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inding the right exchange to buy and sell cryptocurrencies is often a hurdle most crypto novices must overcome. Landing on a platform with complicated user interface can back away a potential investor from day one.

Without further assistance from an already invested friend, I would have probably put on hold my first crypto endeavor.

Now let’s say you do join an exchange and learn its basic functionalities after days of struggle. You might feel relieved, but then you see more obstacles ahead. Let me name a few of them: verifying your account, sending funds to the exchange, availability of your favorite coins on that exchange, price parity, proper volume, security of funds, and the list goes on and on.

These are all issues that novice or potential crypto investors have to surpass in order to start their crypto journey with the right foot. Needless to say that the primordial impediment for most people is getting rid of their crypto mistrust, a trait generated by people and social FUD.

So after combating all these factors, I believe that everyone deserves a smooth investing experience, at least from the above mentioned points of view. But can this really be achieved at present?

Frankly speaking, nobody can guarantee that you won’t lose your investment, at least not when we’re talking about cryptocurrencies. However, more and more startups trying to alleviate these initial struggles are emerging.

Today I will talk about one of the most promising projects of sorts – Blockport.

Having behind a team of young and enthusiastic entrepreneurs and skilled developers, Blockport aims to facilitate a friendly entry point for novice crypto investors and traders alike. Of course, the intermediaries and experienced traders are not neglected by this project, but the main focus remains on new users to the crypto space.

How are they trying to do that? They are focusing on key aspects such as:

Clean and intuitive user interface so you don’t get lost in details much.

Guidelines and a knowledgebase meant to educate the more inexperienced users of the platform.

Fiat gateway, a feature allowing anyone to purchase tokens directly with fiat money.

In-platform social network allowing users to connect and engage with each other.

The ability to view and/or copy the portfolio of more experienced traders (that theoretically are seeing constant and stable gains from their investments).

Better security for private key storage and funds safety.

Reduced transaction costs.

In a nutshell, Blockport aims to becoming the first social cryptocurrency exchange. Furthermore, they plan to upgrade their system into a hybrid-decentralized exchange with tons of innovative features that I will boast about briefly, because I’m more eager to share with you what they have achieved so far, as well as near-future releases.

Let’s first have a look at some of their later ambitions:

Connect to other exchanges – the platform will bridge other exchanges via an API key, thus ensuring increased liquidity and improved token prices.

– the platform will bridge other exchanges via an API key, thus ensuring increased liquidity and improved token prices. Atomic swaps – feature allowing users to purchase token using other tokens, not just through the consecrated pairs (ETH, BTC) and fiat.

– feature allowing users to purchase token using other tokens, not just through the consecrated pairs (ETH, BTC) and fiat. ARK integration – this will enable cross-chain connections and the transfer of value between them. In other words, the Blockport platform will communicate and connect with the various blockchains out there in order to determine the best token prices and make them available for purchase on the Blockport internal exchange. This will also pave way for true decentralization.

While these features may sound absolutely amazing, keep in mind that they are only on paper and there’s a long road ahead before turning them into reality.

With this said, let’s get into details regarding the features at hand.

Blockport Beta

At the end of the first quarter of 2018, the team had released their beta platform as mentioned in the roadmap. The beta was a closed one, with testers under a ‘non-disclosure agreement’ (NDA), a professional move put in motion by the team in order to release a bug-free and secure product.

In addition to their initial promise of delivering a fiat gateway for purchasing Bitcoin and Ethereum, as well as selling and storing these currencies, the team announced three other coins available for purchase using fiat.

The five crypto currencies are Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum, Litecoin, and Ripple. That’s already one extra coin than what Coinbase has to offer.

Due to a complicated regulatory framework, only the euro gateway is available for the time being, with other currencies following shortly after in Q3. This might scare away some people, but knowing there are services like Revolut where you can instantly exchange fiat currencies at the best possible rates and with no additional fees, I don’t see this as a reason to worry at all.

Since the open beta is just around the corner, I would like to delve deeper into the features that Blockport adopters will benefit from.

Blockport Features

Clean and intuitive user interface

Once again I would like to stress that user friendliness is a key aspect leading in most cases to mass user adoption. It’s also a great incentive for news crypto enthusiasts to begin their journey. Needless to say how a complicated interface discourages the less techy users from investing in crypto.

The team behind Blockport knows this all too well, so they have worked on a sleek and intuitive design for their platform. New users are likely to not sweat so much, if at all, when trying to buys/sell tokens. The fiat value of your digital assets is also displayed in sight.

In-platform social features

How many times have you sought information about a certain coin or technical issue and were unable to find a relevant answer? It feels so discouraging to ask questions in overcrowded Facebook groups about crypto and not receive an answer.

To tackle this accessibility issue, Blockport will have a social feature allowing you to connect and interact with other traders and investors on the platform. So if you want to talk about price speculation of a certain coin, learn about new trading strategies, discuss about project potential and partnerships, nobody will stop you in doing so on the Blockport platform.

Copy/social trading

This is among the most craved feature in my opinion. Coming as an addition to the built-in social network, the copy trading feature will allow less experienced users to copy, full or in part, the portfolio of other more experienced traders and investors.

Some may see this as a shiller gateway, but the truth is this feature offers transparency, and allows users to discover new promising projects that they wouldn’t have come across otherwise.

It’s true that blindly copying someone’s portfolio is not the wisest thing to do, but assuming that users benefit from quality initial education, they will be naturally pushed into researching each project on their own, and later decide if that coin is worth investing into or not.

You will also have access to the overall returns of a specific trader, feature adding another layer of confidence in a trader and/or coin.

Keep in mind that numerous forex trading platform like eToro, Pepperstone, and Darwinex, to name a few, have implemented this feature and seen extremely positive feedback.

Now, for the crypto space this is a much missed feature, and Blockport aims to becoming the pioneer of crypto social trading. If their ambitions are met, there’s no saying how much the value of their project will increase.

Fiat gateway

This counts among the most awaited features of Blockport. Effortlessly purchasing tokens using fiat money will save you time and possibly a headache. In turn, this will attract a plethora of new users that until now have been reluctant towards crypto currencies.

Five major crypto currencies are available for purchase through the fiat gateway for the time being, with more remaining to be added as the project advances.

Due to a complicated international regulatory framework, scalability, and security challenges, only the euro gateway is available in the beta. You can however purchase other tokens using Bitcoin.

Improved security

The decentralized architecture offers complete control of your private keys. Furthermore, you will have extensive options to manage your keys.

Security is essential in the crypto world, and the team behind Blockport has promised to deliver a secure as possible product. Therefore security is displayed as one of their core values.

BPT token utility

Similar to the model imposed by the Binance exchange, the Blockport token (BPT) will reduce the fees on each successful trade, offering additional value to all BPT holders who utilize the token on the platform.

Using BPT tokens will also extend your fiat deposit limit. This gradually increases with the amount of BPT you own.

Additionally, you’ll be able to follow and/or copy other member’s portfolio by paying a modest amount of BPT.

This is all I can tell you about the initial features of Blockport – the first social crypto exchange. As the project moves onwards, I will break into details about their more advanced features.

As a side note for those willing to invest in this promising project, you should have a look at the low circulating token supply, which is about 52 million according to CMC, as well as the low market cap.

From an investor’s perspective, Blockport seems like an unpolished gem that’s waiting to shine bright. That, of course, IF they succeed in delivering all their promises. If the team succeeds in doing so, only the sky is the limit.

Hope you have enjoyed my review, and remember that nothing within this article is meant as financial advice. All information is optional and is only meant to complement your own knowledge and understanding.

Update: The beta functionality video is here!

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