What Is Uphold?

What Is Uphold?

Let me explain what Uphold is. It's a cloud-based financial service platform that lets you securely move, convert, hold, and transact in different assets. We're talking fiat currencies, cryptocurrencies, equities, and precious metals. You can fund your account using credit or debit cards, bank accounts, or crypto networks, and easily shift funds from one type of value to another. The whole point is to cut down on those pesky transaction costs and fees that come with currency exchanges.

Key Takeaways

Here's what you need to know right away. Uphold is that cloud-based platform for financial services. It lets individuals like you securely handle movements, conversions, holdings, and transactions across various assets. Sure, it's often linked to Bitcoin and other cryptos, but it also handles traditional stuff like fiat currencies, gold, and some equities. The company focuses on slashing transaction fees and keeping things highly transparent. To get started, you'll provide personal details like your name, phone number, and date of birth, and more if you plan to trade.

How Uphold Works

Uphold describes itself as a digital money platform serving a global market. Founded in 2014 by Halsey Minor and launched the next year, it started as Bitreserve before rebranding to Uphold. It's not a bank—it's what they call the world's first real-time transparent and fully verifiable reserve.

On Uphold, you get access to 40 equities, 27 fiat currencies, four precious metals, and over 130 cryptocurrencies. You can send funds to others and trade across assets from a single screen. Converting from one value to another is straightforward—like going from DASH to XRP in one step, without the double transactions and fees you'd see elsewhere.

The goal here is to lower costs, especially for cryptos like Bitcoin. Back in the early days of crypto, people had to build everything from scratch, unlike traditional currencies that evolved over time. Uphold claims it's cheaper than big-name platforms and has gone commission-free. What you see is what you pay.

Fast Fact

One quick note: Third-party developers can build on Uphold using Uphold Connect, their API, to create additional software.

Uphold Exchange Fees

Transparency is a big deal for crypto traders, and Uphold was partly inspired by the 2007-2008 financial crisis's lack of it. They publish reserve status in real-time, showing asset and liability balances for their tiers, and get audited quarterly for solvency.

For cryptos, you get an all-inclusive price with a spread of 50 to 100 basis points— that's 0.5% to 1.0%—but it can drop to 0.4% based on your trading. Deposits from debit or credit cards are free, and withdrawals have no fees except standard network ones for crypto.

Back in March 2018, they added Ripple (XRP) with zero fees on the first five million purchased, which was a big move since even Coinbase didn't support it then.

Important Note on Reserves

Uphold runs on a fully reserved basis, meaning all obligations are backed by held assets. That's different from banks' fractional reserves, where they only keep a fraction and lend or invest the rest.

Requirements for Uphold

When you sign up, provide your legal name, date of birth, and phone number. To withdraw or send funds, get verified with your residential address, government photo ID, and a live selfie.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Uphold

Like any platform, Uphold has its ups and downs. You need to weigh them.

On the advantages side, you can trade, exchange, and transfer across asset classes, converting between traditional currencies, precious metals, cryptos, and equities. Fees are transparent—no surprises—with an all-inclusive price and a small spread of 0.5% to 1.0%, sometimes lower.

Disadvantages include limited options within categories: as of July 2022, only four precious metals and 40 equities like Tesla or Apple. It also lacks advanced features like charts or research tools that experienced traders might want.

Uphold vs. Coinbase

Compare it to Coinbase, another major player. Coinbase focuses only on cryptos—buying, selling, trading, and holding them, starting with Bitcoin in 2012 and now including Ethereum and Dogecoin.

Coinbase has a basic version for beginners and Pro for advanced users with more trade types. Uphold is transparent with fees; Coinbase doesn't list them easily for the basic service. Bank trades are free on Uphold but 1.49% on Coinbase, with fees scaling by trade size. Coinbase Pro does show a fee schedule.

Where Is Uphold Located?

Uphold is based in New York and lets you trade and transfer currencies, precious metals, and cryptos.

Is Uphold a Wallet or an Exchange?

It's a multi-asset exchange, not just a wallet. You can exchange and transfer fiat, metals, cryptos, and some stocks.

Is Uphold Safe?

Yes, it's safe with KYC verification, two-factor authentication, third-party due diligence, bug bounties, staff checks, and regular audits.

Does Uphold Report to the IRS?

It reports taxable transactions to the IRS, requires your SSN, and provides 1099 forms via the app.

The Bottom Line

If you're into trading across asset classes, Uphold might suit you. It offers over two dozen currencies, 40 equities, precious metals, and 130+ cryptos, with growing options. You get transparent fees, easy trades, and security assurances.