OKEx Expands Into India’s Crypto Market via Partnership With Local Exchange

Published at: Feb. 14, 2020

Despite ongoing uncertainty regarding cryptocurrency regulation in India, major global crypto exchange OKEx has just made another push in the country’s market.

On Feb. 14, OKEx partnered with India’s largest cryptocurrency trading platform, CoinDCX, to launch a new crypto futures product in India.

As part of the partnership, OKEx will make a major step into the Indian cryptocurrency market, enabling more liquidity with its extensive expertise in developing world-class futures, CoinDCX said in an announcement shared with Cointelegraph.

Specifically, the partnership purportedly unlocks CoinDCX’s new crypto futures product, DCXfutures, that will enable users to trade futures contracts with major cryptocurrencies with up to 15x leverage. 

According to the firm, the futures contracts will be available for at least eight coins including Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), XRP, Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Litecoin (LTC), EOS, Cardano (ADA), and Tron (TRX). Additionally, users will be able to trade perpetual futures contracts with Bitcoin and Ether, the announcement reads.

According to the firm, maker fees will account for 0.2% at the DCXfutures launch, while the service will be initially open for select users on an invitation-only basis. Once available for the general public, users will be able to access DCXfutures from a single wallet from Q2, 2020.

India’s potential to drive mass adoption of crypto

Zac Zou, head of OKEx India, emphasized the role of India — the world’s second biggest nation — as a primary country behind the mass adoption of crypto:

“As one of the largest economies in the world, India is primed to be the driving force behind the  mass adoption of cryptocurrencies, which is why we are keen on adding more equitable currencies to the ecosystem. We believe having a variety of options to transact digital currencies will bolster the growth of economy in India as it positively impacts both crowdfunding and institutional funding”

Sumit Gupta, co-founder and CEO at CoinDCX, outlined the rapidly increasing demand for futures trading in the Indian crypto market. Speaking to Cointelegraph, he emphasized that the strong demand came despite major banking restrictions in India. Confirming that DCXfutures is the first crypto futures product on CoinDCX platform, Gupta elaborated that the partnership with OKEx will help the exchange to boost its liquidity:

“We finalized on meeting this demand by partnering with OKEx, as OKEx is one of the largest crypto exchanges offering massive liquidity on its futures product. We integrated their liquidity on CoinDCX's platform and now CoinDCX users will be able to access the global liquidity pool with a single wallet. I believe India has a great potential to lead the global crypto space and building a one-stop solution for professional and retail crypto-traders like DCXfutures is a way ahead.”

Gupta also outlined the existing wave of optimism in India regarding the complicated situation over cryptocurrency regulation, stating:

“The Indian crypto ecosystem is bubbling with hope and optimism. Our endeavour is to help the global ecosystem by opening up the Indian market and the potential of Indian capital. The regulatory environment hasn't restricted us in our expansions yet and we are hoping that it won't play spoilsport.”

OKEx told Cointelegraph that the recent partnership basically involved CoinDCX taking OKEx’s futures API, adding that all exchanges are welcome to partner. A spokesperson at OKEx said:

“To clarify, CoinDCX has taken our open API of futures trading and applied to their platform. Such open API welcomes all exchanges to partner and below are the trading pairs we opened to all.”

News of the new partnership comes on the heels of recent court hearings regarding the existing complicated stance of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) toward crypto. During the hearings, the Supreme Court asked the RBI to clarify its position as to why exactly it enforced a nationwide banking ban on the country’s crypto market. Cointelegraph has recently reported on the latest developments in this regard, while CoinDCX’s Gupta published a public call for a “sensible regulation” approach.

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Bitcoin
Regulation
Cryptocurrency Exchange
Cryptocurrencies
India
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