Perhaps everything wrong with centralized exchanges on the blockchain is the depth and range of the services they claim to offer in the first place.
Today, more than ever before, innovation and digitization of products and services have become even more useful and pronounced. Thanks to the internet and the advent of emails, websites, social media platforms, and of course, the blockchain, these products and services have not only become faster, cheaper and more accessible, but also power is being put directly into the hands of the users rather than a select few, and this has seen the rise and developments of more transparent ecosystems.
As world adoption of crypto-assets slowly increases each day, there existed an obvious need for standard marketplaces or platforms where these assets can be exchanged and converted with each other, at the convenience of the general users. And that is exactly what cryptocurrency exchanges do!
Among the different types of cryptocurrency exchanges, the most notable ones are Centralized crypto-exchanges and Decentralized crypto-exchanges.
While decentralized exchanges are still slow to get off the ground, centralized exchanges have had very brilliant starts as seen on Coinmarketcap's crypto-exchanges volume ranking.
More often than not, these centralized exchanges are branded as 'notorious' and overly profiteering, due to a couple of problems including their exorbitant commission fees, ridiculous regulations, policies, as well as susceptibility to hacks and data leaks. With the continuous rip-off that goes on within the system they built and control, they enrich their pockets by taking a part of the trader's money.
Are centralized exchanges completely bad?
Not exactly. While there are a couple of problems with the services in these exchanges, they do have their strengths too, which largely, is responsible for their far-reaching successes so far.
One of the greatest strengths that the centralized model has is the fact that it is organized and replicates a lot of homogeneous systems within itself that answers to a central body. You can’t have a truly centralized system without accountability. And accountability doesn’t necessarily mean that there has to be a boss, it only means that when a group of people working together to defeat a common enemy, they should have a way of keeping a track of their independent activities. Especially those activities that affect the well being of the system where they share a common interest.
While the philosophy behind decentralization is great, the above quote proves that not every product or service needs decentralization. From all indications, centralized services on the blockchain provide a smooth transition from conventional centralized services to blockchain based ones for the masses.
Perhaps if these centralized blockchain services focus on curbing their disadvantages, pay lesser emphasis on commissions, and work on modelling their services to be able to cope with the modern demands of a teeming crypto economy, we just might have been miles ahead now.
Introducing Cobinhood: A Cryptotrading Platform With No Commissions!
Seriously? No fees on a centralized exchange?
You read that right! From the whitepaper, Cobinhood is briefly summarized thus;
Cobinhood is a cryptocurrency service platform that provides cryptocurrency trading and ICO underwriting, with the aim of solving the existing problems associated with centralized cryptocurrency exchanges.
The name itself is closely reflective of Cobinhood's operational model. It is based on the 13th/14th-century story of the legendary Robinhood, an archer, hero and a thief of noble birth who endeared himself to the common people by stealing from the rich to give to the poor.
Cobinhood chose this name because it broaches one of the most important problems associated with cryptocurrency exchanges in both decentralized and centralized ecosystems: Zero commission for every transaction!
Only this time, unlike Robinhood, Cobinhood doesn't steal. Rather, it solves this problem (and several others), by offering ICO services to blockchain startups and businesses launched on the platform. By collecting 5% of the total fundings raised by the ICOs as an underwriting service fee, as well as its interests from margin trading, it completely removes the need for commissions, making it the first ever cryptocurrency exchange to do so!
Cobinhood is built with the future of cryptocurrency trading in sight. By implementing Google Cloud's Spanner DB and its Web Application Messaging Protocol (WAMP), It the first exchange to be able to process over 1.1 million trade orders at once on a stress test, creating the ideal trading environment for Financial institutions and Hedge funds!
That's not all, Cobinhood also allows for Margin trading on the platform. This simply means that traders can earn even more money by leveraging their funds over a long or short timeframe. This means a trader can trade with an amount that is several times larger than the present amount of money they have in their portfolio. By holding Cobinhood's native token - the COB tokens-, These traders also enjoy a 50% slash of margin trading loans!
Traders also have the option to earn passively by becoming Margin trading Loan Providers.. Hence, they will earn interests by simply depositing funds and opting into this feature without trading at all. The interest rate is automatically determined by Cobinhood themselves, depending on the volume of funds available in the lender's account.
Conclusion
Cobinhood is set to establish a strong presence in cryptocurrency transaction in the future, not just with the features listed above alone, but with a lot of other top-notch services that solve a plethora of other problems evident in centralized services too. These problems cut across areas ranging from trust and security to UI, to the speed of access and processing of funds, etc.
This post will not contain it all. Hopefully, in subsequent articles, I shall be revealing these services as we take an in-depth look at Cobinhood.
Cobinhood goes to Jakarta!
In the meantime, it will interest you to find out that the Cobinhood team will be attending and giving a keynote address at the forthcoming Southeast Asia Blockchain Summit 2018 to be hosted in Jakarta. The event will be held on the 3rd and 4th of November next month. Conventional and VIP tickets are available for sale on the Southeast Asia Blockchain summit website.
For further information, please refer to the video and the links below: