Leaderboards profiles, scores, and ranks VASPs across 23 AML variables, specifically designed to showcase in real-time how well services are responding to and dealing with financial crime risks in the cryptocurrency sector. You can find the Exchange and DEX Top 100 here; and you can find out more about our methodology here.
Blockchain.com retains the top position (in exchanges and overall) while Hong Kong-based Hex Trust, a custody service, sits in second. Amber and Cumberland are the only pureplay crypto financial services firms to appear in the Top 10 - the former holding 11 licenses and registrations globally (a record bettered only in absolute terms by Binance).
Exchange Closures**
This quarter, we marked a total of 11 centralised exchanges as inactive. Here they are, along with their final Leaderboards score:
Activity on DEXs has also been hit hard over the last three months, with substantially lower liquidity and trading volumes across many blockchains. Hoptrail has categorised a total of 30 DEXs as either dormant or inactive. We deem DEXs dormant if 24 hour trading volume falls below $10,000. Recent dormant DEXs include:
Ethereum continues to dominate the Top 10 DEXs on Leaderboards, with seven of the 10 active on the blockchain. Cosmos Network has two: Osmosis and dYdX; and Vite has one with ViteX. ShapeShift and 1inch remain the only venues with any form of AML policy and continue to top the DEX Leaderboard as a result.
Compliance and Licensing Changes**
revoked the license held by UAB PayrNet, Wirex's card provider. Customers were informed that their debit cards might cease to function within the European Economic Area due to the revocation. This action resulted in a score decline for Wirex - from 84.06 to 80.00. obtained a license from Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission, allowing it to operate as a cryptocurrency exchange and provide custody services in the jurisdiction. Bybit's score moves up by 2.29 to 78.35. decision to pause its custodial and exchange services for customers in Canada, citing evolving Canadian regulations as the primary reason for this adjustment. This resulted in a score decrease of 0.46. announced it had obtained Virtual Asset Service Provider Registration from the Bank of Spain. The registration now allows the exchange to operate as a VASP in the country. Crypto.com's score increased by 0.39 to 89.63 on the news. announced it secured registration from the Financial Conduct Authority to operate as an exchange and custody venue in the UK. Hoptrail also confirmed the venue operates external transaction monitoring. The venue moves up to 89.52, 11th in the Exchange category. * In April, Bitfinex subsidiary Bitfinex Securities El Salvador S.A. de C.V. secured a license from El Salvador’s National Digital Asset Commission to operate as a fully regulated exchange in the country. This is Bitfinex's first license and moves the exchange score up 8.91 to 72.91.
Integrity Issues**
until September to file an application claim on any assets still held on the platform.
* In mid-March 2023, decentralised exchange Orca announced it would be implementing restrictions for US traders on its platform. While the reason for this decision was not stated, it is widely suspected that regulatory concerns played a role. Orca has a Leaderboards score of 43.75.
levied a $1.2 million fine against bitFlyer USA for lax cybersecurity procedures. The fine was partly in response to an MEV bot attack on the exchange which led to the loss of $34 million. BitFlyer's score declined by 3 points to 84.14.
$1.7 million fine for failing to register as a securities and commodities broker-dealer by New York Attorney General Letitia James. CoinEX was ordered to refund investors and cease operations in New York as part of the settlement. CoinEx's score fell by 3 points to 75.41.
ordered OKCoin to retract misleading statements suggesting customers accounts are protected by the FDIC or face enforcement action for violating US banking law. The statements in question imply FDIC insurance coverage applies to all customer funds, including crypto assets, not only US dollar deposits. This issue has not affected OKCoin's overall score.
$7.59 million fee to settle Sanctions violation charges to the US Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Asset Control. Poloniex failed to maintain proper KYC practices between 2014 and 2019 resulting in the sanctions violations. The venue already has existing penalty points for a $10 million SEC fine for operating as an unregistered exchange, which was levied in August 2021. This new violation does not incur additional point deductions, but it does extend the period that Poloniex will be under our penalty point regime by a further two years.
fined $1.5 million over inadequate AML controls leading to violations in the Bank Secrecy Act by the US Treasury Department's FinCEN. The firm's score falls by 3 points to 73.03.
Solvency Transparency**
* **17%.** The exchange has not published detail on its onchain auditing, liabilities, or solvency ratios. However, it has disclosed extensively on cold storage wallets, holding more than $4.5 billion, primarily in BTC and ETH.
Kraken:** Kraken (See below) has not voluntarily disclosed its wallets, but it does provide information on Merkle tree audits and provides user verification, giving it an overall ST score of **
Our goal with these quarterly reviews is to ensure that users have access to the most relevant and up-to-date risk information on the ecosystem, empowering better and more rigorous decision-making.
To delve deeper into the functionality and benefits of Hoptrail's Leaderboards, Profiles, and Explorer, we encourage you to reach out to us through our website.