Circle acquiring Poloniex changed the game. The rumored assurances from regulators that Poloniex's prior KYC/AML transgressions would be ignored as long as Circle fixed them going forward was all it really took. Now we are seeing a huge wave of M&A deals while Coinbase uses its very strong financial position to buy up the the less compliant but cashflow-rich overseas exchanges. In particular I wouldn't be surprised to see a huge deal such as Coinbase acquiring BitFinex/Tether at a greatly reduced price w/ some negotiated deal with US regulators to phase out Tether as long as holders can prove their Tether balances were acquired legitimately.<p>That said, if trading is the killer app for Bitcoin/Crypto [0] in general - what is the point of this whole business? For example most of the genuinely innovative things I've seen on the ETH blockchain like 0x (the backbone of Paradex), dydx (decentralized derivatives) and related technologies or higher level platforms like relayers and decentralized exchanges involve trading. Which begs the question - what tokens are actually worth trading in the first place? Is all this value really justified by CryptoKitties?<p>Just making HFT bots to trade around a bunch of monopoly money that is useless other than hype-driven speculation? I'm sure this could continue for way longer than I and other skeptics expect, as it already has before, but the whole cryptocurrency sector seems fairly irrational to me. And I say that as someone who was VERY interested/knowledgable about bitcoin during the 2013 bubble, to the point where I was hanging out on IRC channels like #bitcoin-wizards, discussing BIPs etc.<p>[0] - <a href="https://tradingplacesnewsletter.com/move-over-crypto-enthusiasts-wall-street-will-take-it-from-here-5b5a9067bc5" rel="nofollow">https://tradingplacesnewsletter.com/move-over-crypto-enthusi...</a>
Paradex is a decentralized exchange that's built on top of the 0x protocol.<p>DEXs are great because you can trade cryptocurrency pairs without trusting an intermediary (think Mt. Gox for why this is needed).<p>This move shows that Coinbase is serious about building a decentralized trading platform (unless this is just an acquihire which would be very disappointing).<p>Really exciting news!
I had to lookup what exactly Paradex was and it seems the platform is based on 0x. Given that decentralized exchanges have issues like front running, open arbitrage etc[0], I think this might not be a wise move.<p>[0]: <a href="http://hackingdistributed.com/2017/08/13/cost-of-decent/" rel="nofollow">http://hackingdistributed.com/2017/08/13/cost-of-decent/</a>
> The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.<p>Acquihire? It would be weird for Coinbase to take full advantage of a descentralized exchange because many of the tokens clash with regulations and even being decentralized makes Coinbase the owner and target for SEC.
> While we work to integrate with Coinbase, the Paradex app will be temporarily unavailable, starting today, May 23, at 3pm ET.<p>What's the point of a decentralized exchange if the frontend code can be shutdown at will?
> That said, if trading is the killer app for Bitcoin/Crypto [0] in general<p>I've had this thought myself. I think we can agree that most solid evidence points to Yes, trading is the killer app. Trading on something that has no intrinsic value. I.e. gambling.<p>And hey, gambling is a legitimate killer app. The gambling industry is enormous.