Kraken, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the world, has started to offer Ethereum Dark Pool trading, enabling the discreet placing of large orders without exposing intentions to the public, on Wednesday, 11th of May. This expands upon the bitcoin dark pool trading that the exchange started offering in June of last year.
Kraken CEO Jesse Powell commented: “Kraken is proud to be the first exchange to provide clients with a Dark Pool for ether, a strategic option for professional traders. This year, trading volume for ether has dramatically increased on Kraken’s exchange, and we developed the Ether Dark Pool to bridge the gap between our lit order books and over-the-counter desk. Dark Pool trading allows for orders to be placed out of sight so that traders can make large buy or sell orders (minimum of 50 bitcoin or 2,500 ether) without revealing their sentiment to other traders. Advantages include reduced market impact and better price for large blocks.”
In total, Kraken added 6 ETH dark pool currency pairs, with the option to exchange ether for bitcoin, euro, US dollar, Canadian dollar, pound, and yen.
Leverage
Additionally, Kraken announced changes to its margin trading program last week, with increased leverage for ETH/XBT (up from 2.5x to 4x) and new support to three pairs: ETH/EUR, XBT/USD and ETH/USD, all with up to 3x leverage.
Ethereum also became a margin currency on Kraken, meaning that an ETH balance can be used as collateral for the borrowed funds tied to a leveraged margin trade.
Powell added: “The details get technical but there are two important takeaways when it comes to dark pool and margin trading. If traders are looking to move large sizes without affecting the market, they trade dark on Kraken. If traders want to keep fewer assets on account and they want less exposure to funding delays, they trade with margin on Kraken. These services together with our OTC desk reflect the growing professionalism of our client base and our exchange.”
Margin trading on Kraken remains available only to non-US residents, the San Francisco-based exchange reminded its clients.
(Photo: FortuneZ)
