Ether Delta

Ether Delta is a decentralized cryptocurrency exchange, which as it name suggests is heavily connected to Ethereum. This is basically an ERC-20 token marketplace, which allows you to trade ETH for almost any token, based on the network. This is not a beginner-friendly exchange.
 
Ether Delta Advantages

Decentralized – Ether Delta does not run on a centralized server, which can be attacked by hacker. That being said, user mistakes can always lead to a loss of coins and especially with the complicated nature off this exchange, such have occurred.

A lot of tokens – Almost every Etheereum (ERC-20) token imaginable is traded on Ether Delta. In case you have participated in an ICO, it is quite possible this is the first place where the newly created token will be listed. That being said the trading volumes and liquidity on some of them are not surprisingly rather low.

Positive user reviews – The user reviews on Ether Delta are mostly positive, but they come from traders who are experienced in the crypto-verse and know what they are doing. There is a high possibility of a beginner making a basic mistake on this exchange, which will lead to a loss of tokens.

Ether Delta Disadvantages

Possibility for major mistakes – The main issue with Ether Delta is the fact it’s not user-friendly. When going through the forums one can see multiple complaints of people miss-reading/miss-typing orders and loosing a substantial portion of the value in a given transaction.

Trading is not instant – This is currently a problem with all decentralized exchanges, due to their very nature. Centralized servers simply swap entries in a database, without a blockchain transfer ever occurring. At Ether Delta every single trade happens, with the help of the smart contract behind this exchange. Patience is required, when trading on this exchange.

Trading only against ETH –  The structure of this “exchange” is a blessing and a curse. While trading all kinds of tokens is available, this only happens against ETH. Additionally only, ERC-20 tokens are supported – there is no Bitcoin, Litecoin, USDT or any other non-ETH asset.

Dependent on the Ethereum network –  This is an obvious flaw, which comes from the previous two ones. In case there is serious backlog on the Ethereum network, the activity at Ether Delta will also become slow.

Slightly non-competitive fees – Market makers (the people who add liquidity to the exchange) do not pay fees at Ether Delta. On the other hand, market takers (those who take away liquidity, by “hitting” one of the orders) have to pay a 0.30% fee. This is very slightly above the current offers of other exchanges which peek out at 0.25%.

Low liquidity on some instruments – As it is briefly mentioned above, the interest in some tokens is rather low. This is not the fault of Ether Delta, but simply a part of the market dynamics.

No leveraged trading  – The complex system offered by Ether Delta makes the implementation of margin trading all but impossible. This is yet another “weakness” which shouldn’t be viewed as an important factor.

Non-intuitive trading platform – The web-based platform, provided by Ether Delta looks very nice, but feels a bit clunky after a couple of minutes. The charting package is basic. The token selection comes from a single field, which doesn’t even have a search feature. While these are mostly cosmetic things, they make the entire platform even more non-user friendly.

Conclusion

Ether Delta is not for everybody. This decentralized platform allows Ethereum token enthusiasts to exchange ETH for most ERC-20 assets. The project is very well appreciated by the veterans in the community, but it is not recommend it to beginners. Users who have mistakenly bought/sold tokens for unreasonable prices pop up in the  Ether Delta Reddit quite frequently.