You can now margin trade Ethereum Classic (ETC) on crypto-to-crypto exchange platform Poloniex for non-US customers. ETC joins
other cryptocurrencies already available for margin trading on the platform including
ether, dash, dogecoin, litecoin, monero and stellar, all with bitcoin as the
base pair.
Margin trading is essentially trading with borrowed funds. When
placing a margin order, all of the money used is borrowed from other users
offering their funds as peer-to-peer loans. The user’s own funds are used only
as collateral for these loans and to settle debts to lenders.
Like other cryptocurrencies available for margin on Poloniex,
ETC is now also available for lending, meaning that customers holding ETC can
lend it to other customers and earn interest.
ETC is the first cryptocurrency Poloniex has added to margin
since Circle acquired
the company in 2018 and “won’t be the last, either, because we are working on
adding other tokens and base pairs for margin,” it said
on Tuesday.
“We are expanding the tokens available for margin as part of
our effort to make Poloniex one of the most innovative exchanges in the world.”
Poloniex removed its margin and lending products for
US-based customers in late-2018, stating
in October that the changes were part of an ongoing commitment to “ensure that
Poloniex complies with regulatory requirements in every jurisdiction.”
The addition of ETC in Poloniex’s margin trading offering builds
upon other developments the company has announced in recent weeks including the
release
of a new version of its mobile trading app, a new,
streamlined fee structure, and a major
systems upgrade that enhanced performance across wallet functionality, deposits
and withdrawals speeds, trade execution speeds, and overall latency.
Circle said in March that in addition to an immediate impact
on the efficiency and speed of the exchange, Poloniex’s upgraded infrastructure
will enable the platform to scale and lay “the foundation for better
performance, new features, more improvements and more support for crypto projects.”
Founded in 2014, Poloniex is a US-based digital asset
exchange supporting more than 60 cryptocurrencies and over 120 trading pairs.
According to data from Coingecko, Poloniex has a daily trading volume of
about US$15 million.