Bitcoin Forum

This is a reversal from the norm: An exchange that previously mandated KYC is now allowing unverified accounts again.

Unverified Poloniex accounts can now withdraw up to $10,000 per day (https://support.poloniex.com/hc/en-us/articles/360041078913-Level-1-Account-Features). Only an email address is required. I guess that's the payoff for moving to the Seychelles.


PSA: Poloniex's taking money from its customers to cover its loss (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5151636.msg51376687#msg51376687)

Yeah pretty sure it's a consequence of moving to this country. But well, the site is still not reliable to use at any cost. I hope people learned their lesson and after getting this update will move their coins outside their system asap (if they didn't verify their account). Anyone with a cell in the brain isn't going to stay on that platform.

So many alternatives around but please poloniex no thanks

Has to be, but it isn't like I could take advantage of any of this, because I'm pretty sure my country is excluded from their list of places they provide their services to.  And I was never a huge fan of Poloniex anyway, though they did have one or two altcoins available that I couldn't find anywhere else--but I'm not accumulating any of those garbage-y altcoins anymore, so no worries.

OTOH, this is kind of a good thing for people who can use them.  I'm figuring that KYC-less exchanges are going to become a thing of the past eventually, so this almost feels like a throwback.

they prohibit USA users, but if all you need to sign up is an email address, using a VPN is an option. poloniex supposedly limited VPN usage per a report from the new york AG, (https://www.coindesk.com/crypto-exchanges-should-take-a-hard-look-at-ip-address-masking-services) but that's when they were owned by circle and run from the USA. i'm guessing it's not an issue now.

this could be a well-timed strategic move with the AMLD5 coming into effect next month. i'm especially curious about binance given their registration in malta. if binance goes full KYC, this will be a real game changer.

The vpn limits generally mean you can't use a non-premium/paid service but hear that paid ones update IPs often enough. Seychelles fast becoming the known unknown now isn't it?

But soon AMLD5 would anyway ease things off actually for eu based crypto exchanges. Era of no kyc will soon be over but when you can still do it at places like bitpanda licensed in Austria, not sure why people would return to Poloniex, given all their past user transgressions.

Too late the damage is done. There is no coming back from death. (Except for Jon Snow.)

Hmm, of course.
A shady location is the perfect place for shady business.

This doesn't help BTC. There are already plenty of folks saying that cryptos are used by terrorists, drug dealers and dirty businesses, Poloniex has chosen to side with that kind of people. It's another reason to stay away from that exchange if you want to play safe.

Indeed, the damage is done. But I think that the move will revive a little that exchange.
It's something I was expecting (hoping?!) with their move to Seychelles.
Although it's indeed a shady location which could cause other problems, let's be at least a bit optimistic.

To be fair, they're targeting a legitimate market niche. Binance and BitMEX became market leaders partly because of their liberal KYC policies. In fact, Poloniex originally rose to prominence on the basis of unverified traders before Circle entered the picture.

I definitely prefer using exchanges that don't require documents from me. That's not to say I'm going to use Poloniex, just saying.

I appreciate them for their decision. Don't know how they changed their mind but it's a positive motivation for crypto-currency community and other exchange as well. Often we are seeing post about KYC, and lots of people against of KYC especially during trading and buy crypto-currency. Their withdrawal limit also fair enough for medium & small traders. Major part of crypto-currency community is medium & small traders, I mean about capital. So it would be nice for them trading on poloniex now. I have remembered, I have created a account there long time ago, but never used it nor make deposit due to KYC drama. Because I don't think its necessary to use so many exchange with KYC since there is some other reputed exchange without KYC (Although limited withdrawal). Hope other exchange will motivated by poloniex regarding KYC policy.

That's a good way to compete with popular exchanges in the market now.
They were once popular because of that, so it might help their status to grow now with that good decision by theirs.

Binance is the leading exchange, they allow no KYC accounts up to a certain limit, so they should compete with it.

Isn't anyone thinking about safety here?

When Poloniex was in Massachusetts, with a known owner, they managed to steal money from their clients.
Now they're in Seychelles, in a small island in the middle of the ocean, far from everything, and we don't know who is the legitimate owner.

Does anyone with a sound mind thinks it's safe to store your BTC there?

This.

Poloniex's move should be seen as a sign of desperation. They've probably lost so many users that they're trying to attract those people on the fringes who want to trade without a KYC.

People are messed up in the head when you look at how even some of the most trashy exchanges hold tens of thousands of Bitcoins on behalf of their users. That's enough of an indication that people aren't capable of making rational/smart decisions when it comes to how they store their coins. All the hacks we went through in the past weren't enough of a wake-up call apparently.

This recent move of Poloniex might help attract some of the older traders who never wanted to leave that exchange but were forced out. It may sound weird, but some people are attached to services such as Blockchain, Bitfinex, Bittrex, Poloniex, etc on a sentimental level. Time will tell whether or not that turns out to be a good decision. I think not.

There are fewer and fewer exchanges allowing unverified trading. Deribit is preparing for KYC with the AMLD5 deadline approaching. With Binance operating from Malta, it's expected they will either mandate it as well or jump ship to a shadier jurisdiction like Poloniex. Even "DEX" platforms like IDEX have mandatory KYC now.

That has to be a factor here.

Attached on a sentimental level, really?

I can't imagine that. If true, these people shall never manage their finances by themselves. You can invest with your gut, nothing wrong with that, but you must always be ready to reverse your judgment.

Looks like I still can’t withdrawal my NEO stuck in there without a KYC. Well, I got happy for a moment. On a side note, I just took a look at NEO’s price and it’s down from $50+ to ~$5. So not that bad. :D

Will this help increase their trading volume? I hope so...

They have limited number of pairs compared to Binance but this decision to allow no kyc accounts is good, it's like they are back when they first started.
However, getting back the trust from its old traders or clients is a tough job, but like I said, I hope this will have a good effect like particularly in volume.

So far I am happy with what I am using now. I used to trade using Poloniex but after a lot of issues that takes days and perhaps weeks to resolve and read a lot complaints, that's where I decided to pack my bag and leave. It took them quite sometime to figure out a work around on this issue (unverified accounts). People already left. Its hard to take them back again. They should know that.

It happens in all fields. I think the correct term is brand loyalty outside crypto, where people stick to the products or service of a certain company regardless of how many other companies there are with even better and cheaper products and services. In some form or shape, I think we all have been there at some point.

Bitfinex for example was experiencing massive outflow of capital, but they managed to gain back quite a chunk of what they lost. Currently they have over 190,000BTC sitting in their two known cold wallets. That's at least a plus of 50,000BTC, which is quite impressive. People keep going back to Bitfinex no matter how hard they get screwed over. ::)

I wouldn't be surprised if they started requiring KYC again if Binance ever started requiring it too (maybe not immediately, though, to cash on some newly made refugees from Binance), but for now their only hope to remain afloat is this reduction in restrictions.

I was able to get my stuck XLM withdrawn. Too bad it's only worth 0.01 BTC now compared to 0.06 BTC about a year ago  :-\

Did Poloniex say why you couldn't get your NEO withdrawn?

Was your account verified already or did they allow you to withdrawal with an unverified account?

I have a Level 1 account. Not 100% sure what that means, but I know I never sent them my ID or any form of verification. I assumed Level 1 = Unverified, but I guess I might be wrong. This is what the FAQ says:

It probably required first name, last name, country, and email if it was made at the time of this screenshot.

https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-mfZ4dF5/1/63856d50/XL/i-mfZ4dF5-XL.png

Level 1 means you can withdrawal up to 10K per day.
I'm just curious if your account used to be frozen and then turned into level 1 or did you recently create this account?
Mine is still frozen as unverified and they haven't upgraded it to level 1.

The account was registered in 2015. Used Poloniex occasionally, and I gave them my name (thanks HI-TEC99) to get the basic verification level. When they forced everyone to KYC about a year and a half ago, my account was frozen and I refused to KYC, so it stayed that way. Recently, I got an email (https://i.imgur.com/Vqjzxzq.png) saying that Level 1 accounts were back and that I could start trading (and withdrawing) again.

I think it's a staged rollout and I was lucky. The FAQ says this:

Hopefully you get access to your funds soon.

Does anyone know whether they'll loosen up on radioactive nationalities like Iranians and Syrians? I assume almost certainly not but they could scrape up some business if they went full axis of evil.

As for myself nothing they've done has done anything other than incrementally reduce the faith I started with there in 20whatever it was. And since Justin Sun looks like a goosed phallus with a wig on, and also initially denied having anything to do with the sale, I'm gone for good.

Interesting description of Mr Sun.

Now, I'd like to point out that Poloniex is unverified.

Justin Sun has officially said that he fully trusts the management of Poloniex, whom he's a shareholder, but never acknowledges he was the largest shareholder, with full control of the company.

It's a possibility that Poloniex is now controlled by Iran. Or Al Qaida. Who knows? In the Seychelles, everything's hidden.

they couldn't do any worse of a job running poloniex than circle did! :P


we don't need him to acknowledge anything. actions speak louder than words. let's look at what poloniex has done since the acquisition:
-they immediately listed TRX. https://support.poloniex.circle.com/hc/en-us/articles/360036113171-Poloniex-lists-TRON-TRX-
-they launched a trading competition for TRX. https://support.poloniex.circle.com/hc/en-us/articles/360037614392
-they launched staking rewards for TRX. https://support.poloniex.circle.com/hc/en-us/articles/360037661752-TRX-Staking-Christmas-Campaign
-they acquired tron's largest DEX. https://cointelegraph.com/news/poloniex-acquires-tron-networks-biggest-decentralized-exchange
-they even got caught telling followers to buy TRX in a deleted tweet. https://beincrypto.com/poloniex-caught-telling-followers-to-buy-tron-in-deleted-tweet/

justin sun is putting that tron ICO money to good use.....

More sexy fun here - https://bitcoinist.com/poloniex-exchange-security-breach/

There's a lot of valuable data on there which I presume wasn't handed it over with the expectation of it winding up in the hands of fuckwits. This doesn't bode all too well for their bright shiny future.

Two months after the buyout and they are already getting hacked! Apparently, they put all their money into pumping Tron and didn't leave much for security.

The lack of official announcement and general secrecy about the compromise -- despite telling users to reset passwords -- is pretty appalling. This screams of incompetence and unscrupulousness.

amazingly, no outlets besides bitcoinist and a few no-name sites covered the breach. nothing from coindesk, cointelegraph, CCN, etc even though poloniex customer support confirmed the emails were real.

i guess to keep a security breach out of the headlines, all you have to do is not announce anything about it? ???

they got me excited for a minute by bringing back non-KYC accounts but screw these shady assholes. stick with binance or kucoin.

It's not a reassuring start to their reign, that's for sure.

Considering the geographical move, the relative mystery of who bought and the Tron shit they should be going all out to prove they're worthy of our business. This is the diametric opposite.

The shonkiest aspect of their handling of it is sending out an email about this and not announcing the leak beforehand. Most people rightly thought it was yet another phishing attempt.

Interested to see where their volumes are in a few months from now.

Very interesting.

We could see some old school players going back to Poloniex because of this move. However, the $10k limit that they impose is still much less than the 2 BTC per day that Binance allows, especially if BTC was to move upwards. So that is obviously something to look out for.

Based on their track record and people's experience with them previously I honestly think this might be too late. Their customer support has one of the worst reputations around here.

Same for me. Did the unfreeze your acount by now?