PRESS RELEASE

Top-Tier Exchanges Gain Market Share as Data Transparency and Security Standards Improve

London (19 August 2021) – CryptoCompare, a global leader in digital asset data, released its updated Exchange Benchmark, revealing the Top-Tier cryptocurrency exchanges based on a comprehensive methodology assessing counterparty, operational, trading and security risks. The report ranks more than 150 global spot exchanges, aiming to bring greater transparency and accountability to digital asset markets. The Benchmark assigns AA - E grades to help identify the lowest risk venues in the industry; these rankings power the selection criteria for CryptoCompare’s suite of investable digital asset indices.

Key findings:

• Six exchanges received the highest grading (AA): Coinbase, Gemini, Kraken, CrossTower, Bitstamp and  itBit.
• Top-Tier exchanges gained a further 4% market share since February 2021, from 85% to 89%, as both retail and professional traders settle on lower risk exchanges.
• The number of Top-Tier exchanges grew as operational standards increased across the board. However, AA-A exchanges decreased due to stricter category and transaction risk threshold requirements - only 9 exchanges met AA-A status compared to 24 in Feb 2021.
• KYC still leaves much to be desired, with 34% of exchanges rated as having poor or inadequate KYC programs.
• Data transparency is relatively unchanged but data quality standards still need improvement, with 15% of exchanges having pushed some form of error-prone data or unannounced updates via their REST API or Websocket data feeds over the last year.

“As more individuals and institutions seek to gain exposure to digital assets, it is becoming increasingly important to benchmark which exchanges are the most trustworthy and reliable in the space. Our bi-annual Exchange Benchmark has become the industry standard for ranking these exchanges, using a comprehensive data set that covers more than 150 exchanges across 8 categories of evaluation to identify the lowest risk exchanges in the industry.” - Charles Hayter, Co-Founder and CEO, CryptoCompare

"We continue to invest in innovative products that attract new customers and deepen relationships with existing ones. Our products are built to be safe, trusted, and easy to use for both retail and institutional users." - Vishal Gupta, Head of Exchange, Coinbase

Gemini is on a journey to create a company that is both a utility and provides a sense of community for our customers and employees. Since inception, Gemini has proactively worked alongside regulators and authorities to ensure we are providing our customers with a secure, transparent, and regulatory compliant platform - this has helped us achieve growth across both our institutional and retail business. We are excited to, again, be recognised as one of the top exchanges for delivering a trusted experience to customers.” - Blair Halliday, Head of UK, Gemini

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Media Contacts
Alissa Ostrove, ‍CryptoCompare

press@cryptocompare.com

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‍Note to Editors:

About CryptoCompare - data.cryptocompare.com
CryptoCompare is the global leader in digital asset data. Institutional and retail investors rely on the company for real-time, high-quality data spanning 5,000+ coins and 200,000+ currency pairs. By aggregating and analysing tick data from globally recognised exchanges and seamlessly integrating multiple datasets, CryptoCompare provides a comprehensive, granular overview of the market across trade, order book, historical, social and blockchain data.