Paxful is an online P2P marketplace that allows trading of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. On Paxful, users can sell and buy bitcoins using various payment methods such as bank transfers, credit cards, PayPal and many more. The marketplace works by offering users the ability to search and compare different offers to sell or buy bitcoins from other users. When users agree on a trade, Paxful ensures that the transaction is completed safely and quickly.
On Wednesday, December 21, 2022, Paxful CEO Ryan Youssef (Ray) informed the approximately 11.6 million users of the platform that it will no longer support the Ethereum (ETH) cryptocurrency. He subsequently shared this decision on Reddit:
Ryan Youssef highlighted three main reasons why they decided to make this move:
Ethereum has switched from Proof of Work to Proof of Stake consensus. According to Paxful, Proof-of-Work is the only consensus that makes cryptocurrency "honest money", while Proof of Stake is just another form of existing fiat money
Ethereum is not decentralized, it is controlled by a small group of people and one day Ethereum users will have to have permission to use this cryptocurrency
Ethereum had several real uses, such as lending, but it was particularly successful for tokenization. Tokens that originated on Ethereum have been misused to deceive and rob millions of people. They thus stole the important momentum of Bitcoin and cost years of work the important mission of getting people to decentralized money
"In short, our industry is now facing a lot of pressure and attacks, which means our responsibility to protect users is greater than before. We are not perfect, but we always try to do the right thing, even if it is not popular or it costs us money," added Youssef to this decision, who has long been among those who called for the transfer of cryptocurrencies to private wallets, arguing that centralized exchanges are not in safety.