The year 2021 has been one of the most challenging and exciting in the cryptocurrency space. As we approach Q4, it is fair to say that this year will go down in history for the success of the cryptocurrency industry, and there may still be some more surprises and shocks coming soon.
During the last nine months, what we have seen has been the result of the cryptocurrency market gaining massive interest amongst people from all walks of life and backgrounds. Moreover, the year 2021 has been especially eventful. It has played host to one of the biggest bull markets, the rise of NFT’s, the DeFi boom, several corrections, regulatory hurdles and even bans. And those are just a fraction of the events that took place.
Cryptocurrency exchanges have also been especially busy developing new products and concepts to provide their userbases with additional value and to acquire as many new customers during this time. Here are some of the developments that have taken place with some of a selection of the main players.
Binance
This year was indeed effective enough for the largest crypto exchange. Amongst the most popular releases that Binance had delivered the last year, it’s worth noting the NFT marketplace launched back on June 24. This was an especially strategic and smart move as 2021 proved to be the year of the NFT, allowing Binance to capitalize on this market in a timely manner.
Another significant trend related to Binance was the further development of the Binance Smart Chain that resulted in cost-effective transactions and the additional influx of retail traders on BSC-based decentralized exchanges. Since its inception, there have been a significant amount of projects that have chosen BSC as their blockchain of choice, and so far, it has proven itself to be an extremely efficient solution that allows very fast transactions to take place with cheap gas fees.
HitBTC
HitBTC, one of the most advanced cryptocurrency exchanges that has been in action since 2013, started 2021 with the release of a fiat on-ramp solution, providing end-users with the ability to buy cryptocurrencies with credit cards.
September was eventful for HitBTC in terms of platform releases. The last month of Q3 was marked with the launch of a brand new crypto wallet app which has gained a lot of traction from its global community. The wallet allows users to store and trade crypto with enhanced security and also has a comprehensive selection of cryptocurrency options of over 500 digital assets.
Later on, HitBTC introduced its long-anticipated perpetual futures trading feature allowing users to trade a number of tokens, including BTC, ETH, SOL, ADA, UNI, and HIT (the platform native utility token). By accessing futures trading on the platform, users have the option of leveraging funds to maximize profits with low initial investments and can borrow up to 75x on their initial investments.
Huobi
For Huobi, 2021 was also a big year for innovation and development. Over this time, the exchange platform rolled out a number of new initiatives for its users, which have been quite successful.
At the start of the year, Huobi rolled out a service called “crypto loans”, which allows users and traders to collateralize crypto and borrow other crypto-assets with instant approval. This has enabled Huobi users to borrow on-demand and access low-interest rates as long as they are KYC verified.
The global exchange platform has also developed its own public blockchain environment called Hubi ECO (HECO) that provides blockchain developers with an efficient and low-cost on-chain environment to test decentralized applications (dApps), smart contracts, and digital assets. It currently has around 12.5 million total addresses, with 463 million transactions made on the platform.
During the year, Huobi was one of the first exchanges that fell victim to increased global regulations and had to cease its operation in mainland China. This was following a crackdown in China where regulators banned cryptocurrency transactions and mining and stated that overseas exchanges could no longer provide services to mainland investors via the internet.
Summary
The cryptocurrency market has been booming over the past few years, and it’s not slowing down anytime soon. With a growing community of investors, more traders are joining in on the potential for profit that this industry offers. To help accommodate these new customers, many platforms have had to adapt by rolling out features and initiatives designed to grab investor attention as well as gain loyalty from those who may be interested in trading with them exclusively. In some ways, we can already see how 2021 is shaping up to be one of the biggest years so far for cryptocurrencies – which also means bigger things ahead.