We’ve probably known about Sam Bankman-Fried, the world’s richest self-made billionaire under 30. His product is the Cryptocurrency exchange FTX. The article below helps you understand what FTX is? Who is Sam Bankman-Fried? And how to use and FTX sign up for newbies.
What is FTX?
FTX is a cryptocurrency exchange built by traders and for traders. It provides innovative crypto-related Derivative products including Leveraged Tokens, Futures Contract, Prediction Market, and Tokenized Stocks, besides traditional products like Spot trading, Margin, and OTC.
FTX exchange scale
By 2022, after 3 years of development, FTX is becoming a cryptocurrency exchange with a very active transaction density in the market. The daily trading volume of FTX is currently at $1,183,386,234. This can be seen as a large volume of transactions on the market with 332 coins & tokens, and 514 trading pairs. In addition, the exchange also has a weekly number of visitors up to 4,718,412.
The history of FTX exchange
FTX was launched in 2019 by two crypto traders, Sam Bankman-Fried (CEO) and Gary Wang (CTO) to provide a wider trading range than other crypto exchanges.
FTX is established in Antigua and Barbuda. Although the exchange is based in Hong Kong, FTX management moved the company’s headquarters to the Bahamas because of concerns about new regulations on crypto management by the Chinese government in September 2021. There, a subsidiary of FTX, FTX Digital Markets, has been certified by the Securities Commission of the Bahamas to be registered for trading in digital assets under the “DARE Act.”
The exchange does not provide services to crypto users in the United States. US traders will access the FTX US exchange, which is a money services business registered with FinCEN. FTX US officially acquired LedgerX in October 2021, later renamed FTX US Derivatives. It is licensed as the Digital Currency Options and Futures Derivatives Clearing Organization that is registered and regulated by the US CFTC (Commodity Futures Trading Commission).
Who is FTX’s founding team?
The founding team of FTX comes mainly from leading financial and technology companies on Wall Street – Jane Street, Optiver, Susquehanna, Facebook, and Google.
- Sam Bankman-Fried (Founder and CEO): Prior to founding FTX, Sam was a trader on Jane Street Capital’s international ETF desk. He has traded ETFs, futures, currencies, and even stocks. Moreover, he also designed their automated OTC trading system. He graduated from MIT with a Bachelor’s degree in Physics.
- Gary Wang (Co-Founder and CTO): Gary was a software engineer, who worked at Google before founding FTX. He built systems to aggregate prices on millions of flights, reducing latency and memory usage by more than 50%. He also graduated from MIT with a major in Mathematics and Computer Science.
- Nishad Singh (Head of Engineering): Before joining FTX, he was a software engineer at Facebook as a machine learning officer. He is one of the best graduates of the University of California Berkeley with a Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.
- Dan Friedberg (Manager): Previously, Dan was an employee at Fenwick & West LLP. He led a team working on cryptocurrencies. He was also the president of Payment Systems Group. Dan received outstanding bachelor’s degrees and an MBA master’s from the University of Wisconsin.
- Can Sun (General Counsel): Prior to joining FTX, Can was Co-Chair of the Blockchain Practice Group at Fenwick & West LLP where he advised hundreds of blockchain-related projects and companies on regulatory matters. He graduated from Yale Law School.
- Constance Wang (CEO): Constance took over the position of risk controller at Credit Suisse before joining Huobi Global to expand their business in APAC. She graduated from the National University of Singapore with a major in Finance.
Who is Sam Bank-Fried?
Sam Bankman-Fried has a net worth of $8.7 billion. Sam is the richest person in the world under the age of 30 who does not own inheritance. He built his fortune in the Crypto market.
Sam Bankman-Fried is a workaholic with strict discipline. He spends most of the night at the FTX office and only really returns when the staff is “fed up with my presence,” he said.
Bankman-Fried has donated more than $5 million to a group supporting President Joe Biden’s campaign, making the political spending newcomer becoming the US President’s biggest donors.
FTX Exchange Review before FTX sign up
Advantages of FTX exchange
- Diverse and modern trading products (Perpetual futures, Volatility contracts, Crypto Indexes). Other innovative products (Token leverage, MOVE contracts) have made FTX unique.
- Providing services to retailers, institutions with low transaction fees and OTC desk services, etc.
- Accept deposit to account by credit card with fiat currency such as USD, EUR, AUD, GBP, CAD, etc.
- Allowing traders to maximize their profit potential with the maximum Leverage (which can be up to X101), even when the market is volatile.
- Multi-Platform and Multilingual Customer Support.
Disadvantages of FTX exchange
- The confusing and difficult user interface for newbies with lots of information
- Leveraged tokens are risky for users who don’t understand clearly how it works.
Compare FTX and Binance.
FTX and Binance are both the top cryptocurrency exchanges in the world. Binance exchange is slightly better because it was established in 2017 and maintains the position of the world’s No. 1 cryptocurrency exchange in terms of the trading volume. However, despite being established 2 years after Binance, FTX quickly entered the top 5 of the world’s leading cryptocurrency exchanges and the trading volume on FTX once surpassed Binance.
Binance exchange is more beginner-friendly, and FTX exchange has many advanced trading orders, with high volatility, and high leverage, used by pro-traders.
The number of coins in the two exchanges is almost equal with about 350.
FTX Exchange Ecosystem
The strength of FTX is the variety of derivative products. The exchange offers the following trading products:
FTX Futures: FTX supports contract types such as Quarterly and Perpetual futures, popular cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin (BTC), Binance Coin (BNB), Ethereum (ETH), and Chainlink.
FTX Leveraged Tokens: FTX exchange provides more than 45 leveraged tokens. They are pegged to the base coins, so every time the base coin price changes, the leveraged token will also fluctuate in proportion.
MOVE FTX Contract: The MOVE contract works like a futures contract, it expires according to the amount of BTC moved in a certain period of time. The more volatile the Bitcoin price, the higher the value of the MOVE contract, it doesn’t matter whether Bitcoin goes up or down.
FTX OTC: FTX has an OTC portal, where users can get instant, 24/7 OTC quotes for most major coins.
FTX Token: This is a Native Token of the FTX exchange with the main purpose of revolving around the ecosystem of the FTX exchange.
FTX Option: A derivative contract gives the holders the right but not obligation to buy or sell at an actual future price. They can use the options to protect their open positions against price fluctuations.
FTX Spot market: Trades are instant or in a very short time without margin or collateral.
FTX Prediction markets: Traders make predictions about the likelihood that a derivative event reflects the probability of actualizing the outcome in a futures contract.
Guide to FTX sign up
If you FTX sign up by phone, you can download the FTX PRO application from the Google Play or App Store and then click “Create a free account” in the top right corner of the FTX application interface.
To create an FTX account on your computer, click the FTX sign up button below or do the following steps:Step 1: Access the website by the link https://ftx.com/referrals#a=111618265
Step 2: In another way, press Create a free account on FTX’s homepage.
Please don’t forget to enter the ref code 111618265 to get 5% off on the fees for every exchange.
Step 3: Then, enter your Email and password (must be at least one lowercase, one uppercase character, and one special character (!@# $% ^ & *)).
Step 4: Enter your personal information (Name, date of birth) and click Continue
Step 5: Enter your home address and click Continue
Step 6: Enter your phone number and press Send Code, you’re going to receive an SMS with a verification code, enter the code and then press Submit.
Step 7: Wait for a few days to receive the confirmed email from the FTX exchange.
FTX account security guide
Preparation before FTX sign up:
- Commonly used email address.
- Photos of the ID card or driving license: a photo of the front, a photo of the back, and a selfie photo with the front.
- A smartphone has the Google Authenticator Application.
How to verify identity – KYC when FTX sign up
KYC (Know your customers) is the process of collecting and identifying information related to the customer. The basic information that is usually collected is a portrait photo, ID number, Passport, address, etc. to eliminate unqualified people.
To KYC your account after FTX sign up, you do the following:
Step 1: On the homepage of the FTX exchange, click the profile symbol and choose Settings.
Step 2: Choose Identify Verification and press Submit
Step 3: Determine the source of your fund by selecting one of the options: Occupation, Investments, Inheritance or Mining.
Step 4: Press Continue
Step 5: Choose the way to upload your Picture and press Next
Step 6: Choose one of the identification types for KYC (Driver’s license, ID or Passport)
Step 7: Press Accept and Continue to allow using your biometric technology
Step 8: Press Continue to allow Camera Access
If you don’t receive this notification, please skip it and move to the next step
Step 9: Put the front of your ID in the rectangle green frame to take a photo
Step 10: Similarly, take a photo of the ID’s backside
Step 11: Press Allow to confirm these images using
Step 12: Press Continue to take a photo of your face
Step 13: Take 3 selfie photos. The system will compare them automatically.
Step 14: Press Continue to submit your picture.
Step 15: Press OK to confirm the verification pending. You’re going to be notified when it’s done.
Google Authenticator (2FA) setup guide after FTX sign up
Google Authenticator (GA) is an application that automatically generates a random 6-digit code to log into your account. However, these 6 numbers only last for 30 seconds and will change to 6 other numbers on their own.
This is also known as 2FA two-layer authentication (two-factor authentication). When this feature is turned on, you’ve added a layer of security to your account in case your password is stolen. To set up Google Authenticator, follow these steps:
Step 1: On the homepage of FTX exchange, click the Profile symbol, then choose setting
Step 2: In the Main Account section, choose Security and then Switch to Authy/ Google Authenticator
Step 3: Copy the QR Code
Step 4: Setup and activate Authenticator on Google Extensions if you haven’t used it before. Open it.
Step 5: Click the pen symbol
Step 6: Click plus sign
Step 7: Choose Manual Entry
Step 8: Name the Code, for example, FTX 2FA Code. Then paste the QR Code you have copied to Secret and click OK.
Step 9: In this step, you’ll see a random 6-digit code, copy it, and move to the next.
Step 10: Paste the code to Authy/GA 2FA Code and click Send SMS. Check your phone and fill the SMS code you have received into SMS 2FA Code. Then click Submit.
Depositing and withdrawing money when FTX sign up
Depositing money on FTX
Step 1: From the homepage of the FTX exchange, you choose Wallet
Step 2: Choose the token you want to deposit or find it if it’s not shown on the list, then press Deposit. 
Step 3: Choose the chain that is compatible with your asset, then copy the Wallet ID.
Step 4: Check the information carefully and click Send
Step 5: Paste the wallet ID you have copied to the Recipient Address and enter Amount. Then press Send.
Click the bell icon to see the transfer history.
Withdrawing money on FTX
Withdrawing money on FTX exchange is also uncomplicated, you do that by following these steps:
Step 1: Choose Wallet → Portfolio from FTX’s homepage.
Step 2: In the Balances section, click Withdraw in the row of the coin that you want.
Step 3: Choose one of the assets which you want to withdraw, for example, Withdraw USDC.
Step 4: Fill the amount of coin you want into Amount and the Wallet ID into Address. Enter your 2FA Code from Google Authenticator to Authy/GA 2FA Code and click Withdraw.
You can check your transfer history by clicking the bell symbol on FTX’s homepage.
Spot Trading guide on FTX exchange
FTX is known as the best derivatives exchange. However, that doesn’t mean that the Spot array is not quality. Users can top up via chains like Ethereum, Solana, Tron, etc.
To make a Spot trade, you do the following steps:
Buy coins on FTX
Step 1: Choose Spot on the homepage of FTX exchange.
Step 2: Search the name of the coin in the search bar and choose the pair of coins that you want to buy.
Step 3: Before buying, you must check the price of the coin carefully and enter the amount of coin you want in Amount or adjust the bar below in Buy BNB section. Then press Buy.
Step 4: To check the coin you bought, click Wallet. In the Balances section, you can see all of the coins that you own.
Sell coins on FTX
The operation of selling coins is similar to buying. Instead of choosing the section Buy BNB, you choose Sell BNB. You have also to check the price of the coin carefully and enter the amount of coin you want in Amount or adjust the bar below. Then click Sell.
Frequently asked questions when FTX sign up
Is FTX a scam? Should I trade on FTX?
FTX exchange was officially launched in July 2017 (simultaneously with Binance) and so far FTX has not encountered a case of fraud or loss of assets like some other major exchanges.
Has FTX ever been hacked?
From its launch to June 2022, the FTX exchange has not had any signs of security attacks affecting the user experience.
Is FTX exchange prone to maintenance errors?
Up to now, the FTX exchange has not undergone any system maintenance. This could be good news for the person who looking for an uninterrupted exchange.
Which country’s FTX exchange? Does it support Vietnam?
FTX is owned by FTX Trading LTD, a company based in two island nations in the Eastern Caribbean, Antigua, and Barbuda. Currently, FTX is supporting 8 languages, of which Vietnamese is one of the earliest supported languages. Therefore, Vietnamese investors can use the exchange easily.
What is an FTX coin?
Like other exchanges, FTX has its own token called FTT. This coin was launched at the end of August 2019 with conversion available on the website. At the time of the token sale, each account can buy about 1000 FTT, and if you want to buy FTT, you need to deposit money to your account 24 hours in advance to buy.
Is it necessary for KYC to withdraw money when FTX sign up?
Withdrawing on FTX is quite convenient. Users can withdraw up to $1000/day without KYC. This is a fairly reasonable policy for traders who use multiple accounts or want to test the exchange and trade with a small amount.
What is the deposit and withdrawal limit when FTX sign up?
- Withdrawal limit: Unverified (KYC) accounts can withdraw up to 1000$/day. If you have done identity verification, there is no withdrawal limit.
- Deposit limit: There is no limit on the amount of deposits.
What are the fees on FTX?
Deposit and withdrawal fees on FTX:
- Free Recharge
- Free withdrawal fees (except ETH, ERC-20 tokens, and withdrawals BTC<0.01BTC)
Transaction fees on FTX
- FTT holders will receive a discount of up to 0.0030%
- The minimum Taker fee is 0.015%
- Maker fee after discount should not be lower than -0.01%
- Free OTC transactions and convert coins from wallets
- Free Futures Payments
- Leveraged tokens have a creation and redemption fee of 0.10%, a daily management fee of 0.03%
- Move contract fees depend on the price of the underlying index.
What is the FTX app on Android, and iOS?
FTX is now available in App Store and Google Play, you can find the FTX app on both platforms as FTX Pro.
Conclusion
FTX is currently one of the exchanges with the highest cryptocurrency trading volume. In the article, Ecoinomic has provided you with an overview of the FTX exchange, and how to FTX sign up and use it. If you are looking for a safe, liquid exchange with vital infrastructure, then FTX might not be a bad suggestion.
