The promise of cryptocurrencies being de facto pure liquidity has yet to materialize. In fact, the current state of the cryptocurrency market is that of a bunch of isolated liquidity silos, in the form of custodial cryptocurrency exchanges, who are excellent targets for prominent hacking groups around the world. Few offer an out in the form of an actual fiat currency pair of some kind. No major cryptocurrency exchange deals in currencies like the Canadian CAD, or the Singaporean SGD, or the Australian dollar, or NZD, IDR, PHP, etc. There is no good on or off ramp to the crypto economy for most of the world.

In addition, most cryptocurrency exchanges are unregulated entities, who may or may not be taking the proper steps to secure trader’s funds from hackers. These exchanges could be doing something completely unexpected while they have control of your funds, things that are not outlined by the exchange operators, things that you may not feel comfortable with, due to the lack of oversight. Regulators are starting to take notice, so the crypto exchange landscape may change rapidly over the next few months.

Thanks to the lack of liquidity, the entire cryptocurrency market moves as Bitcoin moves. If Bitcoin is doing well, the market does well, if Bitcoin is doing poorly like it has recently, that also effects the entire market. If alt-coins had sufficient liquidity, many would likely decouple from Bitcoin, forging their own path to the moon, or to zero.

Decentralized exchanges are thought to be the answer, but they require scalable blockchains, and many transactions-per-second to function well. An exchange not controlled by a single entity would also likely face regulatory and governmental challenges that mirror the struggles Bitcoin and Ethereum currently face. Who knows when, or if, the day will come where quality decentralized exchanges thrive? Exchanging fiat to crypto may no longer be necessary tomorrow, but today it is imperative that this swap be as easy as possible to help the industry grow and spread towards that future.

One company is endeavoring to solve this key issue: QUOINE is a fintech company incorporated in Singapore that operates 2 different cryptocurrency exchanges, QUOINEX and QRYPTOS , and boasts being the first cryptocurrency exchange company to be licensed in Japan. They are currently building the LIQUID platform , which promises to bring enhanced liquidity to the crypto markets, and hopefully large institutional players with it. The platform beta is slated to be released during the first week of April. Here is a quick and thorough rundown of what the platform will offer:

The LIQUID Platform

• Combines the entire network of different crypto exchanges via a single, regulated trading platform.

• Combines Quoine's QUOINEX(Crypto-Fiat) & QRYPTOS (Crypto-Crypto, ICO self-service) exchanges with new World Book technology and a Prime Brokerage service.

• The Prime Brokerage will provide traders and institutions with direct market access to a variety of crypto exchanges, fiat + crypto custody services, credit & lending capabilities, and lots of account data that makes paying taxes easy.

• QASH is the token that will power the platform

How Does the LIQUID Platform Combine with Other Exchanges?

• Quoine establishes partnerships with multiple exchanges.

• Quoine establishes partnerships with multiple banks around the world. Most accounts are open with banks who also have the accounts of major exchanges, most of the time co-located in the same branch as the major exchange.

• Quoine deposits millions of dollars on each partner exchange and in partner banks to obtain easy access to a variety of currencies, both fiat and crypto, as well as provide a liquidity channel between crypto exchanges and the LIQUID platform.

• When an order on the World Book is placed, a search for a match across the various exchanges and markets takes place. Once a match is found, the order is executed, and the desired funds in the desired currency are transported to the order maker's LIQUID account, as well as the order taker's account on whichever exchange was used to accept the order.

How Does the World Book Work?

The World Book is powered by 3 different Quoine technologies:

Smart Order Routing The Matching Engine The Cross-Currency Conversion Engine

• LIQUID utilizes Quoine's Smart Order Routing (SOR) system which provides low-latency real-time data feeds for all major exchanges, and then automatically routes orders to check for matches across different exchanges.

• The Order Matching System + Matching Engine, which can process several million transactions-per-second, finds and executes an order.

• After an order execution is confirmed, The Cross-Currency Conversion Engine (CCCE) converts each quote currency from 2 different parties involved in the trade if they do not already match. CCCE even facilitates trades between 2 completely different markets, such as QASH/EUR and ETH/YEN!

The Order Book has 2 parts:

An Internal Order Book An External Aggregated Order Book

• The Internal Order Book contains all the orders placed by the users of the LIQUID Platform.

• It also contains a Multi-Currency Matching Engine, which can seamlessly convert different markets into a single market denominated by a quote currency of the user’s choice. It is capable of 2,3,4,5, etc. “hops” to facilitate matches, assuming prices between different currencies and markets line up correctly.

Example: Alice lives in Singapore and wants to check the BTC/SGD market today. She opens the World Book and can see all the orders from the BTC/USD, BTC/EUR, BTC/YEN, etc. markets all under one order book, BTC/SGD. Bob, who lives in the US, can see all BTC/Fiat markets in terms of BTC/USD at the exact same time Alice views the markets as BTC/SGD. If Alice places an order on her BTC/SGD market, Bob can see and accept the order on his BTC/USD order book. Bob will also be able to see Alice's order fluctuate according to the current SGD/USD conversion rate. Alice and Bob can each view the BTC market, or any other supported currency, in other quote currencies as well. Under the right circumstances, The World Book will even look at ETH or BCH markets to facilitate a match for Alice’s order!

• The second part of the order book, the External Aggregated Order Book, contains all other orders that exist throughout the world from different exchanges, FX-adjusted into the desired quote currency as previously discussed.

What Features Will the Prime Brokerage Have?

• The Prime Brokerage is a collection of tools and services designed to reduce counterparty risk on the part of a trader or service provider.

• A LIQUID trader can directly connect to any other exchange in the world without having to sign up for an account or go through yet another KYC/AML procedure thanks to the SOR system.

• Third party liquidity providers will be able to make fiat transfers instantly around the world using the Prime Brokerage.

• Quoine will also extend a line of credit to traders, collateralized in either fiat or crypto tokens, for them to leverage their positions.

• Finally, Prime Brokerage users will have access to customized data about all types of account activity, including the ability to run trade confirmation reports and view all executions.

What Other Features Will the LIQUID Platform Possess?

• LIQUID supports automated trading. Traders, Institutions, Data Scientists, etc. can all create and maintain trading algorithms that they can use both for their own personal benefit, as well as sell to other users for a fee.

• LIQUID will also take over for QYRPTOS and contain an ICO & Listing Self-Service function. Much like how the NYSE seamlessly takes companies from the pre-IPO stage, to IPO, to having their asset traded on a regulated exchange recognized around the globe, LIQUID will attempt to do the same for the crypto world.

• Token Liquidation Service- When certain individuals have the need to liquidate outsized positions quickly, they either must use a shady, non-transparent, 3rd-party OTC service, or disrupt the entire market by dumping large positions repeatedly. LIQUID will allow these types of individuals to quickly liquidate their positions, without disrupting the market, directly on the platform via sophisticated automated order types.

How Does the QASH Token Fit into All of This Exactly?

• QASH is a utility token that will be used to pay for the following features on the LIQUID platform:

 Transaction Fees

 Direct Market Access to other exchanges

 Crypto/Fiat Credit

 Fiat Management and Custody Services

 Automated Trading Strategies

 Trading Tools

 System Co-location

 ICO Self-Service

 More to come

• QASH token holders will gain Quoine insider status, where they will receive special offers and discounts.

• QASH can be freely used by other financial service platforms as a payment token.

• QASH will be the token that powers the QASH Blockchain.

• Paying with QASH will yield a 5% discount on all Quoine services.

• There are 1 billion QASH tokens with:

• 350 million currently circulating

• 300 million tokens reserved for growing the community/ecosystem (Divests evenly over 5 years)

• 150 million tokens reserved for strategic partners and institutional buyers

• 200 million tokens reserved for Quoine management and shareholders (unlocked after one year)

Wait, Did You Say QASH Blockchain?

• Quoine plans to make the LIQUID platform a decentralized exchange by launching their own high performance public blockchain in Q2 of 2019.

• The blockchain will be geared towards the fintech industry and have the following features:

KYC/AML Node Management (Region Restrictions) Financial Services Features such as:

 Banking

 Credit/Lending Management

 Market Data Distribution

 Margin Management

 Matching Engine

 Market Making Engine

 Issuance of new Crypto Tokens

 Etc.

• Quoine plans to use alternative DLT architecture, such as Hashgraph , to achieve the throughput and low latency necessary for banking-level financial platforms to build upon.

• They plan on using Proof-of-Stake as a consensus mechanism

• As more and more outside institutions and fintech startups embrace cryptocurrency and use the LIQUID platform + QASH blockchain, the more the utility of the QASH token will grow.

• Quoine plans to use a portion of the community/ecosystem pool of QASH tokens to fund fintech start-ups that want to utilize the QASH blockchain.

What is the Current Timeline for the LIQUID Platform Release?

The LIQUID Platform release will be broken into 5 stages. The first 3 mostly concern retail traders/investors and will come relatively quickly, while the final 2 stages are geared towards institutions and will take more time.

World Book Beta- Will test the internal portion of the World Book, is slated for release on April 6th, 2018 LIQUID Full Launch- Launch of the External Portion of the World Book and the desktop version of the LIQUID platform. Will happen on May 31, 2018 assuming all goes well during the beta. LIQUID Mobile- Launch of mobile version for iPhone and Android. June-July 2018 Projected Launch date. Infrastructure(Projected to be finished sometime in Q3 2018):

Financial = T+1 agreement, connecting with banks.

Technical = ECN (DMA to Exchange) Prime Brokerage + Custodial Service Rollout. Current plan for release is sometime within Q1 2019.

Can the Quoine Team Pull This Off?

• The Quoine team is full of members who were once a part of leadership for various well-known banks, collectively boasting 100s of years of experience. Goldman Sachs, Credit Suisse, Merrill Lynch, Softbank Group, Morgan Stanley, Barclays Bank, etc. They have all the experience and relationships to make the LIQUID platform a reality.

• The team has been working on getting various regulatory licenses and building relationships with banks around the world for years, and have largely been successful.

What Other Solutions Are Out There?

• Blockstream's Liquid Sidechain - A Bitcoin sidechain that has one-minute block times + confidential transactions and is designed to make it easier to transfer bitcoin between exchanges. Still suffers from extremely low tx/s, only is compatible with BTC, and is weakly confidential. Traders must sign up for accounts on each exchange, and do not have the ability to look at all btc/fiat markets under one orderbook.

• Bancor - A decentralized exchange platform that is designed with the long-tail of tokens in mind, and does not connect with, or provide liquidity to, other global exchanges. Would benefit from linking up with the LIQUID platform.

• Genesis Vision - A decentralized Ethereum-based platform for financial brokers. Instead of directly trading on the markets, investors buy and sell "manager tokens" of financial managers and traders who then trade their money for them. Based on a system of smart contracts, the platform is supposed to be more open and transparent than alternative financial systems. Unfortunately, the GVT and various manager tokens all seem like unregulated security tokens, and the Genesis Vision team is full of developers who have no experience working with financial regulators. In addition, a big problem their platform faces is withdrawing tokens into various fiat currencies in an adequate manner, something they may very well use LIQUID for, assuming they solve their regulatory issues first. They also seem like a platform that would benefit from using the QASH DLT when it comes out in 2019.

• Dimensions Network - A hybrid centralized/decentralized crypto-derivative exchange platform with an API aggregated order book feature. The DST token will give 15% of trading fees back to token holders. The project’s ICO is set to begin in May. The platform plans lack a cross currency converter and has no real intention to aid the crypto-fiat on/off ramp. The team has not even started pursuing the required licenses to accept fiat currency. In addition, their token is almost assuredly a security, yet they have no apparent plans to work with regulators in the various jurisdictions to transform their plans into reality. The Dimension Network team lacks experience in working with regulators and pursuing the required banking licenses and it shows. Expect this project to experience significant problems and delays as it gets off the ground, if it ever does at all.

• Hybridblock - The mysterious cryptocurrency exchange company founded by 8x Winter Olympic Medalist Apolo Ohno, with former Managing Director at JP Morgan, Jonathan Bates, acting as CEO/Chairman. Hybridblock plans to employ 4 different offerings:

Hybrid Central- A cryptocurrency educational platform. Hybrid Basetrade- A trading platform for beginners, think Coinbase. Hybrid Exchange- A trading platform that connects exchanges via Smart Order Routing and is marketed towards intermediate traders. Hybrid Terminal- A standalone, downloadable cryptocurrency trading terminal for advanced traders and institutions.

In addition, Hybridblock wants to create an HFX token that is backed 1-to-1 with Euros, along with a mobile cryptocurrency wallet. They want this to be a price stable cryptocurrency that traders, exchanges, etc. can use in place of fiat. Their goal seems to be to attempt to onboard many of the 2.5 billion unbanked adults in the world, while Quoine seems to be more focused on bringing large amounts of institutional money into the crypto ecosystem. Unfortunately, Hybridblock has no completed products yet, and have only just begun working with various regulators on getting the appropriate licenses. They have a capable enough team to succeed, but it is still too early to tell how long it will take them to complete their vision.

Conclusion

Overall, I think the LIQUID platform is far and away the best solution for the cryptocurrency market’s liquidity issues with no close second. Hybridblock seems like it could be an interesting project to follow, but it will likely be some time before they can make an impact.

Disclosure: The ICO School has invested in this project. All information presented in the article was communicated with as little bias as possible. We believe in transparently and truthfully promoting promising cryptocurrency projects, and will consequently invest in some that we cover.