5 of the Best Cryptocurrency Exchanges to Use in 2021

Unless you were living in a cave, the fervour that consumed the crypto markets in the final few months of 2020 wouldn’t have escaped your attention. With the world continuing to feel the devastating effects of the pandemic, bitcoin went on a face-melting tear, surging past its previous all-time high in December, eclipsing $30k in the New Year, and surpassing $40k a week later.

Coupled with several positive developments in the industry, including PayPal’s decision to support digital assets and rising institutional interest, the favourable price action fueled a fresh wave of adoption. Today, there are thousands of cryptocurrencies to choose from, and though bitcoin is by far the best-known, it’s not alone in offering the potential for huge returns. 

Cryptocurrency exchanges remain the primary gateway to the industry. Many give users the chance to buy digital assets with their credit or debit card and provide an opportunity to trade and earn a profit. Here are five of the best platforms currently available.

KuCoin

Based in Singapore but serving customers worldwide, KuCoin is one of the most advanced platforms on the planet. As well as offering spot, margin and futures trading, the highly liquid platform lets users lend out their digital assets to others to earn interest. To date, KuCoin has facilitated over 722 million trades with transaction volume exceeding $100 billion, with users able to pose questions of customer service agents available 24/7.

Once a crypto-only venue, KuCoin later contributed to a trend that saw a slew of platforms integrate fiat on/off-ramps, a move that helped push the industry closer to the mainstream. European payment provider Simplex handles the fiat-to-crypto particulars for KuCoin. Although the platform succumbed to a sophisticated hack in September 2020, it held itself accountable and managed to reimburse users who lost funds in the incident. You can’t say better than that.

BTSE

BTSE is an easy-to-use cryptocurrency exchange that offers both spot and futures trading. Like KuCoin, it enables the purchase and sale of cryptocurrency into fiat such as the US Dollar, Japanese Yen, Great British Pound, and the Euro. In fact, users can order a BTSE debit card that provides incentives such as reduced trading fees, unlimited free account transfers, bitcoin cashback and a generous monthly payment limit of €100,000.

Notable for its multi-asset margin and settlement, not to mention high leverage (100x), BTSE uniquely combines all fiat, crypto, and stablecoin pairs in one order book, something many traders appreciate from an organizational standpoint. What’s more, it claims to store 99.9% of user funds in cold storage, meaning users can trade confidently at all times.

Binance

Binance is one of the established giants of the cryptocurrency space and supports over 200 coins for deposit and withdrawal. A one-stop-shop for all your crypto needs, the Hong Kong-based platform offers margin, lending, futures, fiat ramps, mining pools, an earning and lending product, a DEX, a crypto debit card, and even an educational academy where you can bone up on the history of bitcoin and other topics. Binance Launchpad, meanwhile, is a token launch platform with an assortment of respectable projects under its belt.

With an average daily volume of $2 billion, the ability to handle 1.4 million transactions per second, and round-the-clock customer support, Binance has a lot going for it. Like KuCoin, Binance has fallen prey to hackers in the past, though it reimbursed affected users and has since upped its opsec.

Coinbase

Coinbase is another true heavyweight of the industry and Binance’s principal sparring partner for market dominance. A highly regulated platform founded in San Francisco in 2012, it is widely feted for its fraud prevention, secure custody and insurance, as well as its ease of use. Serving over 35 million verified users in 100+ countries, Coinbase features a regular portal for normal traders, Coinbase Pro for more advanced operators, and Coinbase Prime for institutional trading. Coinbase Earn, meanwhile, allows account-holders to earn digital assets simply by learning about them.

Like several other platforms, the U.S. exchange offers users a Visa debit card that allows them to spend any asset in their portfolio and earn rewards for each purchase. As a mark of its outstanding reputation, Coinbase has helped facilitate crypto purchases for some of the world’s biggest asset managers, including Microstrategy and One River Asset Management.

BitMax

One of several digital asset platforms based in Singapore, BitMax supports over 200 pairs and facilitates trading for spot, margin and futures. Trading services are divided into Standard and Professional, with the latter suitable for more advanced users. Besides an eye-catching trading window, BitMax offers several investment products including its own yield farming and staking services. The latter enables users to earn direct rewards simply for locking up their cryptocurrency for a set period of time.

Of most interest to new users will be BitMax’s Copy Trading feature, a subscription service that allows users to mimic the trades of successful professional traders. At present, BitMax users can take advantage of a 5-day free trial to get to grips with the service.

There you have it: five acclaimed crypto exchanges for those looking to expand their bitcoin holdings, speculate and earn rewards.