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Understanding Coinbase

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Re: Understanding Coinbase

#41
post #6
post #2

The biggest threat to Coinbase are decentralized exchanges like Uniswap & Sushiswap. During the peak of DeFi summer, Uniswap handled more trading volume than Coinbase. [0] Uniswap airdropped its token $UNI to all users on Sept 17, 2020. Uniswap is already at a $17 billion market cap. Coinbase is expected to IPO at ~$100 billion. [0] https://www.theblockcrypto.com/data/decentralized-finance/de...

Coinbase is more about turning non-crypto currencies into crypto currencies while UNI/SUSHI are more about turning crypto currencies into different crypto currencies. In my POV, there's only two ways to get into crypto: - Centralized exchanges with KYC - Mining Coinbase is a KYC centralized exchange and enables people to turn their bank account $$s into crypto. Uniswap and Sushiswap are only relevant once someone has…

bisq and p2p exchanges exist

but yeah buying from miners/mining is the safest way to get into crypto

Re: Understanding Coinbase

#42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What does a decentralized exchange give me that beats that? Owning the actual asset and not just an IOU

Doesn't Coinbase give you a wallet? What am I missing?

You don't have the private keys. If coinbase loses them, you're out of money. Possibly. They're insured supposedly, but if you have your own private keys then the only entity you have to deal with in this case is yourself (this can be both a positive and a negative, depending on how careful you are)

Re: Understanding Coinbase

#43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are fees for every exchange, not sure where you saw the no fees part.

Do you mean they give me a slightly worse exchange rate than I could get somewhere else? The “fee” line when I do an exchange is $0.00

They make money off the spread on exchanges. Exact same principle as Forex “no fees” - it’s the difference between buy/sell rates.

On the OTC side (which I guess you’re referring to?, CB sets their own spread , which makes it more akin to a fee. Even if CB is technically correct saying “0 fee”, they can still charge any price they want for buying vs selling.

Re: Understanding Coinbase

#44
post #2

The biggest threat to Coinbase are decentralized exchanges like Uniswap & Sushiswap. During the peak of DeFi summer, Uniswap handled more trading volume than Coinbase. [0] Uniswap airdropped its token $UNI to all users on Sept 17, 2020. Uniswap is already at a $17 billion market cap. Coinbase is expected to IPO at ~$100 billion. [0] https://www.theblockcrypto.com/data/decentralized-finance/de...

1) considering the astronomical fees of uniswap currently I think Coinbase is fine. Even when fees will be fixed you still can only swap erc20 tokens and ether, not currencies from other cryptos. Projects like Axelar might change that though as they’ll be able to support cross swaps between different blockchains.

2) Coinbase do on/off ramp which you can’t do with uniswap

Re: Understanding Coinbase

#45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coinbase tells me there are no fees for crypto to crypto conversion, just when I initially buy crypto with cash. What does a decentralized exchange give me that beats that?

> What does a decentralized exchange give me that beats that? Owning the actual asset and not just an IOU

You can transfer from Coinbase to your own wallet.

Re: Understanding Coinbase

#46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As others mentioned you're forgetting an economy which just uses crypto as the means of exchange, which for many has always been the long term goal. Taxes are owed in income or capital gains, whatever form that income or capital takes, but taxes can only paid in legal tender. Until the IRS et al hang out a wallet address for payments you will still need to touch the ordinary financial economy.

A good number of people (in the US at least) legally pay no taxes every year. So it's hypothetically possible to live entirely within crypto (legally) already. But yes, that was more talking about the future. That is the matter at hand, after all – Coinbase's future (or lack thereof).

A good number of that good number of people that dont pay taxes are children that dont participate in the economy first hand.

Re: Understanding Coinbase

#47
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yesterday someone asked for me to pay them in Bitcoin rather than PayPal/CashApp. I'm kind of at a loss for how to do this...

If you had said this 6 years ago I would have laughed, now I'm just sad at how bastardized this project has become. You know you can just... use a bitcoin wallet and do an on-chain transfer?

You do know a lot lot lot of people would still be at a loss when it comes to doing what you describe in your last sentence.

Re: Understanding Coinbase

#48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't forget working for it by doing stuff and receiving payment in them. That's my personal philosophical favorite.

True, though in practice “stuff” means “drug dealing”. \s

yes, if you don’t have marketable skills there are artificially crippled growth industries involving drugs or your body

that isn’t new with crypto

Re: Understanding Coinbase

#49
post #8
post #2

The biggest threat to Coinbase are decentralized exchanges like Uniswap & Sushiswap. During the peak of DeFi summer, Uniswap handled more trading volume than Coinbase. [0] Uniswap airdropped its token $UNI to all users on Sept 17, 2020. Uniswap is already at a $17 billion market cap. Coinbase is expected to IPO at ~$100 billion. [0] https://www.theblockcrypto.com/data/decentralized-finance/de...

How's the liquidity/UX/fees on decentralized exchanges these days? Last I heard they were pretty lacking in those aspects.

AMMs are quite a different beast than posted-order exchanges.

These are more like ballast systems, yes, as seen in large ships, than anything else I could describe.

It has revolutionized trading and liquidity without exactly being a panacea, but its pretty damn close.

They’re pretty good, and it is an active area of development to be better. Transaction fees can range from $.01 to $150.

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