Bitstamp

Bitstamp’s crime policy is one of the few pieces of genuine protection in this category. It covers employee theft, computer fraud and funds-transfer fraud, it is brokered by Paragon and underwritten at Lloyd’s of London, and it is insurance in the ordinary sense rather than a self-declared fund or a derivatives liquidation backstop. Most exchange "insurance" is one of those two things.

The qualification is that Bitstamp has never stated the policy’s size, so you know cover exists without knowing whether it would meet a loss of the scale that actually occurs.

Against that, the oldest exchange still operating has no proof of reserves — and this is the one that deserves a raised eyebrow, because it committed to one publicly. In November 2022 Bitstamp announced a proof-of-reserves audit and, as far as we can establish, never delivered it. Its own page argues that transparency goes well beyond such proofs, and the Big Four audit it points to instead names no firm and publishes no report, which is not a substitute for either.

The record is otherwise good: MiCA and FCA licences, operating since 2011, and users made whole after the 2015 hack — something only a handful of venues here can say without qualification. We score custody 7 out of 10, and the deduction is almost entirely the unkept promise.

A $10,000 bitcoin buy cost 0.30% on 14 July 2026, dearer than Kraken’s 0.26% and three times the cheapest venues, rising to 0.3083% at $100,000. Depth measured 26.7 BTC within 0.1% of best ask, on the thin side.

Fiat is where it earns its keep, scoring 9 out of 10, and for a European user moving euros in and out that is often the deciding factor rather than the trading fee.

API response latency measured 320 ms, respectable.

The case for Bitstamp is longevity, real insurance and licences in the jurisdictions that matter, at a price above the market. The case against is that you pay a premium to a venue that promised verifiable reserves and did not deliver them.