The US-based major cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has announced that it will be launching four new Great Britain Pound (GBP) trading pairs on September 7, 2018. The new pairs are Ethereum (ETH)–GBP, Ethereum Classic (ETC)–GBP, Litecoin (LTC)–GBP and Bitcoin Cash (BCH–GBP). The exchange already supports Bitcoin (BTC)–GBP trading pair.
Each new pair will go through three stages - first, a post-only phase, second, a limit-only stage and third, full trading. In the first stage, customers can post limit orders but there will be no matches (completed orders). Order books will be in the post-only mode for a minimum of 10 minutes. In the second stage, limit orders will start matching but customers are unable to submit market orders. Order books will be in the limit-only mode for a minimum of 10 minutes. In the final stage, full trading services will be available, including limit, market, and stop orders.
This announcement follows a report in early August where Coinbase had added GBP support for its UK-based customers (individuals, active traders, and institutions), enabling faster payments with same day deposits and withdrawals from Coinbase to British bank accounts. They previously had to convert funds from pounds to Euros and vice versa to buy and sell digital currency.
Coinbase was granted an e-money license in March of this year from the U.K.'s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), which enabled the exchange to expand its services to the U.K. and Europe. In addition to e-money license, also joined the U.K. Faster Payments Scheme in the same month, to provide efficient bank transfers to residents.
Coinbase said that with the support for UK domestic bank transfers in GBP via the Faster Payments Scheme, it is now significantly easier, faster and cheaper for UK customers to trade cryptocurrencies on its platform. In advance of the launch of the new trading pairs, all UK customers now have access to send GBP to their Coinbase accounts via domestic bank transfer, it added.
Coinbase has been on the expansion and development spree since the start of this year. Last month, it set up five core principles for its institutional cryptocurrency products. These include -- operating a fair and orderly market, protecting its customers with institutional-grade infrastructure and processes, enforcing transparent market rules and governance, providing fair access to all market participants, and publicly disclosing listing practices and market rules. Coinbase also recently announced two new developments - instant trading and increased trading limits to $25,000 per day for most customers.