<p>LocalBitcoins, a Finland-based peer-to-peer (P2P) Bitcoin (BTC) exchange
founded in June 2012, has announced the timeline for the closure of its
Bitcoin trading services. The exchange announced the development on
Thursday in a statement on its website.</p><p>The operator noted that LocalBitcoins can longer provide its BTC trading services as its efforts to weather “the ongoing very crypto winter” has been
futile. The announcement comes after <a href=”https://www.financemagnates.com/cryptocurrency/whats-next-for-crypto-after-the-chaos-of-2022/” target=”_blank” rel=”follow”>a chaotic 2022</a> saw the crypto
industry battle with the collapse of several crypto projects, including
once-leading Bahamas-based crypto exchange, FTX. </p><p>Due to <a href=”https://www.financemagnates.com/cryptocurrency/crypto-winter-are-we-really-in-front-of-a-bear-market/” target=”_blank” rel=”follow”>prolonged crypto winter</a> or sustained
declining prices of digital assets and other factors, the market capitalization
of the cryptocurrency industry <a href=”https://www.financemagnates.com/cryptocurrency/crypto-market-cap-fell-by-641-to-829-billion-in-2022-report/” target=”_blank” rel=”follow”>collapsed by 64.1%</a> from $2.3 trillion
at the start of last year to $829 billion by year-end. </p><p>“We are sad to share that regardless of our efforts to overcome
challenges during the ongoing very cold crypto winter, we have regretfully
concluded that LocalBitcoins can no longer provide its Bitcoin trading
service,” LocalBitcoins announced.</p><blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”><p lang=”und” dir=”ltr”>🧡💙 <a href=”https://t.co/4j5M7iZkaD”>pic.twitter.com/4j5M7iZkaD</a></p>— LocalBitcoins (@LocalBitcoins) <a href=”https://twitter.com/LocalBitcoins/status/1623683223178862593?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>February 9, 2023</a></blockquote><p>Data from CoinDance <a href=”https://coin.dance/volume/localbitcoins/ALL” target=”_blank” rel=”follow”>shows that</a> LocalBitcoins has been generating between $5 million to $10 million in weekly volumes in the past months, in sharp contrast to its peak periods in 2017 when it generated over $100 million weekly in trading volumes.</p><p>LocalBitcoins Gives 12 Months Withdrawal Period</p><p>In preparation for its closure, LocalBitcoins has encouraged all its customers to
withdraw their funds on its platform within the next 12 months or earlier. This
is even as P2P BTC exchange announced suspension of new signs up on its platform on Thursday
(today). </p><p>Furthermore, the company noted that it will halt BTC trading on its platform
on the 16th of this month and further bar the use of the platform’s wallets on the same day. However, the wallets will be available for withdrawal of funds, LocalBitcoins said. </p><p>In addition, starting from January 17th, 2023, LocalBitcoins’ customers
will only be able to login into the platform to withdraw their Bitcoins as the
trading and wallet services will no longer be available starting from that
date.</p><p>Meanwhile, Finance Magnates reported in 2021 that Venezuelan authorities <a href=”https://www.financemagnates.com/cryptocurrency/news/venezuelan-authorities-detain-two-alleged-localbitcoins-scammers/” target=”_blank” rel=”follow”>detained two scammers</a> over their alleged involvement in a $136,000 scam committed through LocalBitcoins. </p>
This article was written by Solomon Oladipupo at www.financemagnates.com.
