The cryptocurrency market is growing at a rapid pace, and exchanges are trying to keep up. This article aims to help you decide which exchange will best suit your needs.
The cryptocurrency exchange is an online platform that allows users to buy, sell, and trade cryptocurrencies. There are many different types of exchanges, but Kraken vs Poloniex is the best comparison for now.
It’s critical to choose the appropriate cryptocurrency exchange for your investing requirements. Whether you’re buying, selling, or trading, each exchange has its own set of peculiarities that may or may not be significant depending on your goals. Read our comprehensive Kraken vs Poloniex comparison to see the differences between the two most popular crypto exchanges and decide which one is right for you.
The Most Significant Differences
Kraken and Poloniex have taken quite distinct paths in their development. Since its start in 2011, Kraken has managed to maintain ownership and top management of the exchange. Traders and investors have flocked to and flocked away from both exchanges according to market circumstances. It is critical to choose the finest exchange.
Poloniex, on the other hand, has had a number of different owners since its launch in January 2014. Despite losing +/- 98 percent of its worldwide exchange trade activity, they did manage to remain afloat. Regulators and delistings plagued them, ultimately reducing their trading volume to where it is now.
Poloniex seems to be rising from the ashes, striving towards a new life, like a phoenix. They’ve removed KYC restrictions, barred American traders and investors, and introduced a new set of currencies. The TRXMarket has changed its name to DEX Poloni. All TRX-20 tokens may be listed for free on Poloni DEX.
Kraken, on the other hand, employs extremely strict verification procedures that go against the crypto ethos’s goal. Kraken allows US residents to trade on margin, making it suitable for public disclosure. In the crypto realm, security and currency safety take precedence above everything else.
Table of Comparisons between Kraken and Poloniex
What exactly is Kraken?
Jesse Powell established Kraken, a cryptocurrency exchange, in July 2011. Jesse Powell, who worked at Mt. Gox, believed that better security measures and a better user experience might enhance the exchange environment. Since its establishment, there has never been a single hack on the Kraken Exchange. Their customer service was stretched in 2017 owing to the high number of customers, but in stable markets, they provide fast assistance. San Francisco, California is home to Kraken.
Kraken is on the cutting edge of delivering Cryptocurrencies to the masses of institutions. Their trade data was the first to be posted on Bloomberg Terminals by a crypto exchange. As the Tokyo Government’s court-appointed Trustee and Germany’s BaFin-regulated Fidor Bank, Kraken is also at the forefront of regulation.
Kraken was one of the first cryptocurrency exchanges to provide leveraged margin to the cryptocurrency community and US citizens. It is also the first Cryptocurrency exchange to successfully complete a cryptographically verified proof-of-reserves audit.
Blockchain Capital, Digital Currency Group, Hummingbird Ventures, Money Partners Group, and SBI Investment are among Kraken’s investors.
What exactly is Poloniex?
Tristan D’Agosta established Poloniex, a cryptocurrency exchange, in 2014. Under his guidance, the exchange was able to capture more than half of all worldwide exchange trading activity.
Poloniex featured a large selection of cryptocurrencies, and no KYC was required provided the account user didn’t mind a daily withdrawal limit of $2000. Everyone had access to lending and margin trading. They were able to do so by operating as a crypto-to-crypto exchange rather than a fiat-to-crypto onramp.
Circle stated on February 26th, 2018 that they will acquire Poloniex, a cryptocurrency exchange, for $400 million. The trade and Circle went into a downward spiral as a result of this. Poloniex had an eventful year in 2018, as they started a delisting frenzy and needed complete KYC to trade on their platform in order to comply with regulatory requirements. Poloniex had to shut down its margin trading and lending services in the United States. Circle changed the legal site of the exchange from Delaware to Bermuda.
Poloniex was subsequently separated from Circle in October 2019 to become Polo Digital Assets, Ltd. At the time, the exchange accounted for less than 1% of worldwide exchange-traded activity. Poloniex was purchased for $400 million by Justin Sun, the creator of the Tron TRX cryptocurrency network, and an unidentified Asian investment company. Circle essentially spent 18 months to break even on their investment, which was a huge loss for them and saw their stability unravel.
Sean Neville, Circle’s co-CEO, has stepped down, although he will continue to serve on the Circle board as an independent director. He’ll also keep working on the USDC stable currency project alongside Circle and Coinbase. From May 2019 to June 2019, the circle had to lay off 40 employees: 30 before the Poloniex was sold and 10 after the co-CEO stepped down.
To be fair, Circle did make significant improvements to the exchange, including improved assistance and the development of a mobile app, all while dealing with regulatory issues. Unfortunately, they purchased at the peak of the 2017 bull market and were forced to endure a massive bear market from the beginning of 2018 until the end of 2019. What’s more, they went on to surrender at the bottom of the market, making the sell much worse.
As of November 1, 2019, all Americans are prohibited from using Poloniex. Poloniex has transitioned from a global cryptocurrency exchange to an American cryptocurrency exchange and back again, with a heavy focus on the Chinese market. Poloniex is accessible to Chinese investors and traders through pwang.com, a redirect website that connects Chinese traders and investors to the exchange. Poloniex accepts Chinese identification papers as well.
With around 100 full-time workers, the new owners aim to invest $100 million in expanding and enhancing the exchange. To kick off their new Poloniex and bring the exchange back to its previous splendor. To entice traders and investors back into the platform, they lowered all spot fees to 0% from October 21st to December 31st, as well as removing non-KYC blacklisted accounts. Accounts that aren’t KYC-compliant may withdraw $10,000.00 per day, but they can’t trade on leverage. Poloniex is currently based in Seychelles, therefore no information about the private investment company is accessible.
Kraken vs. Poloniex: Comparisons
Review of the Kraken
The Kraken trading and investment platforms are made for the big leagues. Their systems are jam-packed with built-in security mechanisms that enforce user security.
Despite Kraken’s low to average service history, they nevertheless react to tickets/user complaints or problems. They’ve put in a lot of effort, and their latest statistics indicate that they’ve made progress.
Kraken offers 5x leverage on your account balance, which is a good deal. Professional pit traders consider 4x to be gambling rather than trading, and most professional FX traders maintain 10x margin restrictions. At 2.5x, Kraken has twice the margin trading capability of Poloniex.
Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Tether (USDT), Monero (XMR), Ethereum Classic (ETC), Augur (REP), Ripple (XRP), and Bitcoin Cash are all available for margin trading on Kraken (BCH)
Kraken’s charting services are provided by Cryptowatch. While the Cryptowatch service does not compare well to Tradingview in terms of programmability or to Coinigy in terms of overall number of exchanges, it is nonetheless great and simple to use. On Tradingview or Coinigy, you may track all of Kraken’s assets. Using Coinigy’s API, an investor or trader may exchange all of the assets.
Pros of the Kraken
- Trading platform for professionals
- There are a lot of cryptocurrencies and trading pairs to choose from.
- Liquidity in EUR markets is at an all-time high.
- It has never been hacked.
- Margin trading in the United States
Cons of the Kraken
- The verification process takes longer.
- When the market is volatile, there are problems with the servers.
- Support
Review of Poloniex
Trading on cryptocurrency exchanges has always been a risky proposition. Will this be the last time you see a positive account balance due to scheduled maintenance? In their present form, Poloniex systems are something traders and investors should carefully consider.
Poloniex announced a data leak of 5.5 percent of their users’ emails and passwords on December 30, 2019 (this could just be user error; end users are known to reuse the same password everywhere and use the same email address for everything), which is allegedly linked to another exchange being compromised.
A problem in the exchanges order execution code occurred between 17:53 and 18:05 UTC on February 12th, 2020. Poloniex’s reaction was to reverse all trades and put a hold on withdrawals. We agree that withdrawals should be frozen to safeguard traders’ and investors’ money in the event of a hack.
The majority of competent and accountable exchanges have an insurance fund in place to cover the financial damage of poor coding. This is what occurred with GDAX and the Ethereum Flash Crash, not only monetarily hurting victims of the glitch but also rewarding traders who were fortunate enough to benefit (this was not faulty code but market conditions, nevertheless, the standard and president was set).
Poloniex has been working hard to reintroduce merchants. With three USDT and TRX20 airdrop programs. The TRXMarket has been renamed Poloni DEX, which now handles the world’s biggest decentralized Tron TRX exchange. They removed the prohibition on all non-KYC accounts and imposed a $10,000 non-KYC account withdrawal limit. Using pwang.com to allow Chinese users to access Poloniex was a brilliant move.
Poloniex’s support history is worse than Kraken’s because of their scale; at one time, they held more than half of all worldwide exchange volume, which is a big task for any Cryptocurrency Exchange. They’ve enhanced their services under Circle, and non-KYC accounts have alleviated a lot of exchange pain. We believe the most of the problems were from non-KYC accounts during the 2017 bull market, but only time will tell whether this is an issue for them again.
Poloniex offers a lower leverage limit of up to 2.5 times your account balance, but a larger coin variety. On Poloniex, you can margin trade Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Tether (USDT), USD Coin (USDC), Monero (XMR), Ethereum Classic (ETC), Litecoin (LTC), Ripple (XRP), and Bitcoin Cash (BCHABC), Bitcoin SV (BCHSV), Dash (DASH), Cosmos (ATOM), Stellar (STR), EOS (EOS), and Dogecoin (DOGE) (DOGE).
Poloniex’s charting services are provided by Tradingview. The service is minimal and pales in comparison to Tradingviews’ initial offering. In both Tradingview and Coinigy, all assets listed on Poloni DEX are not chartable. A restricted version of Tradingview is also used by Poloni DEX.
Pros of Coinbase
- Trading platform for professionals
- There are a lot of cryptocurrencies and trading pairs to choose from.
- Non-KYC accounts
- Low Fees
- Excluding the United States, global margin trading
- Poloni DEX
Cons of Coinbase
- Support
- Security
- Fund for Insurance
Fees
Fees for Kraken
Kraken is known for being the cheapest exchange when compared to other exchanges, but not when compared to Poloniex. Kraken caters to the more security-conscious trader and investor, with money cryptographically provable via a proof-of-reserves audit. These circumstances are well worth the money.
To trade successfully on Kraken’s platform, you must first examine and understand their costs. For a skilled trader or investor, the levels available may make all the difference in the monthly bottom line. When trading expenses are not taken into account, they may have a huge impact on a user’s trading balance.
Fees for Poloniex
Poloniex is actively pursuing traders and investors for business. As a result, their rates are very low. For the sake of saving money, compromises are made. Poloniex is a smaller, lower-volume exchange. Kraken is ranked higher than Poloniex on both Coinmarketcap and FTX Volume Monitor.
Safety and trustworthiness
Is Kraken a dangerous creature?
Kraken is one of the most secure cryptocurrency exchanges, having never been hacked. This isn’t by chance; it’s by design. Engineers at Kraken have taken the effort to create a system that works and is, for the most part, useful.
The Global Settings Lock is another fantastic feature. IP addresses that aren’t connected with the account are blocked by this function.
This may be spoofed/made to seem as though a different address is being used than the real originating address, allowing someone in the United States to appear to be computing from Austria over the internet. This would have to be a targeted assault, and most likely the fault of the user. This has nothing to do with Kraken at all.
Kraken supports two-factor authentication, which makes stealing your account more difficult but not impossible.
Is Poloniex a safe product?
Poloniex is less secure than Kraken. We are concerned about money remaining on this exchange, given how they handled an internal issue on February 12th, 2020, and how they did not compensate customers for the consequences of the flaws via the usage of an insurance fund. It’s also more difficult for them to obtain legal help for their issues because of their location.
For new IP addresses, Poloniex employs Email 2FA. Poloniex will send you an email to the address you provided. This will include a sequence of numbers that you may enter once you’ve entered your login information. This is secure unless your email account is hacked and an old Poloniex email is discovered, or you publicly discuss your crypto interests. You may also use 2FA to further secure your Poloniex account.
Conclusion: Kraken vs. Poloniex
It all comes down to how an investor or trader interacts with the exchange and the marketplaces accessible. Kraken and Poloniex each have their own marketplaces. Kraken is centered on the United States, whereas Poloniex has switched its emphasis to China.
Because we can examine what their management has done in the past and anticipate what they will do in the future, Kraken is the more trustworthy exchange. We don’t see any issues with utilizing Poloniex as a trading or investing platform since the costs are lower, but we highly advise against storing money on the exchange for extended periods of time.
To be honest, neither do we trust Kraken, neither your keys nor your crypto. Both exchanges should be utilized only when absolutely necessary; otherwise, coins should be stored in hardware wallets. Coins should only be traded on an exchange if they are going to be sold right away.
We are confident in our ability to use both exchanges. Simply use a hardware wallet, back up the hardware wallet, and never leave money on an exchange if the investor or trader maintains good crypto hygiene. Secure the transaction using two-factor authentication (two-factor authentication) and generate a two-factor backup.
See also:
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the most accurate crypto exchange?
The most accurate crypto exchange is Coinbase.
Is Kraken a good crypto exchange?
Kraken is a good crypto exchange for beginners, but it does have some issues that make it not the best option.
Is Kraken better than Coinbase?
I am not sure what you mean by Kraken, but Coinbase is a cryptocurrency exchange that allows users to trade their coins.
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