giving legal advice, I am of the understanding that any US citizen is responsible to report trading gains/losses to the IRS regardless.
Being KYC verified does give you added options and opportunities, but a non-KYC verified account is still fully functional. The biggest differences that I am aware of is the daily withdrawal limit of 2 BTC/day (about $22,000 at the time of this writing.) They also have some promotions that are only available to KYC verified accounts as well.
Profit Sharing
This is the part that gets me excited. There are several reasons that I like real estate. The value in most markets is relatively stable and predictable and most importantly, depending on the type of investing, real estate can produce rental income. This is very similar to dividend yielding stocks, which can be another great investment vehicle. KuCoin uses half of its daily profits from trading fees to purchase KCS (KuCoin Shares) coins from the exchange and redistributes those coins to accounts that hold at least 6 KCS in one of their accounts. By purchasing KCS each day this keeps the price of the coin stable as there is a large buyer every day.
Competitions and Spotlight Promotions
KuCoin is frequently running promotions, contests, and competitions to encourage more trading activity across its exchange. Everything from bonuses for “locking up” coins for a period of time to actual trading competitions and more. Just participating in the competition will also allow for bonuses. While it’s nothing to brag about, but I received about $2.50 after one of the recent competitions and most of my trades were done through my Cryptohopper trading bot. Not only was I able to make profits with automatic trading, I was rewarded for just trading the coin during the competition period.
Soft Staking
While staking coins and proof of work mining vs proof of stake is beyond the scope of this article, many cryptocurrencies offer rewards for holding/staking their coins. There are cryptocurrencies that are currently paying as much as 20% in annualized returns if requirements are met. KuCoin provides soft staking rewards for 16 different currencies. The requirements for soft staking be found at the soft staking rewards page. While staking cryptocurrencies will not likely make you rich, it is a great way to store your uninvested capital.
KuCoin just recently announced the launch of Pool-X, which is a platform for Proof of Stake mining. While the details available are limited right now, it appears that this platform will be an expansion of the current soft staking rewards program. More information can be found at the Pool-X website.
Leveraged Derivatives
KuCoin has also launched their KuCoin Mercantile Exchange (KuMEX) where customers can trade leveraged derivatives, Bitcoin Mini Perpetual Contract(XBTUSD Mini) using leverage. While non-KYC accounts can only leverage 5X, KYC verified accounts can leverage up to 100X in some circumstance. While trading on margin or leveraged accounts can be very dangerous, and most traders lose money this way, this can be a very powerful tool for experienced traders to take advantage of market trends. KuMEX.com also offers a sandbox environment to practice trading to practice and test your trading techniques for free.
Closing
The list above barely scratches the surface of all of the components that make KuCoin an amazing cryptocurrency exchange. They have an experienced leadership team dedicated to living up to the brand of “The People’s Exchange.” Whether you are interested in trading cryptocurrency coins or longer term investing and/or staking crypto coins, I highly recommend exploring the KuCoin exchange and all that it has to offer. It provides offers and expansive amount of altcoins to trade, passive income opportunities through soft staking and referral bonuses, as well as leveraged trading of Bitcoin.
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