Bitfinex – Cryptocurrency Exchange Volume and Information

Home to some of the world’s most sophisticated cryptocurrency trading features, Bitfinex is aware of the varying needs of different customers on its platform. Therefore, we devoted extra effort to developing distinctive features to cater for the various requirements of our customers. For professional traders and institutional customers, we have developed a suite of advanced features to meet the very highest standards.

Bitfinex allows for users to trade with up to 3.3x leverage by receiving funding from the peer to peer margin funding platform. Users can enter an order to borrow the desired amount of funding at the rate and duration of their choice, or they can simply open a position and Bitfinex will take out funding for them at the best available rate at that time. For more information on our Margin Trading feature, please go to How It Works.

The margin funding market provides a way to earn interest on Euro, US Dollar, Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, EOS, Bitcoin Cash, NEO, Iota, Litecoin, OmiseGO, Ethereum Classic, Monero, Dash, Zcash, Bitcoin Gold, ETP, Santiment, and Eidoo by providing funding to traders wanting to trade with leverage. Users can offer funding at the rate and duration of their choice, or they can simply lend at the FRR (Flash Return Rate). In addition users can use our Auto-Renew feature to renew their offers automatically upon expiry. For more information on our Margin Funding feature, please go to How It Works.

Platform features

• Exchange. Bitfinex offers order books with top tier liquidity, allowing users to easily exchange Bitcoin, Ethereum, EOS, Litecoin, Ripple, NEO and many other digital assets with minimal slippage. Bitfinex also boasts a suite of order types to help traders take advantage of every situation.
• Margin trading. Bitfinex allows users to trade with up to 5x leverage by receiving funding from the peer to peer margin funding platform. Users can enter an order to borrow the desired amount of funding at the rate and duration of their choice, or they can simply open a position and Bitfinex will take out funding for them at the best available rate at that time.
• Margin funding. The Bitfinex margin funding market provides a secure way to earn interest on fiat and digital assets by providing funding to traders wanting to trade with leverage. Users can offer funding across a wide range of currencies & assets, at the rate and duration of their choice. What's more, users can use the Auto-Renew feature to renew offers automatically upon expiry.
• Derivatives. Users wishing to mitigate the risks associated with the volatility of Digital Tokens may trade Derivative Products on the Derivatives Site. Perpetual contracts are already available and further Derivative Products are under development. Derivative Products can be traded using a Derivative Wallet credited with USDt0, a Digital Token which can be obtained by converting USDt, as explained in more details on our Knowledge Base.
• Advanced order types. We know that entering multiple orders repeatedly is not efficient and can be very tedious. To streamline this task, we created the Scaled Orders tool for our users. It’s an algorithmic order type designed to enable traders to focus more on strategy instead of spending the time manually entering orders. The tool enables our customers to automatically create multiple limit orders across a user-determined price range. At the same time, traders still have control as they can set the diversity and the distribution of the orders. Check out our Support page for further details and a tutorial on Scaled Orders.
• Paper Trading. Bitfinex’s Paper Trading feature allows traders to test trading strategies in a simulated market environment without the needs to deposit real funds. It works on sub-accounts, which emulate the master account’s trading functionalities.
• Honey Framework. Creating custom order types and event-driven automated trading strategies is no longer the preserve of specialist algorithmic trading firms. We have made these strategies accessible to our customers through the Honey Framework integration. What’s more, our latest development has made it easier to use, even without any coding knowledge or developer know-how.

Bitfinex is a cryptocurrency exchange, which also provides margin trading. The leverage ratio may seem low to experienced forex traders, but this is due to wild and unpredictable nature of cryptocurrencies. At the time of writing of this review Bitfinex is the largest Bitcoin exchange, in terms of volume.

Bitfinex is operated by iFinex Inc., a Hong Kong based company. Although regulation in the cryptoverse is often times a bit shaky, this company has some history in dealing with the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Despie claiming they should not fall under any dervatives regulation, Bitfinex did pay a fine to the CFTC rgarding a particular case. Of course, we are talking about the famous hacking scandal.

In August of 2016, Bitcoin worth approximately $72 million was stolen from Bitfinex users, resulting in the second-largest hack in the history of cryptocurrency exchanges. The company reacted accordingly, trying to trace the villains. Simultaneously it issued the so called BFX tokens, to the victims. This represented a pledge by the exchange, to pay back the money, once it has the ability to do so. 

An interesting development then followed, as a secondary market for these tokens emerged. Applying a strategy, used by the aptly named “Vulture hedge funds”, the initial bidders were offering 2 cents on the dollar. Obviously the uncertainty regarding the payments was very high, as people were speculating this was the end of Bitfinex. Prices started increasing, with new developments in the story. Eventually the firm paid back the entire debt, at the full promised value (and withdrew all the tokens in the process).

This story raises the credibility of Bitfinex in our eyes. The exchange had a major issue but managed to handle it well. Important Update: As of November 9 2017, Bitfinex will no longer accept US clients in any form. This is most likely the result of a SEC guideline, which suggests all crypto-exhanges will have to at least be registered in a newly created list.

Bitfinex Advantages

• Professional connectivity. Partnering with Market Synergy, corporate accounts and professional traders can take advantage of the fastest trading speed through institutional-grade connectivity and co-location services. These connectivity services come with direct access to our digital asset gateway.
• Advanced chart features. Bitfinex facilitates a graphical trading experience with advanced charting functionality that allows traders to visualise orders, positions and price alerts, tap to modify order properties, and annotate to their trading strategy.
• Corporate accounts. Bitfinex has a bespoke offering expertly tailored to meet the specific needs of professional and institutional traders including sub-accounts, expedited verification, and dedicated customer support.
• API. The Bitfinex REST and Websocket APIs are designed to facilitate access to all features of the Bitfinex platform, allowing full integration with traders’ own products and platforms.
• Enhanced Reporting Framework. Bitfinex’s enhanced reporting framework would benefit both traders and developers. We added more features and capabilities to our reporting tools to create comprehensive reports that will make it even easier to measure trading performances.
• Bitfinex Terminal. Develop algorithmic trading strategies, view historical price action and enhance your market research with Bitfinex Terminal. View Bitfinex's entire price action data set, accessible for free through Dazaar, for a limited time only.