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Exchange tokens are another easily overlooked sub-sector of the market but they have been performing exceptionally well in 2021 as increases in trading volumes results in a larger pool of fees to collect when the exchange’s native token is used for settlement.

FTX Token (FTT) is the exchange token for the FTX cryptocurrency exchange which got its start in the summer of 2019.

The exchange began to see an uptick in activity in 2020 which coincided with an increase in trading volume for FTT as well as its price.

Since Dec.11 when FTT was trading at $4.12, a surge in buying volume which reached a peak of $270 million on Feb.19 has propelled FTT to a new record high of $35.01 as the exchange is rapidly becoming the go-to derivatives exchange for the cryptocurrency community.

KuCoin also offers a growing list of tokens available for derivatives trading along with various ways to earn through staking or providing liquidity, with fees generated by the platform distributed to token holders who keep their KCS staked on the exchange.

This translates into a larger user base that conducts more transactions, leading to an increase in trading volumes and healthy price appreciation for underlying exchange tokens like BNB, FTT and KCS.

While decentralized exchanges like Uniswap and SushiSwap are growing in prominence and beginning to eat into the market share of centralized exchanges, they still comprise only a small portion of total trading volume seen in the cryptocurrency market.