How important are exchanges?

[tjtonmoy]

Not so important for BTC TBH. But for other crypto as Altcoins, i think exchanges have done a good job. As for sending a different network tokens to exchange for some other blockchain, would be kind of hard without exchanges.
But BTC is a single chain operator. If you are not in BTC blockchain network, do you really own BTC? That's the question for some other time.
But to value the exchanges, it has helped a lot to build a combined network with different assets.
So it has it's benefits.

[Ayers]

Bitcoins can exist without exchanges, but would you support the argument that the existence of exchanges are among the factors facilitating the popularity and accessibility that people have to bitcoins?

It would be shortsighted to not recognize that exchanges have accelerated the rate at which bitcoin was adopted and they have increased its popularity as an asset to hold and to trade all over the world.

But we cannot deny that centralized exchanges have also brought their fair share of issues, one of the most obvious ones is that now many people prefer to keep their coins at exchanges so they can trade and invest as soon as there is a big news, but this compromises significantly their privacy and the true ownership of their coins, two aspects which are incredibly important and which are disregarded by a great deal of traders now.  

it's true, most people put their assets on the exchange, they see the exchange as a place to keep their assets so they can quickly use it whenever there is a signal for see them make a profit. here, we often advise each other not to put too much money on the exchange but I have seen many people put millions of dollars into it to trade futures and they even hang orders overnight, weekly. today's investors no longer care about privacy, what they care about is profit, and how to make as much money as possible

[Hyphen(-)]

Bitcoins can exist without exchanges, but would you support the argument that the existence of exchanges are among the factors facilitating the popularity and accessibility that people have to bitcoins?

Yes, many people learn about Bitcoin through cryptocurrency exchanges because it is easier to trade in the exchanges and they are not concerned with their privacy; however, as you learn more about Bitcoin, you begin to understand the exact meaning of privacy, and you will realize what you have done wrong.
Buying Bitcoin in a crypto exchange is a good idea, but keeping your Bitcoin in an exchange that has full force and power to control your Bitcoin is a bad idea; you can buy in the exchange and send it to your personal wallets where you have full control over your Bitcoin.

I also believe that the existence of cryptocurrency contributes to Bitcoin's popularity.

[Flexystar]

Bitcoins can exist without exchanges, but would you support the argument that the existence of exchanges are among the factors facilitating the popularity and accessibility that people have to bitcoins?

Well in initial days bitcoin used to be either mined and traded from p2p way out and it still worked. Rather it worked perfectly without any hindrance and there was not much buzz about it but it was working anyways. However , if they were not there then that would have been opposite to what we see bitcoin at.

What I mean is, bitcoin would have been traded at limited rates, the volume could have been lesser and its popularity would have been far more simpler than today.

For me previous days were good, it was more about trading anonymously p2p and borderless than the price today.

[Leviathan.007]

That's important for bitcoin or any other asset to have a platform for trading and these platforms are called exchanges in the case of bitcoin, generally using exchanges you can find the exact price of bitcoin and other similar cryptocurrencies, if we had no exchanges at all none could understand how much he should pay for each bitcoin, As far as I know, this happened years ago at begging years of bitcoin and the only exchanges to sell and buy bitcoin was shut down so people could do any bitcoin deal at all.

[pawanjain]

Bitcoins can exist without exchanges, but would you support the argument that the existence of exchanges are among the factors facilitating the popularity and accessibility that people have to bitcoins?

Exchanges are indeed important factors of popularity and accessibility to bitcoin.
They are needed because of the liquidity as well as the various altcoins and BTC pairs it provides.
P2P exchanges are good but at the same time it involves various risks and less options of payment.
Exchanges provide a variety of options and utilities such as staking, lending etc.. on altcoins.

[kamvreto]

~snip~
But we cannot deny that centralized exchanges have also brought their fair share of issues, one of the most obvious ones is that now many people prefer to keep their coins at exchanges so they can trade and invest as soon as there is a big news, but this compromises significantly their privacy and the true ownership of their coins, two aspects which are incredibly important and which are disregarded by a great deal of traders now. 

About privacy it is the decision of each user. about centralized exchanges of course some of them require KYC completion to find out who their customers are, because this is also to tackle criminal acts such as money laundering and other things. If you want to use an exchange that does not include KYC, you can use a DEX exchange because it is a decentralized exchange that is directly linked to your wallet. Exchanges like Binance require KYC to withdraw a certain amount of assets, but security is guaranteed. But remember once again, not suitable for those who are very concerned about privacy more than anything else..

[D ltr]

In my opinion, for now the exchange is very important in the development of bitcoin, the reason is because bitcoin has not become a means of payment, if done p2p, it is too dangerous at this time, fraud will always occur in every transaction. even though p2p is the same as an exchange

[omone1]

People knowing they can securely exchange their bitcoin in a centralized and decentralized give them a hope of a quick ready liquid market which builds confidence to hold and pass the good news to family and friends. I started my bitcoin journey in 2017 when I got tired of ponzi schemes. I took my laptop and taught myself how bitcoin works. I only learnt to buy and sell bitcoin via P2P and buyers were more than sellers. I started using CEX in later 2017.

[KaliLinux]

Not so important for BTC TBH. But for other crypto as Altcoins, i think exchanges have done a good job. As for sending a different network tokens to exchange for some other blockchain, would be kind of hard without exchanges.
But BTC is a single chain operator. If you are not in BTC blockchain network, do you really own BTC? That's the question for some other time.
But to value the exchanges, it has helped a lot to build a combined network with different assets.
So it has it's benefits.

I really don't think that Bitcoin or any other crypto asset is in question here but "How important are exchanges?" Of cause, if it is not on the BTC network, it is really not Bitcoin, like all those wrapped BTCs however, how have the exchanges assisted in the general crypto space, has crypto exchange assisted in easing the exchange i.e Buy and Selling of our crypto assets or it wouldn't have mattered if there were no exchanges it still would have been easy to trade Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. I still think the exchange is important in that sense.

[yazher]

The more exchanges there, the more people will engage in investing in bitcoins because when they see they have their own local exchanges in their country, it will settle their hearts and they will gonna try to have some bitcoins to hold or trade in their local exchanges. I think after people are used to using exchanges, they will gonna find another way to trade if ever the government banned it. This time, there will be other options when trading bitcoins and it will be more decentralized and hideous from the government.

[inthelongrun]

Bitcoin can exist and survive without exchanges, no question about it. But I don't think the price of Bitcoin and its adoption will be at this current pace if not for the exchanges. These exchanges further advertised around the world the presence of a decentralized currency that is non-inflationary. Bitcoin and its blockchain is a revolutionary technology but its huge trading volume further convinced more people, companies, and governments that it's not just the technology they could copy but it proves that Bitcoin has value. The existence of local exchanges helped Bitcoin to become more accessible to many parts of the world.

I'm not saying that Bitcoin should be thankful for these exchanges because these exchanges should be the ones thankful for the creation of Bitcoin, as it provides them with opportunities.   

[blue_hurricanger]

~snip~
But we cannot deny that centralized exchanges have also brought their fair share of issues, one of the most obvious ones is that now many people prefer to keep their coins at exchanges so they can trade and invest as soon as there is a big news, but this compromises significantly their privacy and the true ownership of their coins, two aspects which are incredibly important and which are disregarded by a great deal of traders now. 

About privacy it is the decision of each user. about centralized exchanges of course some of them require KYC completion to find out who their customers are, because this is also to tackle criminal acts such as money laundering and other things. If you want to use an exchange that does not include KYC, you can use a DEX exchange because it is a decentralized exchange that is directly linked to your wallet. Exchanges like Binance require KYC to withdraw a certain amount of assets, but security is guaranteed. But remember once again, not suitable for those who are very concerned about privacy more than anything else..

Agree. A lot of times, I saw people put CEX on the absolute shit list cause of the KYC requirement. But in the reality, unless you living off-grid, most of the time people give away their KYC like it was a normal thing without batting an eye. KYC help exchange to reduce bots and farming accounts for whatever purpose they want to do. You definitely don't want to use an exchange full of bots, CEX or not. Cause it'll be full of pump&dump, fake trading accounts. Not even talking about heavy stuff like money laundering, trying to scam in the p2p with exchange wallets,... Anyway, don't want KYC? Go to DEX exchange.

Someone has said on the first page of this thread. I feel at ease when using the p2p trade on the CEX exchanges compared to the p2p in the old days. The ease and security of CEX exchanges are well worth the downside of giving away your KYC. As long it was a trusted CEX exchange like Binance, your KYC data is encrypted.

[Antonas1]

~

Hmmm. Interesting regulation. Is this regulation is only for physical stores? Or you are not allowed to use bitcoin buying any kind of digital goods on your country too?

Any kind of buying stuff using Bitcoin/cryptocurrency is forbidden, because the regulations say the legal currency in Indonesia is only Rupiah. So yes, you can't buy stuff even if they are digital and pay with bitcoin, or you will be punished for it. Maybe this news will help you understand the complicated regulations in my country: Indonesia to Tighten Crypto Regulation With Stricter Rules for Exchanges.

Is there any way your government knows that people or you are using bitcoin particularly an app only for indonesian people? To track whether you use it buying anything else other than trading it? Or it is illegal ^{(buying things with bitcoin)} just if they caught you on hand?

So far no cases have been heard of people being arrested for buying goods using bitcoin. It seems like if we do it secretly then we'll be fine, but it might be easier to get into trouble if we do it online.

[Solosanz]

No doubt exchanges are the biggest factors that make Bitcoin volume is really high because it's easier and safer that doing peer to peer trading. If exchanges isn't exist, I think Bitcoin price and the volume would significantly decreased since not many people are know Bitcoin and they're not really comfortable to use a new stuff. Personally I never do any peer to peer transaction and only trade Bitcoin in the exchange.

[ethereumhunter]

The existence of exchanges helps spread bitcoin among people because they can trade bitcoins with others. And if people can benefit from the exchange, they will invite others to try it too. And from those people, there will be many who spread information about the existence of the exchange, which will trigger more people's curiosity to try it. And that's why the popularity of bitcoin can increase now so that in the future, with a lot of information about bitcoin, it will give more popularity of bitcoin.

[GideonGono]

Bitcoins can exist without exchanges, but would you support the argument that the existence of exchanges are among the factors facilitating the popularity and accessibility that people have to bitcoins?

Yes crypto could exist but would it still be the same without exchange?
Do you think other's would still use crypto without the access of easily changing their assets into Fiat?
For me exchange played a huge role in crypto adaptation it played a huge part why other people came into crypto.

[posi]

Bitcoins can exist without exchanges, but would you support the argument that the existence of exchanges are among the factors facilitating the popularity and accessibility that people have to bitcoins?

As long as the demand for fiat money remains and bitcoin is not the world currency, the need for exchange will never go away. Having said that, exchanges play an important role in the market, it is a safe gateway for a newbie to the crypto world. How do we get bitcoins without exchange? Although we always say that a centralized exchange is no different from a centralized bank but I believe we all have at least 1 account on the exchange because we still use fiat as a unit main currency.

[qwertyup23]

Bitcoins can exist without exchanges, but would you support the argument that the existence of exchanges are among the factors facilitating the popularity and accessibility that people have to bitcoins?

Definitely! Exchanges (even local exchanges) provide a platform for people to convert easily one's BTC to their desired currency. In addition, the exchange would provide the utmost convenience to the users who are planning to enter this space. I remember, there are dozens of users who are curious about BTC, but they find it too complicated on how one it would convert it to cash (using the p2p of Binance).

Personally, the presence of our local exchange in the Philippines provided the convenience of converting our BTCs to our local currency. Not only does it provide accessibility 24/7, but it also has the option of paying your bills immediately.

[PX-Z]

~

Hmmm. Interesting regulation. Is this regulation is only for physical stores? Or you are not allowed to use bitcoin buying any kind of digital goods on your country too?

Any kind of buying stuff using Bitcoin/cryptocurrency is forbidden, because the regulations say the legal currency in Indonesia is only Rupiah. So yes, you can't buy stuff even if they are digital and pay with bitcoin, or you will be punished for it. Maybe this news will help you understand the complicated regulations in my country: Indonesia to Tighten Crypto Regulation With Stricter Rules for Exchanges.

Is there any way your government knows that people or you are using bitcoin particularly an app only for indonesian people? To track whether you use it buying anything else other than trading it? Or it is illegal ^{(buying things with bitcoin)} just if they caught you on hand?

So far no cases have been heard of people being arrested for buying goods using bitcoin. It seems like if we do it secretly then we'll be fine, but it might be easier to get into trouble if we do it online.

Quite unique regulation, i never heard something like this, i wonder if other countries can do something like this instead of banning bitcoin/crypto which they called as "tool for money laundering".
For this kind of regulation since no bitcoin or money will be used to buy/sell things ^{(assuming since its the aim of the regulation)} money laundering crypto will not happened as it is only considered as an investment tool on regulated exchanges in the country.