We’ve made some monumental changes here at ShapeShift and the trading experience you once knew is no more.
Since mid-April we have turned off our previous trading experience and now have integrated DEXs for all of our customers’ trading needs. That means every trade you complete happens through a decentralized protocol. Fees, rates, etc are no longer managed by ShapeShift but instead the market within these decentralized exchange systems.
Depending on the coins you are trading and the amounts you are trading, you may experience different levels of “Slippage” (meaning the fluctuation in price). We offer you a few options while trading: up to 5% slippage for 0X and 3% slippage for ThorChain. This means if you select 2%, you agree to continue with the trade even if there’s a 2% price change. But if there is more than 2% your trade will fail and you’ll be refunded your original deposit. It’s important to note if your trade fails you will also be charged the network fee to receive your refund back. Once again, this is not charged by ShapeShift, but rather the respective network you are trading with.
Additionally, network (miner) fees have been extremely high recently making it impossible to trade smaller amounts (because the fees amount to more than the total being traded).