Best alternatives to Gox, Bitstamp, BTC-E?

[freebird]

Hello fellow bitcoiners,

I've been trading bitcoin since April and am in at an average price of about $120 per coin. I've been reading this forum occasionally over the past few months but never had any reason to register to ask a question or enter into discussions. Now, since my investment has gone up in value so much already -- and I expect it to keep going up a LOT more in the coming months -- I'm getting more serious about making sure to protect my coins from possible theft or disappearance in shady online exchanges. I would appreciate some advice on this issue.

I currently hold coins on Bitstamp, Mt. Gox, BTC-E, and Coinbase. I've been gradually removing my coins from Gox, since they've had so many problems and I have a feeling that company could be shut down sooner or later, and everyone might end up losing all their coins that are there. My last withdrawal of a couple coins took more than a day and I had to open a support ticket before it actually went through. I've seen the horror stories in the Service Discussion forum of people's BTC withdrawals from Gox taking days and days. I wonder if at some point they might just stop processing any withdrawals, even coins?

I also want to remove most of my coins from BTC-E because it seems kind of sketchy (based in Russia, poor customer support, reports of people's coins randomly disappearing, etc.). I like it for trading, but it might be too risky to hold a lot of coins there.

Coinbase seems like the most legitimate operation by far (backed by millions in venture capital, America-based), but it's not really meant for trading. I only keep coins there that I want to just hold, not actively trade. So I'm trying to figure out where to put the rest of my Gox coins and BTC-E coins, in some place other than Bitstamp that's good for active trading -- since I don't want to hold all my coins for trading in just one exchange.

Does anybody have any thoughts on Bitfinex? What about Coinsetter? Any other good options? I figure the safest thing is to split most of my trading coins between Bitstamp and another reputable exchange (relatively speaking).

Looking forward to your replies. Thanks!

[mjc]

Coinbase is great for moving to/from fiat, Bitstamp allows better trading.

[freebird]

mjc, thanks for your reply. In your experience, how long does it usually take to buy or sell on Coinbase, from the time when placing the order to the time when the order is filled?

I realize that Coinbase is not intended for active trading, but I'm thinking that it might be the best option for cashing out a part of my BTC position, whenever I'll eventually do that (probably not for quite a while though).

In the near term, I'm thinking of maybe investing more fiat into BTC. But with the way it's been going up fast lately, is there a risk that I'd place an order in Coinbase and then the order wouldn't get executed for a couple of days, and meanwhile the price would've gone way up? Do they give you the coins at the price when you clicked "buy" or the price at the time when the fiat actually arrives from the bank?

[rigel]

Where are you from?

If you are European: https://www.therocktrading.com

[freebird]

rigel, thanks for your reply. However, I'm American.

[Tally-ho Soy Sauce]

Vircurex