This post walks through the most commonly used features on FTX. It's not exhaustive, though. Note that it makes a bunch of approximations and should not be taken literally; please read through our documentation and learn how to use FTX for yourself.
Summary
1. Wallet
The wallet page contains your balances, deposits, and withdrawals.
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In order to find a coin in your wallet page, click the 'search' icon, and type in the coin you want; or browse the tabs 'All Balances', 'Crypto', Leveraged Tokens' and 'Fiat'. Note that if you have 'Hide zero balances' checked you'll have to type in a coin if you don't have any of it.
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1.1 Balances
You'll see Balance and Available Balance for each coin.
- Balance: how much you own
- Available Balance: how much you own and aren't using for open positions or orders.
If you want to filter for coins that you own, click 'Hide zero balances'.
1.2 Depositing/Withdrawing
To deposit a coin, click 'DEPOSIT'; this will bring up the blockchain address to send the coin. To withdraw, click 'WITHDRAW' and enter the details.
You can see your pending deposits and withdrawals by scrolling down to the bottom of the wallet page.
Note that FTX does not charge any fees for deposits or withdrawals.
1.3 Convert
Converting is the easiest way to trade on FTX. If you have BTC and want to convert it to USDT, you can click the 'CONVERT' button, and enter the quantity. You'll be shown a price; if you want to confirm it, just click 'CONVERT'. There are no fees on conversions! The price you see is the price you pay, all-in.
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Two ways to CONVERT on APP
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1.4 Fiat
FTX has fiat (wire transfer) deposits and withdrawals! You can click 'Fiat' on the wallet page to see the available currencies:
In general, FTX aims to be able to accept wire transfer deposits and withdrawals of up to $1m and above with no fees, tight spreads, and reasonable settlement. Click DEPOSIT to get the details, and click WITHDRAW to request a wire out. You can use CONVERT to buy/sell any of the fiat currencies on FTX.
All fiat can be used as collateral on FTX!
Note that you have to be KYC level 2 to deposit or withdraw fiat currencies on FTX.
1.5 USD Stablecoins
The default PnL currency on FTX is USD. You can freely interchange a bunch of stablecoins 1:1 as 'USD' on FTX. USD wire transfer deposits and withdrawals will credit USD as well.
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You can deposit any of these and be credited 1:1 with USD, and you can withdraw USD as any of these 1:1.
Note that tether (USDT) is not part of the USD Stablecoins basket on FTX. We do support USDT though. You can find it in its own row in your wallet, and deposit/withdraw it normally through via OMNI or ERC20.
2. Markets
2.1 The Markets page is the easiest way to see the products listed on FTX.
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Click on the different tabs to explore all of the markets that FTX offers! We have everything from perpetual and quarterly futures, spot markets with fiat support, Leveraged Tokens, and volatility products.
Clicking the star icon next to a market will add it to your favorites; clicking the star at the top will list your favorite markets. This will also move those markets towards the front of the top row of tickers. You can favorite things from the markets page, trading pages, and mobile app!
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3. Trading
Once you decide what product you want to trade, go to the trading page for that product. Below I'll explore two markets: a futures market (BTC-PERP) and a spot market (FTT/USD).
3. 1 Sending Orders
There are two ways to send orders: using the standard orderform, and using the 3-part orderform.
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For the standard orderform, you choose a direction, price, and amount. You can also select select an advanced order type from the drop-down menu. You can toggle between buying and selling either by clicking the tab on the top, or the arrows on the bottom.
You can also use our bracket orderform, which allows you to place a limit order, stop loss, and take profit all at once.
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You can toggle between orderforms using the circle in the upper right hand corner.
3.2 Collateral
FTX uses USD-based flexible cross margin isolated to subaccounts. Let's unpack that.
3.2.1 USD PnL
On FTX, all futures settle in USD. What that means is that if you buy 2 futures for $9000 and sell them for $9150, you make 2 * (9150 - 9000) = $300 in profit. All futures are denominated in the underlying coins; so 1 BTC-PERP future means 1 bitcoin. Similarly, if you sold 3 ETH-PERP for $200 and bought them back for $210, you would have lost $30.
3.2.2 Flexible Collateral
The easiest way to understand collateral on FTX is by using USD.
However, you are allowed to use many assets as collateral on FTX! Say that you have 10 ETH as collateral, and you buy 5 BTC-PERP for $9000 and then sell them back for $8950. You've lost $250 of PnL. But you don't have any USD to pay--only ETH. FTX will debit your account for the USD amount owed; your balances will become 10 ETH and -250 USD. If that negative USD balance grows large enough, eventually FTX will sell off $250 worth of your ETH into USD to settle your PnL. If it sold the ETH for $200 each, you'd be left with 8.75 ETH and no USD.
You can mix and match collateral assets as you want, using any combination of USD, USDT, BTC, ETH, FTT, any fiat currency, and much more! You're free to use whichever you prefer. You're no longer locked into using only BTC, or only USDT, as collateral; you can hold your funds as you choose.
3.2.3 Cross Margin
By default, you can trade all of the futures products on FTX without having to separate your funds. Just deposit any collateral into your wallet, and then trade whichever futures you like; FTX will automatically use all of your collateral to backstop all of your positions. If you make or lose PnL on any position, that will come out of your central collateral.
That means that there's no need to manage 10 different wallets or currencies or liquidations--all of your portfolio is automatically together.
3.2.4 Subaccounts
However, if you want to isolate your positions from each other, you can do so using subaccounts. Each subaccount has totally separate collateral, PnL, etc.; so you can store funds in a subaccount for one position, and other funds in a separate account for a different position.. This gives you total control: you can combine or separate your trading as you prefer.
You can create subaccounts here. You can also transfer collateral between them on that page.
If you want to switch between your subaccounts--perhaps to change which product you're trading--the easiest thing to do is to use the subaccount bar on trading pages.
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This will appear on every trading page, and with one click you can move to a different subaccount! You can also switch subaccounts in the top right menu by clicking on your account name.
3.2.5 Risk and Liquidations
Margin trading can be risky! You can monitor the state of your account using the info boxes on trading pages.
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Your total collateral is the sum total USD value of the collateral currencies combined in your account. Your free collateral is that total USD value minus the amount being used as collateral for your positions. So for example, in the image above I have $183.57 worth of assets, and am using about $12.14 of those assets as collateral, with another $171.43 free to open more positions.
Your leverage is your positions' size divided by your total collateral; in this case I have a position size of roughly $9000 and a collateral of just under $3000, so my leverage is about 3.33. Your margin fraction is just 1 / leverage: it's your account's value divided by your position size. Your Max position leverage is the highest amount of leverage you have allowed for any positions in your account. You can take this up or down using the slider; note this does not send any orders or change your current risk profile, it merely changes the maximum risk you've allowed your account to take on. Finally, your maintenance margin requirement is how high your margin fraction needs to be to avoid liquidation. If your margin fraction drops below your maintenance margin, your account's positions will begin being liquidated by the FTX risk engine.
Remember that within one subaccount FTX will add up your total collateral and your total position size across all contracts; if you want your risk to be independent, put the positions in separate subaccounts.
Note that, unlike many exchanges, FTX will update your collateral nearly in real time: usually with 30 seconds or less of delay. So if you make money, that USD will almost immediately show up in your wallet, and you can use it to open more positions, buy other tokens, or withdraw. The one exception is that PnL isn't realized on the platform until there are no active liquidations.
3.3 The Graph
By default, FTX uses TradingView graphs on its desktop site. You can edit the graph settings, place and move orders, and customize the graph display. You can bring up the graph settings page by clicking on the gear on the upper right corner of the graph:
3.4 Spot Markets and Margin
FTX also has spot markets! You can trade FTT, BTC and other coins. The interface is similar to futures, if you decide not to use margin.
And we provide you with the ability to use spot margin. Please read more about it here. In order to enable spot margin, you'll have to visit https://ftx.com/profile#spot-margin
3.5 Navigating to different markets
You can navigate to different markets by using the nav-bar on top or just by hovering over the dropdown button directly on the trade ticker.
4. Customizing The UI/UX
There are a lot of ways to customize the FTX trading interface!
4.1 Build your own layout
First of all, you can drag around all of the boxes, rearranging your order entry form, orderbook, and more.
Beyond that, you can find a large list of choices by clicking on the settings gear in the upper right hand corner of any trading page, or the User tab of the mobile app.
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We encourage you to check out all of the settings and see which configuration you like best!
4.2 Track all your markets and coins directly
On the home, trading and wallet page you can follow any market you like.
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5. Account and Security
Your account settings have your security, referrals, fees, API keys, and more.
5.1 Security
The account security / KYC and other settings are accessible from most pages by clicking the top right corner.
You can change your password and other security settings on your profile page.
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The most important thing to do is to add 2-factor authentication to your account. We recommend using Authy / Google Authenticator, although you can also use SMS. You must do this before depositing to FTX. You'll be shown a QR code and a 16-digit string; they are equivalent, and act as the secret key for your 2FA. Enter it into any common 2FA app--like Google Authenticator--and you'll be able to get the authentication codes.
You can also add a separate password for withdrawals, and decide when 2FA is required.
The 'Logins' section allows you to create custom logins: you can decide what subaccount they can access and what level of control they have.
5.2 API keys
You can also create and manage your API keys on your settings page.
Clicking on the pencil icon will bring up a box where you can toggle the permissions for the key:
6. FTX Token: FTT
6.1 Rebates
FTT is the exchange token of the FTX ecosystem. You receive lower trading fees for holding FTT on FTX. We also do a weekly buy and burn of 1/3 of our trading revenue! Finally, you can use FTT as collateral for all futures on FTX, so you can hold your capital on FTX in FTT and still trade with it.
You can find more information about FTT here, and you can trade it here.
6.2 FTT Staking
You can stake your FTT for additional rewards including increased referral fee and SRM rewards.
7. Mobile Apps
As of May 2020, FTX has a brand new set of mobile apps for both android and iPhones! You can download them here. They are significantly faster and cleaner than the older versions of the FTX app.
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