In a bid to comply with KYC requirements obtainable in financial assets activities, Bitmex has announced that they will be requesting traders on their platform to go through an identity verification exercise.
The exercise has been scheduled to commence from August 28 and run for six months. To encourage customers to participate in the process quickly, Bitmex would also be running a trading competition, where users stand to win monetary prizes. Still, you will need to be verified to participate.
Bitmex, which is one of the notable crypto derivatives exchanges, was launched in 2014. Before this announcement, the exchange did not require users to complete identity verification.
According to Ben Radclyffe, a principal staff and Commercial Director of BitMEX, the verification exercise would end by February 12, 2021. Existing users have until that time to complete verification or risk suspension from trading on the platform.
He also noted that although Bitmex had adopted a minimum/low KYC requirement at the initial launch of the exchange, circumstances has changed this approach. He stated that several regions where they are operational have come up with new laws requiring cryptocurrency exchanges within their borders to verify customers' identities.
Apart from complying with regulatory requirements, Radclyffe opined that the exercise would help Bitmex improve its product offerings and assist in further market segmentation of its diverse user-base.
However, as expected, the announcement has been received with mixed reactions. Some customers believe it is a step in the right direction, as it would further strengthen confidence in the system. Others think that 'forcing' customers to submit KYC documents defeats the purpose of cryptocurrency transactions, which is supposed to allow a degree of anonymity.
Source: Cointelegraph
