Can you walk me through this. Pretend I know nothing about this. You are able to buy and sell coins in which you do not own? How exactly is this happening? Any links you can provide to these exchanges would help.
The exchange I use for these alt coins is https://poloniex.com/ They offer margin trading and financing on most pairs. It is a Bitcoin denominated exchange so you need to get btc on there. To purchase BTC I use a Coinbase. Warning: You should never leave your coins on any of these exchanges if you are not in a position. Just withdraw and send then back in when your ready to trade. Warning #2: The markets are highly volatile and flash crashes are now becoming more and more common for example today this happened https://www.ethnews.com/kraken-users-margin-positions-liquidated-as-ddos-hits-amid-selloff
I looked pretty hard into crypto for a while. I actually almost bought 5000 bitcoin at $1 a while back and decided not to because I thought the gov would make it fail. Missed that boat. But I still don't trade them because the risk using these "exchanges" is unreasonably high. Last time I looked, to date not a single major exchange has survived hacking or the owner stealing all the money. I do believe a lot of professional pump and dumpers have moved on from penny stocks to alt coins and I think you could do well trading them like you would a penny stock you know is being pumped.
I'll add this to the alt currency discussion since I found it interesting and illuminating in terms of some of the details regarding security and market structure that aren't necessarily obvious to low tech people like myself. https://chatwithtraders.com/ep-113-benjamin-small/
I find it hilarious that people are screaming at lack of vol in ES and all major assets really when crypto is going apeshit. But hey, 80/20 rule applies everywhere. Been involved with ETH since summer '16. Crypto is just gearing up.
Yes, but to clarify something here, one can't just "trade" crypto. You have to actually acquire bitcoins and use them to trade on these exchanges. That is really the stumbling block for a lot of people including myself. Personally the vol in oil and gas is perfectly fine for me. I do agree with you that I don't have the foggiest clue why anyone would trade the ES.
There's also the whole regulation aspect. Are crypto-exchanges CFTC regulated? Pretty damn sure they're not, so you better be ready to be out of the party before the music stops.
@Maverick74 Exchanges do take fiat for crypto. There are 2 types of exchanges: crypto only and fiat/crypto. I use Kraken and Kraken takes fiat which you can get whatever crypto of choice(they have a lot). But there are others depending on whether you deem them suitable counterparties. @i960 You are right. They are not. And I absolutely couldn't care less. Majority of volume is driven by Asia today. If you are talking security of funds, don't trade on margin or you risk a DDOS attack. Cash positions will be fine.