Crypto.com Review
Founded in 2016, Crypto.com has grown into a fully-fledged and well-known international cryptocurrency hub in a few short years. It’s crypto ecosystem consists of Crypto.com App, Crypto.com Exchange, Crypto.com DeFi swap and Wallet, Crypto.com Pay, Crypto Earn, Crypto Credit, and many other services. Crypto.com works with regulatory institutions all over the globe, and aims to bring you the most convenient way to buy, sell, trade and spend cryptocurrencies. The Crypto.com App allows users to buy over 100 top cryptocurrencies at true cost, earn high interest on their crypto, manage their Crypto.com Visa Card, and easily make crypto payments, among many other rewarding features. The company’s Crypto.com DeFi Wallet is non-custodial, so users can have full control of their private keys.
Crypto.com Review: Key Features
- Spend cryptocurrency with its well-known Crypto.com Visa Card and get up to 8% back on spending.
- Crypto.com App – Buy over 100 cryptocurrencies at true cost and manage the Crypto.com Visa Card, which allows users to pay for daily purchases with crypto.
- Crypto Earn – Deposit crypto and earn up to 8% (up to 14% for stablecoins), paid weekly in your deposited crypto.
- Crypto Credit – Secure crypto loan with up to 50% LTV.
- Crypto.com Exchange – Trade top cryptocurrencies with deep liquidity, the best execution prices, and the lowest maker and taker fees in the industry. You can also refer a friend to the Exchange, and get up to a USD 2,000 referral bonus and a 50% commission on their trading fees for a year.
- Crypto.com NFT – Users can access exclusive NFT collections by A-list artists, musicians, athletes, and brands by signing up to Crypto.com NFT. The user-friendly platform allows users to buy NFTs using just their credit/debit card, and sell collectibles in the Marketplace, where bidding starts at just USD 0.
- The Syndicate – Crypto.com Exchange traders can access The Syndicate and buy top cryptos like BTC, DOT, and ZIL at up to 50% off.
- Supercharger – Crypto.com App and Crypto.com Exchange users can deposit CRO into the Supercharger pool and earn popular DeFi tokens as rewards. The reward allocation is calculated every day during the Charging Period and is based on the liquidity provided by the user.
- DeFi Swap – It is a fork of Uniswap V2 and allows users to swap and farm DeFi coins at the best available rate. They can also connect to and safely store their crypto in the Crypto.com DeFi Wallet.
- DeFi Earn – Users are able to receive the best returns by depositing their tokens into the protocol with the highest APY at the time of the deposit. It’s currently integrated with Aave Lending V2, Yearn Earn V2, Compound, Cosmos Staking, and native CRO Staking.
- Crypto.com Price – Crypto.com’s price page provides an easy way for users to track on the latest token prices, market movement, market capitalization ranking, and token information.
Depending on your location, some Crypto.com features may not be accessible to you. For instance, lending services are not available to residents of Hong Kong, Singapore, Switzerland, Malta, and the United States.
Background and history
Crypto.com launched as Monaco Technologies GmbH in June 2016. Founded by its current CEO, Kris Marszalek, the company started with the slogan, “Spend anywhere, without fees.â€
In the first half of 2017, Monaco launched its own token, MCO, which was funded via an ICO. The ICO took place from May 18 to June 18, and Monaco managed to raise approximately USD 26,7 million worth of crypto by selling 12,135,542 MCO tokens (out of 31,587,682 in total supply).
In July 2018, Monaco announced its rebranding to Crypto.com and began shipping its Crypto.com Visa Card a few months later. At the same time, the company announced the launch of the Crypto.com Chain with its native CRO token.
In late 2019, Crypto.com launched its own crypto-to-crypto exchange, aiming to win a bigger market share amongst crypto traders. The company also introduced its Crypto.com Pay, Crypto Earn, and Crypto Credit, among other services, and Crypto.com Visa cards started shipping to the United States.
In 2020, the company launched its non-custodial DeFi Wallet and DeFi Swap services, and started delivering Crypto.com Visa cards to its European customers. The company also decided to phase out the MCO token completely by swapping it to CRO, meaning that from now on, Crypto.com Visa card users have to stake CRO tokens to earn rewards.
At the moment, the core management team at Crypto.com consists of:
- Kris Marszalek, CEO
- Rafael Melo, CFO
- Gary Or, Co-founder
- Bobby Bao, Head of Corporate Development
- Brent Diehl, Chief Business Officer
- Weiyi Zhang, Head of Trading
- Eric Anziani, COO
- Jason Lau, CISO
- Steven Kalifowitz, CMO
- Matthew Chan, CTO
- Antonio Alvarez, CCO
A complete list of current core team members and their advisory board can be found here.
At the time of writing, Crypto.com boasts of having more than 10 million users worldwide. The company’s headquarters are located in Hong Kong, but it has offices all over the world, including Malta, Bulgaria, Singapore, United States, China, Japan, Russia, India, United Kingdom, Australia, and Argentina. As such, it has grown into a global crypto giant with a rapidly increasing user base.
Crypto.com’s upcoming plans include scaling the presence of the Crypto.com Visa Card, launching additional features on the Crypto.com Exchange, and further developing its DeFi offerings and NFT platform.
Supported countries
Crypto.com is a fully regulated crypto company, meaning that it complies with all necessary financial and risk-prevention regulations. As a result, you won’t be able to use its services, be it the App or Exchange, anonymously.
Currently, Crypto.com is available in most countries, including the United States, Europe, Canada, Australia, Russia, Latin American countries, and some Asian and African states.
Upon registration, you will be asked to verify your identity. You will need to provide the platform with your:
- Full legal name
- Picture of a government-issued ID
- Selfie as proof of liveness
In order to get a Crypto.com Visa card, you will also need to verify your residence address with a recent (not older than 3 months) utility bill.
It can take up to 3 business days to get your account verified.
Crypto.com fees
Crypto.com is on the lower end when it comes to trading fees for centralized exchanges. Though different products are priced differently, it is one of the best fiat-to-crypto gateways in the crypto industry.
Crypto.com App fees
In our experience, the Crypto.com App is by far the easiest way to buy, sell, send, receive, exchange, and pay with crypto via Crypto.com. The app lets you deposit cryptocurrencies free of charge, allows free crypto to crypto exchanges, and supports free transfers to the Crypto.com Exchange and DeFi Wallet.
However, it charges a fee for crypto withdrawals to an external address which differs based on cryptocurrency being withdrawn.
Crypto.com Exchange fees
The Crypto.com Exchange charges trading and withdrawal fees. The trading fees are based on your 30-day trading volume, where get more discounts as your trading volume increases. You also have the option to stake CRO tokens and pay your trading fees with CRO. The more CRO you stake, the bigger your trading discount. As a bonus, you will get 10% p.a. earnings on your CRO stake. All you need to do is stake at least 5,000 CRO and pass KYC verification to earn trading fee rebates.
VIP retail clients on the Crypto.com Exchange can enjoy these rates:
When it comes to cryptocurrency withdrawals, here is a small sample of withdrawal fees for certain cryptocurrencies:
The Crypto.com Exchange charges standard fees for cryptocurrency withdrawals. There are no fees for cryptocurrency deposits.
The Crypto.com App also allows you to purchase cryptocurrencies directly with your credit/debit card. Users pay between0% -3.5% in credit/debit card fees, depending on their jurisdiction.
Crypto.com DeFi Swap fees
Unlike the App or Exchange, Crypto.com DeFi Swap allows you to connect your personal Ethereum wallet for simple and effortless ERC-20 token swaps. Typically, you will pay 0.3% fees to liquidity providers to support the running of smart contracts.
You can connect Defi Swap to your Crypto.com Defi Wallet account. When transferring crypto on the Ethereum network, you will have to pay gas fees. You can conveniently choose between average, fast, and super fast transaction confirmation speeds, where average and super-fast represent low and very high transaction fees respectively.
Cryptocurrencies on Crypto.com
Crypto.com supports more than 350 cryptocurrencies. However, that number varies by global jurisdiction. U.S. customers may have access to fewer cryptocurrencies than others.
Some of the major cryptocurrencies supported by Crypto.com are:
Who Should Choose Crypto.com?
With numerous perks and features, Crypto.com could be a particularly strong option for those willing to go all in on the platform. In fact, like most crypto exchanges, Crypto.com has its own native cryptocurrency, known as CRO. One of the benefits of holding CRO is it can lower trading fees.
In addition, Crypto.com offers a prepaid Visa card that functions like a rewards debit card to allow users to spend their crypto holdings easily. Although it’s available to everyone, those who purchase and intend to stake CRO stand to earn the most from Crypto.com’s card.
If you’re new to cryptocurrency, you may be overwhelmed by Crypto.com’s trading interface. Instead, you might seek a better beginner-friendly platform like our top pick for beginners, Gemini.
Regardless of which exchange you pick, remember that cryptocurrency is a highly volatile asset and that you may lose significant amounts of your investment, particularly in the short term.