This crypto winter has been harsh on many people, resulting in significant losses across the board. However, there are players in this industry who continue to rake in the profits, despite bearish market conditions. Two of these are the leading crypto exchanges, Binance and Coinbase.
According to analysts and researchers at The Block, both Binance and Coinbase have done very well despite decreased trading volume and an over 80% drop in Bitcoin’s (BTC) price through fiscal 2018.
Binance Rakes in $446 Million in Profits in 2018
Binance, the world’s leading crypto exchange based out of Malta, purportedly raked in $446 million in profits in 2018, despite the harsh crypto bear market.
Though Binance’s earnings are not publicly available, analysts at The Block were able to deduce the exchange’s finances by gathering publicly available data from the quarterly BNB token burns (supply reductions), which indicate that the exchange scored a net profit of $446 million.
Over the course of 2018, Binance pulled in $149.6 million in Q1, $166 million in Q2, $80.9 million in Q3, and then $49.6 million in the waning months of Q4. While these quarterly profits are substantial, they are a far cry from the $201 million in profits pulled in from just Q4 2017.
Moreover, not only has Binance secured substantial profits during the 2018 bear market, but the exchange has expanded to provide an array of new products and services. In recent weeks, Binance relaunched their Binance Launchpad, a token sale platform which recently issued the popular BitTorrent (BTT) ICO.
As well, the exchange started an over-the-counter (OTC) trading desk, launched multiple fiat-to-crypto exchanges, and partnered with Simplex to enable Binance customers to purchase cryptos with their debit or credit cards.
Further adding to these accomplishments, Binance Coin (BNB) recently climbed into the top 10 cryptos by market capitalization and has been one of the strongest cryptocurrencies to make it through crypto’s nuclear winter.
All in all, Binance is a clear winner among exchanges, and it will be interesting to see how they fare in 2019 if the crypto markets continue their downward path.
Coinbase Is Doing All Right Too
While even less is known about Coinbase’s finances, there’s no question that they outperformed the 2018 crypto winter. In Q4 2018, the San Francisco-based exchange managed to secure $300 million in funding from Tiger Global, Y Combinator, A16Z, Polychain Cap, and a number of other crypto-friendly venture groups.
Following this funding round, Coinbase was valued at an astonishing $8 billion, making it the most valuable crypto-related company in the entire industry.
Do you think Binance and Coinbase will have an even better year in 2019? Let us know what you think in the comment section below.
