Never store your coins in a CEX wallet

[CryptSafe]

It is nice you brought up this topic and I believe it would also enlighten both the old and new members because it looks a bit confusing and people wouldn't understand what the CEX are up to. I have had this thought in the past and I had to do away with it because I will not for one day in my right sense make such a mistake of using a wallet from an exchange with them claiming it to be a self-custodial wallet which we all know is not true.

Any wallet which is issued by a CEX is nothing but a big trap to get at people. You might think it is a self custodial wallet but in the real sense,it is not what you think and I will not be surprise in the nearest future users of such wallet would start complaining of it being hacked and their funds stollen. Do not believe what they tell you about those wallets as long as they are in charge of if, their is no guarantee of the wallte safety. Be wise and avoid such wallet.

[Publictalk792]

For long time people in cryptocurrency world have known that it is best to keep your coins in special kind of wallet means in decentralized wallet. This is better than leaving them on centralized exchanges. Some big websites like Binance Bitget and OKX are now offering wallets that look like decentralized wallets. They even give you keys. But it is very important to remember that these wallets are still controlled by these websites and we do not have full control over your money. Electrum and Blue wallets let you have full control over your coins and they are safer than using wallet controlled anyone other like any CEX.

[sokani]

I know what I'm saying sir, in order to send funds from my OKX wallet to it's exchange I pay transaction fees and recently I lost my phone and when I tried retrieving my wallet, I could only retrieve my exchange which was binded to my email and keys were requested before I can have access to my wallet.

I initially thought they were intertwined and the wallet is merged with the exchange since it's the same entity, but I found out there was a clear distinction between the two and I lost all coins in my OKX wallet while my exchange was intact because I didn't have the keys.

About OKX, I think it's because both the OKX(exchange) and OKX(web3 wallet) could be accessed in a single application that's why you thought they were interconnected. But I would have expected you to spot the differences since you need to generate a seed phrase to create a wallet which is what the OKX(web3 wallet) requires and an email and password for OKX(exchange). If you'd backed up your seed phrase you would have been able to recover your funds when your import the seed phrase in the OKX app or any non custodial wallet.

[ndutndut]

For long time people in cryptocurrency world have known that it is best to keep your coins in special kind of wallet means in decentralized wallet. This is better than leaving them on centralized exchanges. Some big websites like Binance Bitget and OKX are now offering wallets that look like decentralized wallets. They even give you keys. But it is very important to remember that these wallets are still controlled by these websites and we do not have full control over your money. Electrum and Blue wallets let you have full control over your coins and they are safer than using wallet controlled anyone other like any CEX.

Almost everyone already knows that even storing assets in the best decentralized wallet, but in reality many people still store assets on exchanges. There are two possibilities why many people still store cryptocurrencies on centralized exchanges, maybe they only have a few coins and the second may be because of the cost issue when sending to a decentralized wallet so they store cryptocurrencies on centralized exchanges. In addition, they store cryptocurrencies on well-known exchanges such as Binance Bitget and OKEx. But in fact, all centralized exchanges have high risks because all our assets are controlled by them and many exchanges have collapsed or gone bankrupt in the end many users have lost.

There are still many people who think this is normal, because the assets they have are small they ignore security, even though from the small assets we must learn to store them in a wallet that we can control ourselves. Likewise with the problem of costs, they should have the mindset that costs are not everything, the most important thing is that their assets must be safe. So indeed we should get used to storing assets in a wallet that allows you to have full control over your own coins rather than using a CEX wallet that is controlled by someone else and that is very risky.

[Cryptoprincess101]

It's disappointing that still the great majority of people store coins on exchanges.

The reason is simple, for easy trades. Most of those who don't have intention of keeping their coins for long often prefers to store their coin in exchanges since they will need to trade it within a short time, and we can't really blame them reason being that there are times when you will want to move your coins from a self-custody wallet to an exchange, it will attract high gas fees or a congestion in mempool which will delay the transaction. Storing coins in exchanges is not advisable but if you don't have any plan of storing your coins for a long time then there may be need to just move it to an exchange for easier transaction whenever you are ready. 

[Awaklara]

CEX wallets are centralized and those keys are just a camouflage. Use open source decentralized wallets like Electrum, Blue wallet e.t.c. to have total control over your coins.

some who still store their assets on the exchange are beginners, but those who have trading interests I am sure still store their assets on the exchange.
past events can give us valuable experience not to store assets on the exchange. beginners who come to invest or trade must also know such information. do not just trust exchange advertisements as a trusted platform.
exchange is not a platform for storing assets, even if you want to store them in a wallet, of course, we have to choose the right wallet. I use Electrum.

[hd49728]

some who still store their assets on the exchange are beginners, but those who have trading interests I am sure still store their assets on the exchange.
past events can give us valuable experience not to store assets on the exchange. beginners who come to invest or trade must also know such information. do not just trust exchange advertisements as a trusted platform.

This bad practice can happen with beginners and experienced people, because if they are careless, they will store their coins on centralized exchanges which have undeniable convenience.

They can understand about risk but their are other things to decide their decisions on where to store their coins.
Reminder: do not keep your money in online accounts

exchange is not a platform for storing assets, even if you want to store them in a wallet, of course, we have to choose the right wallet. I use Electrum.

Electrum wallet is an open source, non custodial, that is good, but it is SPV wallet and does not require too much storage space on your device.

Best wallets for desktop and mobile.

[sunsilk]

Exchanges and exchanges owned web3 wallets as they say, it's never worthy to keep the coins there. If someone trades from time to time then there's no need to warn them because even if you tell them not to keep coins in there, they'll still do it because they have to.

What matters is not to keep the most of the portfolio that they have in it. The balance or amount that these traders need on the exchanges should be the amount that they only need for trading, nothing more, nothing less.

Well, and the same goes with the wallets that are owned by exchanges. I'm better using my hardware wallet instead.

[Callido]

However, recently CEXs like Binance, Bitget and especially OKX are introducing their own wallets looking decentralized by issuing keys to it. I know those wallets are still in full control of the CEX and not the investor. It is better to go for decentralized wallets that are open source instead of preserving your precious coins in the wallets of CEXs which you have limited control over.

As long it is sponsored by them with complete doubt it is still under their field.

For those who DCA, it is normal to hold initial purchase for that short time before sending out to decentralized wallet.

Assets on exchanges comes with different risk, personal attack and hackers going through the system to steal funds. No exchange is perfect to escape this attack but for that little time holding in exchange should be done on well known platforms not the minority on the list of exchanges.

[btcltcdigger]

This is indeed true for 99% of the CEXes out there. However, there are few exceptions. Namely Binance. I've had crypto in amounths of $20k there for years now.
Never have i had any issue or any funds lost.

We never said that you will inevitably lose money on CEXs. But, we said that your money is not guaranteed. It's not yours. The only thing you have is a contract the Binance ows you $20k.
Yes, they 're probably never going to go away with your money, but if they decided to freeze bitcoin withdrawals for 10 days, there is nothing you can do, even if the money is yours.

If they freeze BTC withdrawls, i  can always convert to other crypto and pull out. It has happened before, even on binance. They didn't maliciously freeze a crypto, rather had some maintenance just when i needed that cash.
So i converted it to something else, and got it out. Even was in some minor profit due to conversion

[NewRanger]

I myself am still safe placing my funds in Binance until now even though as you said above that nothing is perfect and sometimes it is also stolen by thieves.

And regarding the announcement of theymos in 2022 as conveyed by @apogio it seems that the Unstoppable wallet is also easy and convenient to use.

[cryptoaddictchie]

However, recently CEXs like Binance, Bitget and especially OKX are introducing their own wallets looking decentralized by issuing keys to it. I know those wallets are still in full control of the CEX and not the investor. It is better to go for decentralized wallets that are open source instead of preserving your precious coins in the wallets of CEXs which you have limited control over.

Ive used non custodial wallet of binance but never sure or check whether its an open source or close one so Im still putting my asset on those reputable one like metamask for example.

Id also have funds on cex for the purpose of selling and p2p for my sake and some trading orders. This is true my biggest port was stored non custodial wallet for safe keeping.

[hd49728]

Ive used non custodial wallet of binance but never sure or check whether its an open source or close one so Im still putting my asset on those reputable one like metamask for example.

Id also have funds on cex for the purpose of selling and p2p for my sake and some trading orders. This is true my biggest port was stored non custodial wallet for safe keeping.

If they are a centralized exchange, it's very slow chance that their wallets are open source. Binance acquired Trust wallet years ago and Trust wallet is close source.

Binance tried to say Trust wallet is open source many times, but you see it is truly close source.
https://walletscrutiny.com/?platform=allPlatforms&page=0&query-string=trust

Another review on Trust wallet.

Trust wallet is closed source. We have absolutely no idea how secure seed phrases generated by Trust wallet are. They could all be generated in a pre-determined way known to some programmer at Trust wallet. They could be storing every generated seed phrase on a centralized server. They could be transmitting seed phrases across the internet. We simply don't know. You should assume that any seed phrase generated by a closed source piece of software is compromised. OP should generate a brand new seed phrase on better wallet software and send his coins across.

[Hamza2424]

Be Warned and Be Wise while making a decision on wallet to preserve your coins.

Yup, I do agree, if you are planning for a long-term holding above 2 years or even above 1 year make sure to never choose any Centralized exchange wallet, it's better to hold funds on the decentralized open-source hot wallet if you don't have the cold storage or your portfolio size
doesn't require cold storage.

Just for the sake of information, Bybit announced today that they are disabling their services so this is what happens most of the time when you hold your funds over a long period due to regulatory issues platforms shut down their services. Even in some worst cases when exchanges get compromised your funds are gone forever like Wazirax Sacam in India..

[Alone055]

Just for the sake of information, Bybit announced today that they are disabling their services so this is what happens most of the time when you hold your funds over a long period due to regulatory issues platforms shut down their services. Even in some worst cases when exchanges get compromised your funds are gone forever like Wazirax Sacam in India..

Well, in such cases where the platform allows you to withdraw your assets, it might not be that big of an issue; however, despite this fact, it's not a very good idea to keep your funds in a centralized environment because then what's the point of using cryptocurrencies? If you are a trader and you use a specific amount of funds for your trading activities on a daily basis, that's a different thing, but keeping your assets in a centralized exchange or wallet with the intention of holding them for the long term is a bad idea.

When it comes to web3 wallets that most centralized platforms, such as Binance, Bitget, and OKX have these days, I don't think many people use them for storing their assets, these wallets are only good for testing or using web3 services and platforms where you connect your wallet to do certain operations and only fund such wallets when you need to do something.

[Saint-loup]

Ive used non custodial wallet of binance but never sure or check whether its an open source or close one so Im still putting my asset on those reputable one like metamask for example.

Id also have funds on cex for the purpose of selling and p2p for my sake and some trading orders. This is true my biggest port was stored non custodial wallet for safe keeping.

If they are a centralized exchange, it's very slow chance that their wallets are open source. Binance acquired Trust wallet years ago and Trust wallet is close source.

Binance tried to say Trust wallet is open source many times, but you see it is truly close source.
https://walletscrutiny.com/?platform=allPlatforms&page=0&query-string=trust

Another review on Trust wallet.

Trust wallet is closed source. We have absolutely no idea how secure seed phrases generated by Trust wallet are. They could all be generated in a pre-determined way known to some programmer at Trust wallet. They could be storing every generated seed phrase on a centralized server. They could be transmitting seed phrases across the internet. We simply don't know. You should assume that any seed phrase generated by a closed source piece of software is compromised. OP should generate a brand new seed phrase on better wallet software and send his coins across.

I'm not sure he's talking about Trust Wallet, I think he is talking about another wallet, the official one from Binance(Binance Wallet) otherwise he would have clearly named it IMO. Anyway, Trust Wallet is not open source so I agree it shouldn't be used as a cold wallet, but if you don't need to hold much funds on it, I think it's a pretty good multicoins hotwallet offering interesting and convenient features for Web3 especially.

[sokani]

I myself am still safe placing my funds in Binance until now even though as you said above that nothing is perfect and sometimes it is also stolen by thieves.

And regarding the announcement of theymos in 2022 as conveyed by @apogio it seems that the Unstoppable wallet is also easy and convenient to use.

I'd advise against having your funds on a CEX because it's not safe, except of course you're a day-to-day trader. If Binance gets hack or shuts down by the authorities, you could lose your funds.

Unstoppable wallet is a non custodial wallet that supports multi coins and comes highly recommended. Should incase you want to go for it, don't forget to download only from the official website.

[Abu-Naim]

CEX wallets are centralized and those keys are just a camouflage. Use open source decentralized wallets like Electrum, Blue wallet e.t.c. to have total control over your coins.

Be Warned and Be Wise while making a decision on wallet to preserve your coins.

Some centralized exchanges are trying to drag people attention to their wallet they call decentralized wallet, which to me is just a wallet they are still controlling, and the main reason for these keys is to allow you to be able to use multiple wallet with different seed phrases; but in my own understanding, they are still in control of everything because I can see that for OKX you can switch activities from either using the wallet or the exchange which simply means that they can short all of them down when they wish.

I never try any of their seed phrase in other so-called decentralized close source wallets, but I don’t think these wallets are safe, it will just be the same as leaving your money in the centralized exchanges.

[Nheer]

However, recently CEXs like Binance, Bitget and especially OKX are introducing their own wallets looking decentralized by issuing keys to it. I know those wallets are still in full control of the CEX and not the investor. It is better to go for decentralized wallets that are open source instead of preserving your precious coins in the wallets of CEXs which you have limited control over.

CEX wallets are centralized and those keys are just a camouflage. Use open source decentralized wallets like Electrum, Blue wallet e.t.c. to have total control over your coins.

Be Warned and Be Wise while making a decision on wallet to preserve your coins.

I understand what you mean but I think the right word is Custodial and Non custodial wallet instead of decentralized wallet.

I have also seen Exchanges develop their own web3 wallet within the same exchange platform which they believe is different from the main exchange wallet and they make people believe that with the seed phrase it is actually a non custodial wallet and that people assets are not under their control but I don’t buy that at all.

I will not advise people to believe and use exchanges wallet they should make use of a non custodial wallet not linked to any exchange at all, but many people who don’t have this knowledge will always fall for this and believe the wallets are actually safe. Centralized exchanges wants to make people believe that their assets are safe in their hands but since people are not storing coins on their platforms they now came up with this wallet of a thing.

[Woodie]

As much as this advice is openly available for all to read and see everywhere and the bad legislation in some countries of course a CEX is a no no, unfortunately I think what pushes many to store coins on a CEX are things like high transaction fees and people want to cut on these, hustles like peer to peer trading (p2p), leveraged trading, and for obvious reasons "stubbornness "**guilty for this one**

But of course,  if you are going to be storing coins for the long term then opt for cold wallets to give your coins a safe haven and your own peace of mind.