Pionex Review: Useful Crypto Bots But There Are Limitations
Last Updated on February 1, 2024 by Kevin GrovesIf you’re thinking of simplifying your crypto trading process then implementing bots to enter and exit positions will help. Pionex is one of the leading platforms for crypto bots that provides 16 innovative trading bots that are integrated into its exchange. Are Pionex’s trading bots worth using? What other features does it offer? In this article, we discuss the features, strengths, and weaknesses of Pionex, and outline how it might fit your needs.
pionex.com
Pionex
Trading fees:
0.05%
Number of cryptos:
380+
Deposit methods:
Credit card, SEPA
Supported countries:
Global (including Australia)
Promotion:
None available at this time.
The Bottom Line
If you’re looking for a crypto exchange with a strong assortment of trading bots to automate your strategies for you, then Pionex should be a consideration. The 16 trading bots that it offers are more than likely to cater to your every need, no matter if you’re a beginner or a more experienced trader. It is evident that the company has a good reputation for customer service.
However, the strength of its trading bots is dampened by the inability to deposit or withdraw AUD which will prove inconvenient to most Australians. Moreover, there is also no demo account to practice trading or explore the platform.
What we liked:
- The easy creation and implementation of its trading bots.
- Trading fees of 0.05%.
- Good reputation for customer service.
What we didn’t like:
- Can’t deposit or withdraw AUD.
- No demo account to test trading bots.
- General lack of features apart from its trading bots.
Quick Overview
Here is a quick summary of Pionex.
| Exchange Name | Pionex |
| Supported Countries | Worldwide (including Australia) |
| Fiat Currencies Supported | 80+ (credit card purchases only) |
| Supported Cryptocurrencies | 395 |
| Markets | Spot and margin |
| Deposit Methods | Credit card, SEPA, crypto transfer |
| Deposit Fees | None |
| Trading Fees | 0.05% |
| Withdrawal Fees | None, with exception of the network fee |
| Crypto Staking | ETH only (2.75% to 4.25%) |
| Mobile App | Yes (Android and iOS) |
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What Is Pionex and What Do They Do?
Founded in 2019, Pionex is a centralised cryptocurrency platform that revolves around the use of trading bots as its primary service offering. The trading platform offers 16 in-built trading bots to cater to different strategies that traders may want to adopt. Instead of having to analyse the price action of crypto assets through real-time charting, you can automate your strategies using Pionex’s bots that are integrated into the exchange.
The Singaporean-based company takes a unique approach to the crypto trading industry by aggregating liquidity from two of the world’s most heavily traded exchanges, Binance and Huobi Global. Pionex currently provides its services to users in over 100 countries with more than $5 billion of trades conducted every month.
Pros & Cons
Pros:
Cons:
What We Think About Their Features
Comes with 16 in-built trading bots
Pionex offers 16 trading bots that are integrated into its exchange. Trading bots are computer programs that use algorithms and pre-programmed instructions to analyse market data and execute trades on your behalf. This means that you don’t need to be at your computer or on your mobile device as they will enter you into trading positions automatically.
Compared to other crypto exchanges that offer trading bots, Pionex is rather unique and is a market leader for its trading bots. On Pionex, the in-built bots are integrated into the exchange interface. Creating a new bot can be done whilst retaining your price action analysis on the TradingView charts. Because of this, implementing one of the 16 bots with your own parameters is actually quite easy and suitable for people who want to try it out. However, there is no demo mode to experiment with Pionex’s trading bots.
A brief description of some of Pionex’s more popular trading bots is provided below.
- Grid Trading: The grid bot is a popular option for traders in relatively steady markets. A trade will be placed when the market price reaches the bottom of the rectangle (i.e. grid) you set, and sell when it reaches its height.
- DCA: Dollar-Cost-Averaging, sometimes referred to as recurring orders, is when the bot will automatically place a trade at pre-determined timing intervals. For example, you can set the DCA bot to buy $50 of Ethereum every fortnight. DCA is a common method used by investors to slowly build their crypto portfolios whilst mitigating the effects of price volatility.
- Rebalancing: This bot automatically buys low and sells high whilst maintaining your portfolio allocations for each digital asset.
- Infinity Grid: Similar to the spot grid, this bot will continue to buy low and sell high in percentages with no upper limit.
There are over 395 supported crypto and 300 trading pairs
With 395 supported digital currencies and over 314 trading pairs, Pionex offers a reasonable selection of crypto to buy and trade. For crypto/crypto trading pairs, the base currencies are limited to BTC, ETH, USDT, BNB, BUSD, and USDC.
Since there is no fiat gateway, Pionex does not support any fiat/crypto trading pairs such as AUD/BTC or USD/BTC. With this in mind, Pionex is probably not going to feature as one of the top altcoin investing platforms for most Australians.
You can instantly swap coins
Akin to most global cryptocurrency exchanges, you can instantly convert one crypto asset for another using the Pionex swapping feature. There is not much to this feature. Simply select the crypto to change as well as the volume, then click “Swap”.
Earn on your initial investment
Pionex allows you to ‘buy low, sell high’ using its dual investment feature. 21 popular cryptocurrencies including Tether (USDT), BTC, ETH, XRP, SOL, and ADA are supported. The dual investment earning is structured as follows:
- If the market price for a crypto asset is equal to or greater than your target price then you will earn payments by successfully selling the asset at a higher price.
- If the market price is less than your target price then you will receive more of that asset.
Stake ETH, a popular token
Pionex supports the Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus protocol, however, crypto staking is limited to Ethereum. Depending on the term you select, interest yields range between 2.75% to 4.25% which are fairly respectable compared to other platforms. In terms of arrangements, Pionex offers the standard offerings of Flexible, 30-days, 90-days, and 180-days.
Although the yields of 4.25% are attractive, the locked-in period of 180 days may deter some investors. The same could be said for the 90-day term (3.75%). In our opinion, Pionex needs to loosen the fixed-term plans or offer additional terms that are provided by other exchanges such as 21 days and 60 days.
Overall, Pionex doesn’t offer the staking services that you would expect from a global crypto exchange. With multiple crypto staking options in Australia, you’re better off going with another exchange such as Binance Australia if staking forms a central core of your crypto activities.
Is Pionex Safe To Use? Here’s What We Found
One of the worrying things about Pionex is the lack of information regarding its security practices. Pionex’s assets are held by Binance and Huobi, its liquidity partners. This does impart a level of confidence since these two exchanges are highly reputable and secure in their own rights. However, specifics about how its digital infrastructure is protected in largely void from its website. One of the saving graces is that Pionex demonstrated in January 2023 that it has 100% Proof of Reserves, as determined by third-party audits.
How Much Are Pionex’s Fees?
Deposit and withdrawal fees
Pionex does not charge any fees to deposit or withdraw cryptocurrencies to and from its wallet. In terms of minimum limits for BTC and ETH, you need to deposit more than 0.0001 BTC and 0.001 ETH, respectively. Whilst a withdrawal fee doesn’t apply, a standard network fee will be incurred. The size of the fee will depend on the asset being transferred out, network congestion, and the complexity of the transaction (i.e. the number of validation confirmations).
Trading fees
When it comes to trading cryptocurrencies on the exchange, Pionex provides a simple and flat fee of 0.05% for all maker and taker orders. Compare this against the trading fees of other popular crypto exchanges and you will realise that Pionex is more than competitive. The fees, as well as Pionex’s access to liquidity providers, means that the platform is highly economical for high-volume trades where minimal slippage is sought.
| Exchange | Maker Fee (spot) | Taker Fee (spot) |
|---|---|---|
| Pionex | 0.05% | 0.05% |
| Binance Australia | 0.10% | 0.10% |
| Bybit | 0.10% | 0.10% |
| Kraken | 0.26% | 0.16% |
| OKX | 0.08% | 0.10% |
All of Pionex’s 16 in-built trading bots can be used for free. This is a major plus since some providers of trading bots come with subscription fees.
What You Need To Get Started
For a global platform, we found the ID verification process on Pionex to be relatively pain-free and streamlined. We had the choice of submitting our Australian passport, driver’s licence, residence permit or ID card. Overall, the process from document submission to receiving email confirmation that the process was successful took about 6 minutes.
Pionex has multiple membership levels including Level 0, Level 1, and Level 2. Interestingly, it seemed that we were not given a choice given our Australian locale and achieved Level 2. This is because Pionex is legally required to verify your identity under the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act.
How To Fund A New Account
Funding your Pionex account wallet can only be done via transfers of cryptocurrencies from external wallets or using your credit card to buy them directly. Pionex has enabled the use of credit cards through partnerships with third-party payment providers such as Banxa, Simplex, and AlchemyPay. A downside to Pionex’s feature is that you can only use your credit card to buy Tether (USDT), Bitcoin (BTC), and Ethereum (ETH).
The provision of a credit card gateway is particularly common for global crypto exchanges. In a sense, Pionex almost needed to add this feature since there is no gateway to deposit fiat currencies such as USD or AUD. In this way, Pionex may not be ideal for people who want to simply buy crypto with AUD.
After Using Pionex, This Is What We Noticed
Buying crypto
Keeping in mind that there is no fiat gateway for Australians to deposit AUD or any other traditional currency, the credit card feature to buy crypto is simple to use. Although limited to solely USDT, BTC, and ETH, you can choose from over 80 fiat currencies as your payment asset.
Since the credit card gateway is made possible through Pionex’s partnership with third-party payment providers, you should note that all the buying options presented are quotations. Pionex will aggregate the best deals for the USDT, BTC, or ETH you want to buy from its liquidity partners, Binance and Huobi.
Overall, using the credit card feature on Pionex is simple enough for traders to use and it doesn’t offer anything much more innovative than other exchanges.
The trading interface
If you’ve come from or used an advanced trading interface before then the Pionex interface will be surprisingly refreshing. If you are new to crypto trading and charting then you should know that the interface is visually intuitive, straightforward to use, and rather enjoyable.
Essentially, Pionex allows you to easily switch between the standard trading interface, the interface with the in-built trading bots, and the coin-to-coin swapping service with the click of a button. These can be found in the top left-hand corner of the screen (under the Pionex logo).
Although not a crucial requirement, you will need to navigate away from the trading window to deposit or withdraw crypto from your wallet. Installing a ‘quick deposit/withdraw’ feature would be a nice add-on. Although dark mode can be toggled, there isn’t any ability to customise the working interface.
As with most global crypto exchanges, Pionex provides the ever-popular TradingView charting package and all the drawing tools and indicators that come with it. Overall, the trading interface is fairly standard with the inclusion of order books, and panels to view your transaction history as well as quickly switch between crypto trading pairs. Other standard additions include the limit, market, and grid buy orders that can be placed when you buy crypto.
The Pionex trading interface will appeal to Australians who don’t want to be bogged down with overly complicated interfaces. The ability to create trading bots in the trading interface offers a high degree of simplicity, which is emphasized by its visually stunning design. During our testing, we experienced a noticeable latency when switching between trading pairs.
What Other Traders Are Saying
According to popular review websites such as TrustPilot, Pionex appears to have a reasonable reputation amongst its customer base. Although the 361 reviews are not the most reliable sample size, 74% of customer feedback indicated positive experiences with ratings of 4 and 5 stars. The vast majority of positive comments related to its unique features (i.e. the built-in trading bots), excellent customer service, and its mobile app.
Pionex’s overall rating of 4.0/5.0 may be underestimated if the nature of negative feedback is anything to go by. Although 24% of customers gave the exchange a poor rating of 1 or 2 stars, they seem to be exaggerated to some degree. For example, there were cases where customers had failed to properly email customer support or simply vent. It is worth noting that Pionex responded to each negative review.
Is There Customer Support?
If you’re having issues with Pionex’s features then you can reach out to their customer support team via email or live chat. The live chat can also be used when using the trading interface which is a benefit. In our experience, we were quick to receive contact from support on the live chat, however, the email did take a day. The sound level of responsiveness is generally in line with the positive feedback on TrustPilot where multiple reviews indicated better-than-average customer support.
On the other hand, the Pionex Help Centre could do with some improvement. Although there are decent guides for every single trading bot offered, there is a lack of detailed and thorough FAQ articles covering other topics such as deposits, withdrawals, 2FA, and security. For example, there are only three articles that cover leveraged token trading.
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes, Australians can create an account with Pionex and begin crypto trading. Whilst Pionex is not fully regulated in Australia, it is 100% legal to trade crypto. It should be noted that Pionex does not allow direct AUD deposits or withdrawals, however, traders can purchase crypto through a third party using a credit or debit card. This will incur additional payment fees.
No, Pionex currently does not provide a demo account for you to explore the platform or practice trading using the in-built bots. For a crypto exchange that places an emphasis on trading bots, this is a major downside as you can’t ‘try before you buy’.
Our Pionex Verdict
Pionex has established itself in a unique position in the cryptocurrency trading market by making it easy to create and use trading bots. The platform does not contain all the products and services of its much larger exchange cousins, but its in-built trading bots have been delivered to a high quality. Pair its trading bots with its highly economical trading fee of 0.05% which more than rivals the likes of Binance and Coinbase, and you have a value-for-money option to automate your trades.
Pionex is best suited to Aussies who have little time to track and analyse the markets. However, with no demo account and no ability to deposit or withdraw AUD cash, Pionex might be a bit too far for most Australians.
Pionex Alternatives You Can Consider
Pionex remains one of the premier trading bot exchanges available to Australians. If you’re still considering your options after this review, then you may be interested in reading about these exchanges which offer similar services.
- Bybit: A fully established, robust, and feature-rich crypto exchange that also offers trading bots. Bybit offers great fees for its spot and margin trading markets, all of which can be accessed on its state-of-the-art mobile app. Since the exchange is not regulated in Australia, you don’t need to complete KYC procedures.
- Swyftx: Swyftx is the best Australian crypto exchange to buy and trade crypto with AUD. The AUSTRAC-registered platform provides a suite of features including over 320 digital assets, a TradingView charting package, and a multitude of AUD deposit methods, all on a uniquely designed interface that can be customised.