Serenity Exchange

Serenity Exchange Review

What is Serenity Exchange?

Serenity Exchange is a cryptocurrency exchange registered in Estonia. It launched in May 2019.

Liquidity Aggregator

This platform's main claim to fame is that they are an exchange aggregating liquidity. This means that they also obtain offers from other exchanges' order books and let you choose from them as well. This can be very helpful for the users and it also climbs the - sometimes very difficult - hurdle of achieving trading volume for a new exchange.

Trading Volume

On the date of first writing this review (6 September 2020), the platform's 24-hour trading volume according to Coinmarketcap was only USD 37,285. However, a year later, on the date of last updating this review (21 September 2021), there was no information at all about the trading volumes on Coinmarketcap. This is not a good sign and we recommend our readers to refrain from creating a new account on this exchange. 

US-investors

Why do so many exchanges not allow US citizens to open accounts with them? The answer has only three letters. S, E and C (the Securities Exchange Commission). The reason the SEC seems scary is that the US does not allow foreign companies to solicit US investors unless those foreign companies are also registered in the US (with the SEC). If foreign companies solicit US investors anyway, the SEC can sue them. There are many examples of when the SEC has sued crypto exchanges, one of which being when they sued EtherDelta for operating an unregistered exchange. Another example was when they sued Bitfinex and claimed that the stablecoin Tether (USDT) was misleading investors. More cases will likely follow.

It is unclear whether Serenity Exchange permits US investors or not. We have read their Terms and Conditions and have not found any explicit prohibition of US investors. We urge any US investors to form their own opinion on the permissibility of their trading at Serenity Exchange though.

Serenity Exchange Trading View

Every trading platform has a trading view. The trading view is the part of the exchange’s website where you can see the price chart of a certain cryptocurrency and what its current price is. There are normally also buy and sell boxes, where you can place orders concerning the relevant crypto, and, at most platforms, you will also be able to see the order history (i.e., previous transactions involving the relevant crypto). Everything in the same view on your desktop. There are of course also variations to what we have now described. This is the trading view at Serenity Exchange:

It is up to you – and only you – to decide if the above trading view is suitable for you. Finally, there are usually many different ways in which you can change the settings to tailor the trading view after your very own preferences.

Serenity Exchange Fees

Serenity Exchange Trading fees

Every time you place an order, the exchange charges you a trading fee. The trading fee is normally a percentage of the value of the trade order. Many exchanges divide between takers and makers. Takers are the one who “take” an existing order from the order book. Makers are the ones who add orders to the order book, thereby making liquidity at the platform.

Serenity Exchange charges what we call flat fees, meaning that both the takers and the makers pay the same fee: 0.10%. These taker fees are quite in line with the global industry averages for centralized exchanges. Sure, industry averages have historically been around 0.20-0.25% but we now see new industry averages emerging around 0.10%-0.15%.

Serenity Exchange Withdrawal fees

Serenity Exchange has percentage based withdrawal fees (1.00%). This means that just as with the trading fees, the fee charged when withdrawing from the platform is a percentage of the relevant amount. For trading fees, the fees are a percentage of the traded amount. For withdrawals, the fees are a percentage of the withdrawn amount. Essentially all crypto exchanges in the world have percentage based trading fees, but out of the 600+ exchanges we have listed in our Exchange List (including those that have died and been moved to our Exchange Graveyard), only 15-20 have charged percentage based withdrawal fees. The rest have fixed fees (e.g. around 0.0005 BTC per BTC-withdrawal). So it’s quite unusual to have the withdrawal fee model that Serenity Exchange has.

With the fee model that this exchange has, when you withdraw small amounts, it is beneficial to you. If you withdraw 0.01 BTC, the withdrawal fee becomes 0.0001 BTC (very low and consumer-friendly). However, if you withdraw 10 BTC, the withdrawal fee becomes 0.1 BTC (ridiculously high). You should consider yourself whether this withdrawal fee suits how you trade or not.

Deposit Methods

In order to trade here, you must have cryptocurrency to begin with. The only asset class you can deposit to Serenity Exchange is cryptocurrency. However, if you really like Serenity Exchange but you don’t have any crypto yet, you can easily start an account with an exchange that has “fiat on-ramps” (an exchange where you can deposit regular cash), buy crypto there, and then transfer it from such exchange to this exchange. Use our Exchange Filters to easily see which platforms that allow wire transfer or credit card deposits.

Also, we have received information that fiat on-ramps are in the pipeline for Serenity Exchange. We'll have to wait and see if this information is correct.