EB140 – Manfred Karrer: Bitsquare - The Decentralized Open-Soure Cryptocurrency-Fiat Exchange

Summary: Support the show, consider donating: 1EaybNRvKodkF5Xu8FiGXrnLXK1DzUdT5x (http://bit.ly/2a3WsID) Exchanges are often criticized as a central point of failure of the cryptocurrency space. This isn't without justification as, in recent years, we have seen a number of exchanges get hacked, robbed, or embezzled by their founders, which is far from insignificant. One proposed alternative are decentralized exchanges that would allow people make peer-to-peer trades using sophisticated smart contracts. However, there remains the fundamental challenge of interfacing with the legacy banking system. Manfred Karrer joins us for a lengthy discussion on Bitsquare, a decentralized cryptocyrrency exchange which supports most fiat currencies and cryptocurrencies. Built to be a decentralized equivalent of LocalBitcoins, the Bitsquare client, which connects to the peer-to-peer network, uses Tor by default, which makes it almost completely anonymous. There are also a number of safeguards in place to eliminate the potential for fraud and theft, as well as an arbitration system to resolve disputes between traders. Topics discussed in this episode include: - The motivation behind Bitsquare - The Bitsquare client and user experience - A walkthrough of a typical trade - The mechanics of the order book - The fiat currency transfer mechanism - The current and future arbitration process - Manfred's thoughts on DAOs - Bitsquare's product roadmap Links mentioned in this episode: - Bitsquare Website: http://bitsquare.io - Bitsquare Whitepaper: https://bitsquare.io/bitsquare.pdf - Risk Analysis: http://bitsquare.io/risk_analysis.pdf - Arbitration System: http://bitsquare.io/arbitration_system.pdf - Github Repo: https://github.com/bitsquare/bitsquare Sponsors: - Jaxx: Wallets that Unify the Blockchain Experience Across Devices http://jaxx.io Show notes: http://epicenterbitcoin.com/podcast/140 YouTube: http://youtu.be/4GeP7FGc3rE Epicenter Bitcoin is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain, Sébastien Couture & Meher Roy. - Visit our website: http://epicenterbitcoin.com - Subscribe to our newsletter: http://epicenterbitcoin.com/newsletter - Twitter: http://twitter.com/epicenterbtc