Payment platform Strike has announced that it will allow its U.S. customers to buy and sell Bitcoin with almost no trading fees starting today. Thunderclap on the number one blockchain!
Buying bitcoin with no fees, really?
In a July 1 announcement, Strike founder and CEO Jack Mallers launched a salvo against leading U.S. cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, stating that his platform was intended to be “the cheapest and easiest platform on the planet to acquire bitcoin (BTC).”
For those who want to learn more, we already introduced you to the Strike application when it arrived in Europe a few months ago. The new “Bitcoin Tab” will allow you to buy bitcoin on Strike “without any fees apart from the market spread”.
The Chicago-based payment company said it would charge a maximum “execution cost” of about 0.3% for brokering BTC transactions, looking to drop it below 0.1% over the next few months as volume increases.
Jack Mallers is taking direct aim at Coinbase with this decision, calling its excessive trading fees “insane.” He noted that Coinbase had $1.8 billion in revenue in Q1 2021, with $771 million in profits, 94% of which came from fees of up to 3%.
A battle against the giants
In addition, Strike’s CEO strongly criticized Coinbase’s free gifts, which reward users with a few dollars of altcoins for watching videos:
“Make no mistake about it! When you buy bitcoin on Coinbase, you are supporting shitcoins.”
Mallers also added that the goal was to get as close to market prices as possible by reducing fees, which would be in line with Bitcoin’s philosophy. He also took the opportunity to tackle Paypal, considering their model to be contrary to the financial freedom offered by cryptocurrencies.
“Our mission is to ensure financial freedom for everyone, and we won’t stop until we do that for the 8 billion people on the planet.”
Strike announced that it would be possible to join a waiting list to get early access to the Bitcoin tab on Strike. The more friends you sponsor, the faster you will get access.
“I’ve been a bitcoiner for almost a decade at this point, and I’m proud of the experience we’ve built. Buy bitcoin at no extra cost, as it should have always been!”
With his tantalizing promises and straight talk, Jack Mallers intends to take on the most popular exchange platforms directly. Even though the service has not yet been launched, Strike wants to make a mark with its aggressive pricing stance and a philosophy that is closer to pro-Bitcoin than its competitors. So will buying Bitcoin for free change the game? Watch this space as the difficulty of mining bitcoins is reduced, starting today!
