Along the battle lines between crypto exchanges around the world, the Asian region has gradually gained strong positions to rival its western counterparts, with China remaining the biggest power player in the movement of crypto-assets like Bitcoin.

However, although the recent regulations imposed by the Chinese government are changing the rules of the game worldwide, Asia is not only China, so it’s sure that the land of the dragon will continue advancing its pieces to gain new positions on the crypto battlefield.

Today, you’ll learn about the top 6 Asian crypto exchanges, what are the characteristics that make them stand out from the competition, and what you can expect from them. Let’s get started.

KikiTrade

KikiTrade is a platform that offers an exchange service focused on the less experienced user in the crypto world. This is something that you can easily observe thanks to its social trading function, which allows you to follow the strategies of more experienced users.

This feature is very well complemented by the wide variety of social functions, in which users can participate and communicate to enrich their experience on the platform.

In addition, KikiTrade offers 0% trading fees, which makes this platform even more attractive for the beginning Asian user who wants to get started quickly and without complications in this ecosystem.

Supported countries

KikiTrade is available in Hong Kong (China), Taiwan, Thailand, the Philippines, Singapore, Indonesia, and Malaysia.

Security

KikiTrade is a fully licensed exchange in Australia, so it offers enough measures to ensure the security of its users, such as KYC, AML, asset segregation, custodian wallet, auditing, company governance, and more.

Fees

0% trading fees. 0.15% withdrawal fees.

Ease of use

As already mentioned, KikiTrade is a platform that stands out for its ease of use and intuitive interface.

Wallet service

The platform offers a custodial wallet service.

Customer support

At KikiTrade, you can contact support in several ways, including chat, email, and calls. In addition, its social nature allows users to learn from others through other channels like forums.

Additional help

KikiTrade has a help section focused on beginner users.

Additional benefits

You can download the mobile versions of KikiTrade for Android and iOS to enjoy more user-friendliness.

Huobi Global

Huobi is a crypto exchange that began operations in China in 2013 and has grown non-stop since then, already having a base of almost 3 million users.

Currently, although its main office is no longer in China, the company does have branches in other major Asian countries such as Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, and even the United States.

The best thing about Huobi is that it makes life easier for traders around the world thanks to the wide variety of options and tools for crypto trading that it provides for traders of any level, as well as offering a good compilation of easily accessible educational material.

Supported countries

As its name indicates, Huobi Global is a platform with worldwide reach and supports the following countries, Japan, Vietnam, Malaysia, South Korea, Hong Kong (China), Singapore, and the USA.

Security

The exchange has almost a decade of successful operations in the sector, offering a high level of trust and security through tools such as AML and KYC, 2FA, custodial offline wallets, and a protection fund for investors.

Fees

0% fees when buying Bitcoin, from 0.2% to 0.7% in trading fees in a maker-taker scheme, and 0% fees for deposits and withdrawals.

Ease of use

Although the platform is suitable for all types of users, some may find it somewhat confusing at times due to the wide variety of options and tools available.

Wallet service

Online and offline custodial wallets for more than 90% of funds.

Customer support

Customer support is provided through live chat, email, and its educational database.

Additional help

Database with a good amount of information for novice users.

Additional benefits

Over-The-Counter (OTC) services available to high-level investors and organizations.

OKEx

OKEx is one of the largest exchanges in the world, currently ranking 14th by trading volume. This exchange established in Malta, Italy, stands out for the completeness of its offer, with hundreds of crypto assets – about 250 – with which you can operate easily and safely.

In addition to this, OKEx is a decentralized platform that offers highly competitive fees, as well as offering the possibility of obtaining additional benefits in various ways.

Supported countries

OKEx offers worldwide service available in more than 100 countries but supports the following countries in the Asian market, Hong Kong (China), Malaysia, and Bangladesh.

Security

OKEx has not been the victim of any hacker attack, and its security measures are at the expected level, including MFA, cold storage, web encryption, etc.

Fees

The fees at OKEx work based on a maker-taker scheme that starts at 0.1% and can decrease up to 0.09% depending on the volume of your transactions. For deposits and withdrawals, it’s a 0% fee.

Ease of use

It’s an accessible and easy-to-use platform for any type of user since it has two separate interfaces according to the user’s level.

Wallet service

OKEx has an online wallet that any user can use, but you can also connect your private wallet to the exchange.

Customer support

Support is available 24/7 through various channels, but it doesn’t stand out compared to other features of the exchange.

Additional help

An online help center is also available for all users. You can also contact them via social media.

Additional benefits

At OKEx you can trade from anywhere with your mobile app, get extra profit through its staking and affiliate programs.

BTCBOX

BTCBOX is a fiat-to-crypto exchange established in Japan that allows operations with some of the main cryptocurrencies in the industry, such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash, although mainly using the Japanese yen.

A positive aspect of BTCBOX is that it has the support of Japanese banks, which makes it easier to trade with the yen, but for some reason, they don’t allow crypto-to-crypto operations.

Being an exchange focused on beginner users, the design and operation of the platform is quite simple and friendly, although it also has a second interface with more advanced options.

Supported countries

BTCBOX is an international exchange but mainly focuses on the Japanese market since its website is not fully translated into other languages.

Security

The platform offers security that is industry standard with services such as cold storage, 2FA, data encryption, and more.

Fees

0.20% trading fee + BTC 0.001 for withdrawals.

Ease of use

As already mentioned, BTCBOX is a platform focused by default on the beginner user, so its interface is quite straightforward and easy to use. It also has a second interface for more expert users.

Wallet service

A hot wallet for day-to-day trading and a cold storage wallet to secure user funds.

Customer support

Available via live chat and email, but you’ll need to speak Japanese to be able to communicate with them.

Additional help

Help center, FAQ, blog.

Additional benefits

Mobile app for Android and iOS.

Tokenize

Tokenize is another fiat-to-crypto and crypto-to-crypto exchange established in Singapore. It allows you the buying, selling, and trading of a good variety of digital assets. The platform offers around 20 crypto assets through an intuitive interface that will allow you to carry out your operations almost in the blink of an eye.

The exchange was established in 2018 and has had fairly rapid growth – already exceeding 100K users – taking into account that it’s a little-known exchange.

Supported countries

The exchange primarily supports users from Malaysia and Singapore but its fiat-to-crypto exchange option is only available to users in Singapore.

Security

KYC and AML procedures, 2FA, IP whitelisting, and multi-sig authorization, among others. Insurance for up to $100 million.

Fees

Tokenize follows the industry average by offering a flat trading fee of 0.25%, 0.8% for purchases with fiat, and 0.02% for withdrawals. However, these fees may decrease if you subscribe to one of their memberships.

Ease of use

The platform has a very easy-to-use interface, and it’s also possible to access its services from the comfort of your phone with the official mobile app.

Wallet service

Hot wallet for daily use and cold storage to secure the funds of its users.

Customer support

With the free account, customer support may not be the best, but this changes when you upgrade to a paid membership, with excellent response times 24/7.

Additional help

The usual help center with FAQs and other similar additional help.

Additional benefits

Mobile trading app. You can earn passive income from your cryptos through various means.

Luno

Luno Bitcoin is an exchange that began operations in 2013 focusing on bringing the crypto world to developing countries, especially in Africa. Luno tries to offer a simple interface for every type of user, as well as additional tools and education to make the platform more accessible to people who are taking their first steps with cryptocurrencies.

Supported countries

Luno currently supports about 40 countries, mostly from Europe, but also offers its services in Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Nigeria, South Africa, and Zambia.

Security

The exchange is characterized by its high level of security, offering technologies such as 2FA verification, deactivation of sending funds, and touch activation in its mobile app. To date, it hasn’t received any hacker attacks.

Fees

In this aspect, Luno is quite competitive with very low fees based on a variable maker-taker scheme that can result in fees from 0.25% to 1%.

Ease of use

Luno has a basic interface for newbies, but it also offers advanced options for experts, such as advanced charting, indicators, and reports.

Wallet service

Luno is not a wallet, it only offers a temporary custodial wallet so that users can carry out their operations on the platform.

Customer support

As with most exchanges, customer support isn’t noted for its efficiency. It’s possible to contact support through online tickets and email.

Additional help

The platform tries to bring the crypto world closer to developing countries, which is why it offers educational material on the subject within its platform. It also has a forum where users can express their basic doubts.

Additional benefits

It doesn’t offer staking or other similar investment options.

Final words

There are many options available in the Asian region when it comes to crypto, and although in some cases the language can be an obstacle for some users when it comes to taking advantage of these platforms, that’s not the common norm, so looking for new opportunities in these exchanges can be a good alternative for some investors, always depending on their needs.

Even with the circumstances that the crypto world is experiencing today in terms of regulation, it’s sure that Asia will continue providing great options to all crypto enthusiasts around the world now and in the near future insha’Allah.

Assalaamu Aleikum everyone. Today we’re going to take a look at Freebitco.in and Bitconnect. By now we’ve all heard that Bitconnect has ran into some serious problems. We’ll briefly take a look at Bitconnect.

But let’s first answer the main question being asked.

Is Freebitco.in legit? Should we be using this website? From what I have seen, we should not use Freebitco.in because it practices gambling which is haram in Islam and the payout return is questionable. It has elements of a Ponzi scheme.

Please read the blog post below or watch the video as I go into detail as to why you should not use the Freebitco.in website and why you should stay away from Bitconnect.

Video Transcript

Stay away from Bitconnect

Assalamualaikum and thank you for joining me for today’s blog post over at the Islam and Bitcoin Project. Today we are going to talk about Bitconnect and Freebitcoin. As many of you know Bitconnect has been in the news as of late, I’m going to hop over to this website here over at Cointelegraph. We can see that, Bitconnect Closes Virtually Its Entire Operation, BCC Token Drops 87%.

That’s on that website there at Cointelegraph. Going to hop over to another website. Check this one out, Lost My Life Savings in Bitconnect. Now, part of me making this blog post today was because, if you remember sometime back, I actually had a post in the, Is Bitcoin Halal Series, called, Part 4: Investing – Is investing in Bitcoin Halal or Haram? 

And in that blog post I was able to cover some websites that I thought were legitimate; that were good to look at. And I also looked at some websites that I mentioned that I believe we should stay away from and Bitconnect was one of those websites. I’m really hoping that some of you out there did not get caught up in that Bitconnect scam.

I remember on that blog post I even provided the link, if you go back and check it out, I provided a link where there was a gentleman, he even posted a video stating that he believed that Bitconnect was a scam. He thought it was a Ponzi scheme. So, we can see here that Bitconnect has gone down for the count. But, what actually that’s not fully true. Let me go over to the Bitconnect website here.
 
As you see here, we’re at the Bitconnect website and Bitconnect has an update for the users of the platform. I’m going to scroll down and if we look in the first paragraph, we will see, let me go ahead and highlight it here.

It says, “At this time we are closing the lending platform only.” So, it seems like it’s only the exchange will still be open. If we scroll further down, we will also see on the website where it says, and I will go ahead and highlight that as well, “We are launching a new superior system as an exchange that will support several cryptocurrencies as soon as possible and BCC [Bitconnect] will be listed immediately.”
 
Now, even though they’ve closed the lending portion down, which I did not have any confidence in whatsoever, I still don’t have confidence in Bitconnect as it is. That’s just me. I still would advise to stay away from it.

I think we need to be really, really careful in this crypto-space. I believe that there are going to be a number of different websites popping up or quote unquote opportunities that are out there that are really going to be Ponzi schemes and just another way for people to steal your money and we should be careful.

Same thing like, I made a video, I’m sorry, I made a blog post sometime back, let me go over to the website as well, called, 3 Reasons Why You Should Not Cloud Mine. I think cloud mining has the high, high chance, a high possibility of cloud mining being a Ponzi scheme or not legitimate.

So, again, Bitconnect, they’re going through some issues right now. I said in the past to stay away from them. I still say now to stay away from them. And I’m really hoping that none of you had been scammed or taken advantage of by this website. And speaking of websites and scams and all that stuff, let’s take a look at Freebitcoin. This website here called Freebitcoin.

Why you should not use Freebitco.in

Now I had people reach out to me asking me about this website whether I thought it was legitimate to partake in or not. Let me go ahead and on this page here, I’m going to scroll down, I’m going to scroll down so we can take a look at the features of what they are saying that they offer.

So, they offer free bitcoins every hour. Wow! Every hour! Free bitcoin. Who doesn’t want that? Free bitcoin? I want some. But I wonder if there was more to that than what they let on. The next one is, free weekly lottery. So, I guess it says here, “Win prizes with our weekly lottery for which you get free tickets every time you or someone referred by you plays the free bitcoin game.”

Also, with features here we see it says, “Provably Fair Hi-Lo Game”. We got that going on here and then a Generous Referral Program. Hmmm? Generous referral program. Let’s see what is this all about.

Let me go ahead and login to the website. I’ve logged in here. Once in the website we can actually – let me go ahead and click over on this tab here called, Multiply BTC. You see here they have Free BTC, Multiply BTC and all the rest, ok. I’m going to click on Multiply BTC.

Now here, this is where we see it has a manual bet option and an auto bet option. So, on the manual bet option we see it says, BET HI, BET LO. So, it looks like this is the lottery system it has here that allows you to win some BTC, some bitcoin.

Now what I’m looking for is, I want to see if this is a faucet. A faucet that is just going to allow you to receive free bitcoin. And by clicking on that BET HI or BET LO I want to see if I’m just going to possibly win some free BTC, some free bitcoin by doing so.

All right, so I clicked on the BET HI and I notice automatically it tells me, “insufficient balance to make this bet.” Insufficient balance to make this bet. So, that means I need to put money in in order to play the game.

Let me go ahead and click over on the tab that says, Auto Bet. Now when I click there, I’m going to click on that yellow button there that says, Start Auto Bet. Let’s click on that and see what happens. Click on it, same thing. It’s telling me “insufficient balance to make this bet”.

So, this is telling me that I need to put something in to play this game. So, what do I need to put in? Well, if I look up top here, I see my deposit and withdraw button. Let’s go ahead and click on deposit and we see, “Deposit Bitcoins”. So, they want you to give up your bitcoins.

You have to put in your bitcoins in order to play a game where you may or may not win bitcoins. Why would you do that? I have no idea. It doesn’t seem like a win-win situation for you, or me, or us. So, why would we do it. But, let’s keep looking at the website.

Let me go to another tap here. Let’s go to the earn BTC tab. Now if you look up top here, in red. Let’s read in red, receive compounded daily interest on any balance that you hold in your freebitco.in account, without doing anything. Again, this sounds really, really great.

You mean, I can receive daily interest on bitcoin that I have in an account here – and the latter part, that I have an account, that’s your balance. It says, the balance that you have you get some interest on it without doing anything.

But the catch is, it says here in the next paragraph – I’m going to highlight this here – it says, all you need to do, all you need to do, is maintain a balance of at least, at least, 30,000 satoshi which equates to 0.0003 BTC. So, you have to put in a minimum of thirty thousand BTC [Oops! I meant to say 30,000 satoshi] to get a payout; some type of interest.

So, this is not a website that is a faucet; that just gives you free bitcoin and with this free bitcoin coming from this faucet you’re able to have an account where they just pay you interest or a certain percentage on your bitcoin and just give you that just for free.

So, this Freebitcoin website there is nothing free about this at all. Not that I’m seeing right now. Not that I’m seeing right now.

If we look further down on the website, you see here where is says annual interest rate of 4%. That’s the kickback they want to give you 4%, but again, in order to receive that 4% you have to put in at least 30,000 satoshi, 30,000 satoshi. You have to put something in.

If we look here, we also see that another way for you to get some type of free bitcoin as they say, it says here, “we also pay you 25% referral commissions on any interest earned by your referrals.” So, what does that mean? That means let’s say you refer your friend and your friend deposits the 30,000 satoshi.

Once they do that your friend is now eligible to receive that 4% kickback; that 4% interest, that free bitcoin, 4% on the balance that they have in their account just by maintaining at least 30,000 satoshi. Once they do that, once they get their first pay out, this company will then give you 25% of that. 25% of that.

So, to me, I don’t like this idea. In order for them, for you, to get anything they (your friend/referral) have to come in and give $30,000 satoshi. Now, how do we know that the website isn’t just simply having a multitude of people come in, put in 30,000 satoshi and then giving everyone back just in little drips, little pieces, just getting back what they all put in.

A little portion of their 30,000 satoshi, you get a little bit back and we’re going to say that that is interest that you are getting. To me this just smells a little like a Ponzi scheme. That’s what it smells like, Ponzi scheme. I wouldn’t trust it.

Gambling is Haram

Again, if I go back to the Multiply BTC tab, and we look at this whole lottery system setup. We know that in Islam gambling is haram. And this is like straight gambling so I don’t even see this as an option for us to do.

Now I know some people will say, well wait a minute according to some of the scholars we now have some prominent scholars that are saying that bitcoin is not even considered currency so somebody might say well if it’s not considered currency, then am I really gambling? I’m not really gambling. I mean, I’m not really gambling with money.

But you are really, kind of because in order to get the bitcoin onto the platform you had to buy the bitcoin which means you had to put in some money. And regardless, it’s just, it’s just gambling. There’s nothing free about this. I don’t like it. It’s not good. It seems haram, but that’s just what I see.

So, let me hop back over to the tab that says Earn BTC. Some of the frequently asked questions, let’s see here, it says, “how do you make money to pay us interest?” and that’s a really good question. And it says here, I’m just going to highlight the whole first paragraph here.

It says that, it looks like they make their, when they take your bitcoin it’s broken up into three parts. It says, “When you hold money in your freebitco.in account, we split it into 3 parts. The first part is used to cover user withdrawals” – withdrawals.

That means people who want to take their money out. So, part of your money goes to cover that. You’ve got to cover the other person who wants to take money out. So, you’re paying for that. “The second part is used to bankroll our Multiply BTC game” – that whole lottery system.

So, you, are helping them. You’re putting money into that little slush fund so for some people who win the lottery. So, you’re putting money into that for somebody else to potentially win the lottery or maybe you win it so hey, maybe you get your money back that way, right?

That’s what it looks like. The third part is used to expand our mining, our bitcoin mining operation. And they give you the hash rate in which the hashing power that they use there. And then it says that, “We make a profit and assume the full risks of our business [should read businesses] and in return for you saving your money with us, we give you a risk-free fixed rate of return.

Are They Really Mining Bitcoin?

So, I don’t even know if there’s a way for us to prove that they are actually mining bitcoin. I really don’t know. And if they’re cloud mining, well we already know what I think about that.

I can go over to another tab here. It’s another blog post that I made some time back called, 3 Reasons Why You Should Not Cloud Mine. Cloud mining, I think, has a high chance, a high probability of being a Ponzi scheme.

So, I’m going back over to the website now. Again, this whole website, Freebitcoin, there’s nothing free about it; nothing free about this website and I advise that you stay away from it. I’m not confident in this website. Clearly gambling is involved. Gambling is haram in Islam so we should stay away from it.

I think what I’m going to do is, I have some blog posts ideas, some blog posts that I actually want to post within the next month or so. One of those blog posts is going to be, if people of thinking of stepping into the crypto space, what are some of the things that they need to be mindful of or pay attention too.

I want to list those things that we need to be mindful of and pay attention to if we’re looking to get involved in the crypto space. Now with that being said somebody may say but, akhi, akhi, akhi what are you talkin’ about getting involved in the crypto space? Didn’t you just hear a couple of these scholars say that Bitcoin is haram?

Well, I’m going to make another blog post speaking on that as well. I already have made a blog post where I offer a commentary on the fatwa given by Sheikh Assim Al Hakeem in his ruling that Bitcoin is haram.

You can go check that out as well if you haven’t done so already, but I will also make another blog post where I will talk about what does this mean exactly if we have some of our scholars say that bitcoin is haram and some of them just still remaining quiet. So, I’m going to make a blog post on that as well insha’Allah.

In the meantime, I would love to hear from you so, in the comments section down below, please let me know have any of you been negatively affected by the whole Bitconnect scandal that’s going on out there? And also let us know what websites do you go to for bitcoin faucets.

Please, in the comments down below share with us what are the websites that you trust, where, that is a true bitcoin faucet where we don’t have to put in anything; it’s just someone out of the generosity of their own heart giving out free BTC.

If you know of those websites please leave them in the comments section below. Remember, this platform here on the Islam and Bitcoin Project is about us having dialogue and helping each other out to understand the whole cryptocurrency space and to stay away from what can harm us and move towards what benefits us and, so yeah, so please share it would be of awesome help in doing. So, I’m going to leave it there for now.

Hopefully this blog post has been a benefit to you. As I said, in the future I have some other blog posts coming up stay tuned for that. Sign up for the newsletter if you haven’t done so already and that is it so for now, that will do it for now. Assalaamu Aleilku wa Rahmatulahi wa Barikahtu, Ma’Salaama.

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