Poloniex

Poloniex is a centralized exchange for trading crypto against stablecoins and other coins, with spot, cross-margin and perpetual futures markets. Wikidata dates its founding to January 2014 and names Tristan D'Agosta as founder; it began as a US company.

Its ownership has changed twice. Circle, the USDC issuer, bought it in February 2018, according to OFAC's 2023 enforcement release. On 18 October 2019 Circle announced that Poloniex would spin out as a separate international company, Polo Digital Assets, Ltd., and would stop serving US customers, with US trading ending on 1 November 2019. The Block reported, citing Circle insiders, that Justin Sun, the founder of the TRON blockchain, led the group, and Sun has since spoken for the exchange in public, including after the 2023 theft. A 2021 filing by Ontario Securities Commission staff describes Polo Digital Assets as a corporation incorporated in the Republic of Seychelles.

Poloniex does not publish a management team, accounts or ownership breakdown on the pages we could read, and its main website would not load for automated reading in October 2026. Everything below that comes from Poloniex itself is taken from its public API, its API documentation and its press releases.

On 29 October 2026 Poloniex's public market endpoint returned 876 spot trading pairs, 835 of them in normal trading state, and its currency endpoint returned more than a thousand asset entries, many of them for tokens that trade on few other large exchanges. Its April 2026 press release describes the product range as spot trading, margin trading, perpetual futures, lending and staking, and claims support for more than 350 cryptocurrencies.

Margin on Poloniex spot markets is cross-margin. For the BTC/USDT pair the API shows a maximum leverage of 3x, a minimum order of 1 USDT and a maximum single order of 20 BTC. Futures are a separate product with their own API.

Searches for a Poloniex bot usually mean automated trading through its API. Poloniex offers REST and WebSocket APIs with SDKs in Java and Python on GitHub; the legacy private API was switched off on 28 February 2023, so older bots built on it no longer work. Third-party bot services that ask for API keys can trade, and if withdrawal permission is enabled, move funds; grant trading permission only.

Poloniex shows its maker and taker schedule inside its web app, which did not render for us in October 2026, so the tiered rates are not reproduced here; check the fee page in your account before trading. The withdrawal fee for each coin is public in the API: on 29 October 2026 a bitcoin withdrawal cost 0.00004326 BTC, with two network confirmations required for deposits.

Our own measurement gives a sense of the all-in cost. On 14 July 2026 a $10,000 bitcoin purchase cost 0.2412% including fees, spread and price impact, and a $100,000 purchase cost 0.2539%, with 33.5 BTC of resting orders within 0.1% of the best ask. That is more expensive than the cheapest large exchanges we measured that day.

Poloniex has not served US customers since the 2019 spin-out from Circle, when US trading was closed. It is also barred from Ontario: on 28 October 2022 Ontario's Capital Markets Tribunal permanently banned Polo Digital Assets and ordered a $1.5 million penalty and US$1.8 million in disgorgement, according to Advisor.ca. Its full restricted-country list is in its terms of use, which we could not load, so we do not reproduce it here.

South Korea is a practical restriction even without a formal ban: Korean exchanges must refuse transfers with overseas operators that have not registered with Korea's Financial Intelligence Unit, and Upbit lists Poloniex among them on its 31 August 2026 list. A Korean user cannot move coins between Upbit and Poloniex directly.

On 10 November 2023 attackers drained Poloniex hot wallets across several chains. Security firms put the loss at $114 million (Beosin), about $125 million (PeckShield) and about $130 million (SlowMist). Poloniex suspended deposits and withdrawals. Justin Sun said the loss was manageable, that operating revenue could cover it, that part of the attacker's assets had been frozen and that affected users would be reimbursed in full, and he offered the attacker a bounty to return the funds. On 15 November 2023 Poloniex said restoration was mostly complete and that withdrawals would resume after a security audit.

Three years on, we found no independent confirmation that every affected user was repaid, only the pledge and the restart of withdrawals. That does not mean users were not repaid; it means the record rests on the company's word.

On 7 April 2026 Poloniex announced a $100 million User Protection Fund, which it described as a dedicated security reserve for user assets. The press release published no wallet addresses and no rules: it said the fund's structure, trigger mechanisms and coverage scope would be disclosed in later announcements. We found no such disclosure by 29 October 2026. Until the rules exist, nobody can say which events the fund would pay for, who decides, or how a claim works.

The same release says Poloniex's proof of reserves has shown a ratio above 100% for more than 20 consecutive months. The release names no auditor or attestor, so the ratios are the company's own calculation. Our article on what exchange protection funds cover explains the questions to ask of any such fund.

Two US settlements concern Poloniex, LLC, the company that ran the exchange under Circle's ownership, before the 2019 sale. On 9 August 2021 the SEC found that it had operated an unregistered digital asset exchange from July 2017 to November 2019 and had chosen to keep trading tokens it judged at medium risk of being securities; it paid about $10.4 million without admitting or denying the findings. On 1 May 2023 OFAC announced a $7,591,630 settlement for 65,942 apparent sanctions violations between 2014 and 2019, after the platform let users apparently located in Crimea, Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria trade despite KYC and IP data showing where they were.

The current operator, Polo Digital Assets, was banned from Ontario in 2022 after proceedings over trading without registration. Poloniex does not list any licence or registration for Polo Digital Assets on the pages we could read.

Accounts are opened in the web or mobile app. We could not load the onboarding and verification pages in October 2026, so check the identity requirements for your country there before depositing.

Withdrawals go on-chain at the per-coin fee shown in the app and the API. The API also shows each coin's wallet state, so if withdrawals for a coin are paused it appears there before a transfer is sent. For larger balances, our guide on moving crypto off an exchange applies here as anywhere.

Poloniex's API documentation gives [email protected] for API questions; account support is reached from inside the app. Type poloniex.com directly rather than following a search result or a message link to a login page. Offers to sell verified Poloniex accounts appear in search results; an account bought from a stranger is registered to someone else's identity, and that person can reclaim it or have it frozen.

Poloniex's timeline has two halves: the US company under its founders and Circle, and the offshore exchange after 2019.

• January 2014: Poloniex founded in the United States.
• February 2018: Circle acquires Poloniex.
• 18 October 2019: Circle announces the spin-out to Polo Digital Assets, Ltd.; US customers are closed out.
• May 2021: Ontario Securities Commission staff file allegations against Polo Digital Assets.
• 28 October 2022: Ontario tribunal bans Polo Digital Assets permanently.
• 9 August 2021: SEC settlement with Poloniex, LLC.
• 28 February 2023: legacy private API switched off.
• 1 May 2023: OFAC settlement with Poloniex, LLC.
• 10 November 2023: hot wallets drained of more than $100 million.
• 7 April 2026: $100 million User Protection Fund announced without published rules.

People comparing Poloniex with Binance, Kraken or other large exchanges usually weigh its long list of small tokens against weaker disclosure and a contested security record. We cover that comparison with measured costs in our separate exchange comparison for Poloniex.