Rather than operating as an exchange or traditional centralized trading platform, Paxful brings something very useful and friendly to the DeFi and P2P sector. Their peer-to-peer marketplace is famous for enabling more than 360 different payment options to ensure that nobody is excluded from their service. Paxful has more than five years of successful operations and is widely used in Africa, South America and other emerging markets. Essentially, Paxful, is a peer-to-peer digital asset trading platform for connecting buyers and sellers of cryptocurrency.
Like Amazon, Etsy, and eBay, users are encouraged to be both merchants and buyers, giving them a chance to list their Bitcoin or purchase it from others using some non-traditional methods (like gift cards or sending cash in the post). We will explore some of these 360+ options in the next section.
The positives
Let’s start solely with the payment options available:
There are now 9 different bank transfer options
162 online wallets, like ApplePay, PayPal and Alipay
124 different gift cards; simply trade in the value directly for Bitcoin
18 cash payment options are available, such as Western Union, MoneyGram, or by going to your bank to make a deposit
Impressively, 20 different debit and credit cards are accepted, including American Express
Assets are even tradeable on Paxful, in the form of cars, gold, or game items
Finally, there are 30 different cryptocurrencies that can be used to purchase BTC on Paxful, which are:
Ethereum
Litecoin
Tether
Ripple
Tron
Bitcoin Cash
Bilira
Bitcoin Gold
Bitgold
BitShares
BRZ
Credits
Dogecoin
Eos
Ethereum Classic
IOTA
Namecoin
Nano
NEM
NGNT
Paxos Standard
Peercoin
Qtum
Ripple
Siacoin
Steem Coin
Stellar Lumens
Stratis
TrueUSD
VeChain
Waves Coin
Paxful has more than 4.5 million registered users, with a top reputation. Whilst they can’t guarantee sellers are honest and respectful, they do encourage users to review sellers to increase transparency and weed out the bad guys
Paxful is a great platform for African users, as many Africans are unbanked. In 2019, Paxful stated that 45% of its users were based in Africa, so it’s very positive to see a company making it more accessible and democratic for people to get access to Bitcoin. In Nigeria, users can use their BVN code, a biometric ID, to increase their access levels on this platform.
The negatives
For now, the platform is Bitcoin and USDT only, so users who want to purchase altcoins will have to go elsewhere
The platform is the host, and the host is only partially responsible for the behaviour or integrity of the sellers or merchants on the platform. Users have to be wary that some people, as is the case in the crypto world, have malevolent ideas and seek to run scams to separate you from your Bitcoin or money
If you move discussions with a seller away from the platform, Paxful can no longer protect you.
How does it work?
The merchants list their Bitcoins for sale, with the amount, the price, and the payment methods accepted. Buyers then visit the site, choose their payment method of choice, input how much Bitcoin they want to buy, and click ‘search for offers’. It’s very quick and simple. When the results come up, click on the one that you want to proceed with and hit ‘buy’. You’ll then move through the payment process, with the Bitcoin held in escrow so that the seller cannot scam you. If you fail to pay during the required timeframe, the Bitcoin will go back to the owner.
Some information about fees
Fortunately for buyers on Paxful, the fees are swallowed up by the sellers, to the tune of:
Bank Transfers: 0.5%
Credit and Debit Cards: 1%
Crypto: 1%
Online Wallets: 1%
Cash: 1%
Gift Cards: 3% and 5% for iTunes and Google Play respectively
To avoid fraudulent behaviour, the platform has purchase limits in place:
Level 1: email and phone verification – limit $1.5K (lifetime)
Level 2: ID verification + level 1 – limit $10K (lifetime)
Level 3: Address verification + level 1+2 – limit $10K per trade
Level 4: Enhanced due diligence + level 1, 2 and 3 requirements – limits removed
The final say
Paxful gives us reason to smile. The 360+ payment methods might seem overboard at first, but when you realise the mission is to make BTC more accessible around the world as a method of sending value, especially in developing markets, then it becomes more than just a one-stop Bitcoin shop. It’s easy to use too, with a well-designed app and huge potential to become a household name around the world. Sign up on Paxful and join the peer-to-peer revolution.
Originally posted on https://decentralised.africa/
