In true Robinhood fashion, Baiju Bhatt and Vladamir Tenev, co-founders of Robinhood, a no commission stock trading app, are adding a plot twist to the crypto trading scene.
Leading the way for ‘lambs to become lions,’ Robinhood is offering to buy and sell Bitcoin and Etherum without any added transaction fees starting this February. Trading functionality for BTC and ETH will be released gradually in waves to Robinhood residents in California, Massachusetts, Missouri, Montana, and New Hampshire and will be available in more states soon.
Tenev told TechCrunch, “We’re extremely selective about the cryptos we’re making available on the platform. We’re introducing those first because these are the most mature coins that people are trading these days. Multiple times people have declared them dead and they’ve come back stronger than ever.”
Compared to competitors like Coinbase (1.5 to 3 percent fees on transactions), this could save users a great deal of money and fundamentally reorganize who holds the profit and consequently-the power. According to Bitcoinist, Coinbase brought in over a billion dollars last year largely from the extortionate fees and commissions it charges its customers.
Instead of building an app around profit, Robinhood built a trade experience around philosophy: “We believe that cryptocurrencies have the potential to fundamentally reorganize the way money works from the ground up, putting power previously held by financial institutions directly in the hands of the people.”
On the Robinhood app, users can invest in cryptocurrencies alongside stocks, ETFs, and options, track different coins, and read market news all on one platform. Bank transfers up to $1,000 are instantly available in user’s accounts to trade cryptocurrencies and any additional funds are transferred in the user’s account via ACH.
As of now, there are 16 cryptocurrencies on their watchlist. Users can monitor their market data, read cryptocurrencies news, and create custom price alerts for:
- Bitcoin
- Ethereum
- Bitcoin Cash
- Litecoin
- XRP
- Ethereum Classic
- Zcash
- Monero
- Dash
- Stellar
- Qtum
- Bitcoin Gold
- OmiseGo
- NEO
- Lisk
- Dogecoin
In the words of Robinhood, “If you’re building for the future, you need to keep your foundations strong, laws of the land enslave the people to a king who demands loyalty but offers nothing in return.” It seems that this cryto-trading curve ball hits the bulls eye in both the mission of democratizing money behind Bitcoin and the Robinhood app.