Coinbase Exchange Review: Key Features, Trading Fees, and Other Details

Among the growing number of cryptocurrency exchanges in the blockchain realm, Coinbase also stands quirky with its user-friendly services. Coinbase is an American crypto exchange company launched in June 2012 and headquartered in San Francisco.

The company was founded by former Airbnb engineer Brian Armstrong and later co-founded by business executive Fred Ehrsam. With over 108 million users, Coinbase operates in 102 countries and is subject to US regulations.

Coinbase Exchange Details

Coinbase Exchange History Overview

2012

With the aim to build trust-worthy crypto services, Coinbase took birth in 2012 and received a startup incubator fund of $150,000 cash infusion. In October 2012, the crypto exchange incubated services to buy and sell Bitcoin (BTC) via bank transfers.

2013 – 2014

In May 2013, Coinbase gained $5 million from a Series A Fund round led by venture capitalist Fred Wilson. Besides, the company also received $25 million in investment from other VC  firms in the same year.

2014 was an iconic year for Coinbase as its platform users exploded to one million and received Blockr, a blockchain explorer service. The crypto company also acquired bookmarking company Kippt and received insurance covering the BTC value stored on their servers.

Moreso, Coinbase launched a vault system for the secure storage of BTC. To widen its network and allow payments in BTC, Coinbase teamed up with firms namely Overstock, Dish Network, Dell, Expedia, and Time Inc.

In the same year, Coinbase also enabled payment solutions to traditional markets such as PayPal, Braintree, and Stripe.

2015 – 2019

Specifically, the Coinbase exchange was introduced in  2015 after the company received a $75 million fund from various VC firms in the same year. The exchange was initially intended for professional traders. In September, Coinbase extended its services to Singapore and Canada.

In 2016, Coinbase rebranded Coinbase Exchange to Global Digital Asset Exchange (GDAX). Later on, in July, the exchange added retail support for Ether.

In 2017, Coinbase got BitLicense to trade Ethereum (ETH) and Litecoin (LTC) from the NEW York State Department of Financial Services (DFS). The platform listed Bitcoin Cash on its exchange and experienced price anomalies that led to an investigation into insider trading.

In 2018, Coinbase declared to 13,000 users affected by price anomalies, that the company would provide users’ taxpayer ID, name, DOB, address, and transactions records from the 2013-2015 period, to Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

Coinbase also revealed an early-stage venture fund— Coinbase Ventures— that focuses on investments in blockchain and crypto companies.

Coinbase again rebranded its exchange platform from GDAX to Coinbase Pro in May. In the same period, the platform launched Coinase Prime, targeting institutional customers. 

In 2018, data from a UK corporate filing found that non-US revenue at Coinbase surged by 20% to $173 million with a net profit of over $6.8 million. The company’s global revenue also grew to $520 million in the same year.

2021 – 2022

In 2021, Coinbase gained a nine-fold increase in Q1 revenue—from $190.6 million to $1.8 billion—due to the surge in BTC price.

Coinbase became a public company on the Nasdaq stock exchange via a direct stock exchange. In November 2021, Coinbase first appeared in India after purchasing Agara, an AI-powered support platform, for nearly $50 million.

In 2022, Coinbase partnered with BlackRock, an American MNC for investments. The platform has also integrated with Google Cloud Platform allowing the latter’s customers to use cryptos supported by Coinbase Commerce

Coinbase Exchange Platform Interface

The Coinbase platform is divided into Coinbase for retailers, Coinbase Pro for professional traders, and Coinbase Prime for institutional clients. Each category performs different functions that expand the extended features of the Coinbase crypto exchange.

Coinbase Pro is designed for individual traders and offers an intuitive interface with real-time orderbooks, charting tools, trade history, and a simple order process. Coinbase Pro also highlights other features, namely insurance protection, competitive fees, and an industry-leading API.

Meanwhile, Coinbase Prime is typically for institutions—asset managers or trading desks at banks. They are offering things that financial institutions expect, like Financial Information eXchange (FIX) integration.

Coinbase Prime allows users to place block orders and make use of special order execution algorithms. It also provides margin trading to institutions.

Coinbase Pro and Coinbase Prime support more cryptocurrencies and offer cheaper transaction charges. However, crypto support is still substantially less than on other exchanges in the industry.

Features of Coinbase Exchange

Secure Storage

Coinbase exchange stores most of the digital assets in secure offline storage. Moreover, the transaction data and other valuable information are stored and secured safely.

Also, the platform uses industry-leading encryption and security technology that strengthens Coinbase against emerging data threats.

Protected by Insurance

Coinbase holds crypto insurance, and all USD cash balances are covered by Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) insurance, up to a maximum of $250,000.

Industry best practices

Coinbase supports various popular digital currencies. Like every crypto exchange, Coinbase does not use or lend users’ assets without their permission. The platform has secure and multifaceted risk management programs designed to protect customers’ assets.

Coinbase One

This unique feature of Coinbase is a subscription product where the trading fee is free, allowing traders to trade as much as they need. Also, in the event of unauthorized access, Coinbase One members may be eligible to receive reimbursement for up to $1 million in losses.

Coinbase also offers its members a 90-day free trial of the crypto research platform Messari Pro. There are also exclusive staking rates on yield-earning assets for the members of Coinbase One.

Coinbase Wallet SDK

The Wallet SDK expands access to more users as they dive deeper into dApps, trade thousands of crypto assets, and hold their NFTs.

Using this feature, traders can uncover the value of their assets by opening their dApp to millions of Coinbase exchange users across 85 countries. They can connect their dApp to the Coinbase wallet with a few lines of code.

The Wallet SDK works with Solana and all EVM-compatible chains such as BNB Chain, Avalanche, Polygon, Optimism, and more.

Coinbase Cloud

Coinbase Cloud is an essential feature of Coinbase Exchange that provides APIs, services, and infrastructure for trading, payment, staking, and other properties.

Coinbase Pay SDK

Pay SDK offers users an easy and safe way to purchase or transfer crypto to a wallet or dApp. In short, fiat-to-crypto can be easily carried out on the Coinbase Pay SDK. Under this feature, users can increase product adoption by offering a frictionless payment option to trade crypto. There is no need for user verification or to store payment information, as Coinbase handles it on users’ behalf.

Easy integration of the Coinbase Pay button widget into the app can be done using the SDK. This integration permits users to access 100+ cryptos and 60+ fiat currencies.

Coinbase’s own USDC stablecoin

Coinbase has added support for USD Coin (USDC) on its platform. Customers on Coinbase in qualifying countries can buy, sell, receive, and send USDC. It is a fully regulated, verifiable, and transparent stablecoin with regular audits.

Coinbase Card

This product enables customers from the UK, Germany, Spain, Italy, France, Netherlands, Ireland, and many other countries to order a    Visa debit card that allows you to buy and sell goods and services with cryptocurrency.

Coinbase Commerce

Coinbase Commerce is a venue where merchants can accept crypto payments in a fully decentralized way. All the funds will be solely controlled by the customer. Coinbase will not have access to any of the funds that people receive.

Coinbase Supported Cryptocurrencies

Coinbase has different levels of support for various cryptocurrencies. Not all the coins fall under the categories of “buy, sell, withdraw, and deposit” on Coinbase, but some coins fall under all these groups. Also, fees and availability normally depend on the country and selected payment method.

The crypto exchange supports the following coins on its platform:

• Algorand (ALGO)
• Cosmos (ATOM)
• Basic Attention Token (BAT)
• Band Protocol (BAND)
• Bitcoin (BTC)
• Bitcoin Cash (BCH)
• Bitcoin SV (BSV)
• Compound (COMP)
• Civic (CVC)
• Dai (DAI)
• Dash (DASH)
• District0x (DNT)
• EOS (EOS)
• Ethereum (ETH)
• Ethereum Classic (ETC)
• Golem (GNT)
• Kyber Network (KNC)
• Chainlink (LINK)
• Loom Network (LOOM)
• Litecoin (LTC)
• Maker (MKR)
• Numeraire (NMR)
• OMG Network (OMG)
• Orchid (OXT)
• Augur (REP)
• USD Coin (USDC)
•  Stellar (XLM)
• XRP (XRP)
• Tezos (XTZ)
• Zcash (ZEC)
• Ox (ZRX)

Coinbase Deposit / Withdrawal / Trading Fees

Coinbase charges a rate of 0.5% for purchasing cryptocurrency and making sales. Besides, the actual fee distribution may be high or low based on the crypto market fluctuations in the coins’ price displayed on Coinbase between the time of placing an order and execution.

The fee structure on Coinbase is categorized into a flat fee and a variable percentage fee determined by region, payment type, and product feature. The variable percentage fee structure differs depending on location. These fees do not bother crypto conversions. The Coinbase fee will always be greater than the minimum flat fee or the variable fee.

The flat fees are as follows:

Accepted Payment Methods

The payment methods on Coinbase are different for numerous countries. For instance, Coinbase users in Australia can purchase with their debit cards. Here, the pre-funding of the account will not be required to place an order. The purchase will be completed right away.

Coinbase NFT

The Coinbase NFT (Non-Fungible Token) marketplace has a wide array of trending NFT collections, namely  Bored Ape Yacht Club, MUTANT APE YACHT CLUB, Otherdeed for Otherside, CryptoPunks, etc.

Controversies & Issues

Coinbase exchange is one of the growing crypto exchanges with secure and safe trading features. But, like all other centralized and decentralized exchanges, Coinbase also faced several challenges and issues throughout its crypto life.

The Coinbase exchange experienced price anomalies after listing Bitcoin Cash on it in 2017. This led to an investigation into insider trading.

In 2019, Coinbase faced some controversies after it tied up with Neutrino, an Italian start-up company, to acquire a blockchain intelligence platform. The basis for the controversy was Neutrino’s alleged relationship with the Hacking Team, which had been in the limelight for providing internet surveillance technology to  governments with poor human rights labels.

There was also an attempt at a sophisticated hacking attack on Coinbase, using spear-phishing tactics and Firefox zero-day vulnerabilities. 

In 2021, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) reviewed Coinbase due to the fact that the platform provided its blockchain services to blacklisted companies or individuals. Reportedly, the company issued misleading details about its trading volume and later, agreed to pay $6.5 million to settle the regulatory claims.

The same year witnessed the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) reportedly criticizing Coinbase for its plan to launch Lend, a crypto lending product. However, Coinbase dropped its decision to launch the product.

Coinbase Exchange Pros and Cons

Pros

• Great UI for managing crypto funds
• Excellent mobile application for monitoring and sending/receiving crypto
• Provides a wide variety of fiat deposit and withdrawal options
• Online and mobile wallet services
• Two-factor authentication and multi-signature security option to prevent unauthorized manipulation of funds
• Instant transfers between Coinbase users

Cons

• Not all coins are available to purchase
• Tax information could be improved
•  Lack of customer support
• Sometimes under load/high volume, the site and application become unresponsive
• The fees are relatively high, compared to other crypto exchanges

Final Score

Services offered: 3/5

Cryptocurrency support: 3.5/5

Fees: 3/5

Security: 4.5/5

Review Score: 3.5

Coinbase Exchange Summary

Coinbase is one of the top crypto exchanges with utility-based services. Like a few other crypto exchanges, Coinbase is available to both US and European customers, and this feature makes it stand out among several other exchanges. 

The platform is basically only for spot trading, and its fees are not very competitive. Also, its staking features are sometimes worthless as it charges a 25% commission on yields.

FAQs

Disclaimer:  This material must not be used as a basis for making any investment decisions. This serves as informative material about the crypto exchange. Trading digital assets involve high risk and can result in the loss of investment capital. Hence, always make sure to do in-depth research before engaging or investing in any cryptocurrencies.