How and Where to Buy Equilibrium (EQ) – Detailed Guide
- What is EQ?
- Step 1: Register on Fiat-to-Crypto Exchange
- Step 2: Buy USDT with fiat money
- Step 3: Transfer USDT to an Altcoin Exchange
- Step 4: Deposit USDT to exchange
- Step 5: Trade EQ
- Last Step: Store EQ securely in hardware wallets
- Other useful tools for trading EQ
- Frequently Asked Questions
- Latest News for EQ
- EQ Price Prediction and Price Movement
What is EQ?
What Is Equilibrium?
Equilibrium is a DeFi hub of Polkadot that allows for high leverage in trading and borrowing digital assets. By applying lower collateral requirements and supporting cross-chain transfers, it is significantly improving capital efficiency in DeFi. Equilibrium combines its native decentralized EQD stablecoin with full-fledged money market and an order book-based DEX.
EQ is the native utility token that is used for:
- Collateral pledge for borrowing stablecoins and crypto assets
- Insurance liquidity
- Liquidity farming
- Paying system fees
- Accessing system governance
Equilibrium dev tools include:
Node-js API tools to interact with Equilibrium substrate e.g. query state and submit transactions. https://www.npmjs.com/package/@equilab/api Block explorer to monitor network performance: https://equilibrium.subscan.io/ Polkadot.js wallet to aid with substrate debugging and network performance: https://polkadot.js.org/apps/#/explorer
How Many EQ Tokens Are There in Circulation?
The total supply is 12 billion EQ tokens, fully compatible across every smart-contract enabled blockchain bridged with Polkadot. Further information about EQ tokenomics can be found here https://equilibrium.io/docs/EQ_token_economy.pdf.
Who Are the Founders of Equilibrium?
Alex Melikhov is the founder and CEO of Equilibrium. Alex is an engineer in applied mathematics by training. Before blockchain, he was working on fintech projects.
Equilibrium’s team includes 27 team members who have been working together since 2017. The engineering team is highly experienced in building on various blockchain platforms, from Ethereum to EOSIO and the Substrate framework. Now the team is developing on Polkadot to obtain true cross-chain interoperability and to turn Equilibrium into a full-fledged DeFi one-stop shop.
Why is Equilibrium unique?
Other than the fact that Equilibrium focuses on cross-chain functionality from the outset, it is the first DeFi conglomerate that is designed to deliver a unique user experience and to end market fragmentation.
Equilibrium is based on a unique and innovative architecture and doesn’t replicate any of existing DeFI concepts and makes the system way more stable. Here are core components that implement this architecture and set Equilibrium apart from other DeFi projects:
A unique risk management system
This monitors the overall system liquidity in real-time across blockchains, starting from individual users’ multi-asset portfolios and aggregating them to follow overall system solvency. It’s constantly assessing system portfolio volatility, conditions of the bailout liquidity pool that is securing loans in the system, and risk profiles of particular user positions.
Programmatic interest rate
Most DeFi lending applications either follow asset utilization or set interest via governance mechanisms. Equilibrium is the first DeFi project that takes a risk-based approach to borrowing cost assessment that is inherited from traditional finance. Practically it means that borrowers can enjoy flexible interest rates that can be adjusted by providing less volatile collateral or setting higher collateralization levels.
Insurance pools are a proactive solution to bad debt
Most DeFi projects liquidate a debt by way of auctions, but this isn’t as active and reliable a solution as it should be. Equilibrium is solving this inefficiency by using third-party agents called insurers who provide liquidity in advance (called “Insurance Pool”) and earn fees by securing loans in the system. In case of liquidations there are no forced auctions needed as debt obligations are simply transferred from defaulted borrowers to insurers instantly. Insurers can cover them whenever they prefer.
EQD Stablecoin
Equilibrium’s native stablecoin, EQD, is an asset-backed stablecoin, with a 1:1 peg to USD. EQD can be minted against a well-diversified portfolio of assets, thereby greatly reducing a borrower’s collateral risks. EQD’s competitive advantage lies in its built-in strong peg mechanism via three layers of protection: Layer 1: Overcollateralization requirement, Layer 2: Insurance Pool to secure debt positions, Layer 3: Stability fund, backed by Equilibrium Treasury, which acts as liquidity backstops. EQD use cases extend beyond Equilibrium through its extensive connections with other networks via Cross-Consensus Message Format (XCM) in the Polkadot ecosystem.
EQ was first tradable on 31st Aug, 2020. It has a total supply of 12,000,000,000. As of right now EQ has a market capitalization of USD $1,945,521.07. The current price of EQ is $0.000162 and is ranked 2931 on Coinmarketcap and has recently surged 27.68 percent at the time of writing.
EQ has been listed on a number of crypto exchanges, unlike other main cryptocurrencies, it cannot be directly purchased with fiats money. However, You can still easily buy this coin by first buying USDT from any fiat-to-crypto exchanges and then transfer to the exchange that offers to trade this coin, in this guide article we will walk you through in detail the steps to buy EQ.
Step 1: Register on Fiat-to-Crypto Exchange
You will have to first buy one of the major cryptocurrencies, in this case, USDT (USDT). In this article we will walk you through in details two of the most commonly-used fiat-to-crypto exchanges, Uphold.com and Coinbase. Both exchanges have their own fee policies and other features that we will go through in detail. It is recommended that you try both of them and figure out the one that suits you best.
Select Fiat-to-Crypto Exchange for details:
- UpHold
Being one of the most popular and convenient fiat-to-crypto exchanges, UpHold has the following advantages:
- Easy to buy and trade among multiple assets, more than 50 and still adding
- Currently more than 7M users worldwide
- You can apply for UpHold Debit card where you can spend the crypto assets on your account like a normal debit card! (US only but will be in the UK later)
- Easy to use mobile app where you can withdraw fund to a bank or any other altcoin exchanges easily
- No hidden fees and any other account fees
- There are limited buy/sell orders for more advanced users
- You can easily set up recurring deposits for Dollar Cost Averaging (DCA) if you intend to hold cryptos long term
- USDT, which is one of the most popular USD-backed stablecoins (basically a crypto that is backed by real fiat money so they are less volatile and can be treated almost as the fiat money it's pegged with) is available, this is more convenient if the altcoin you intend to buy has only USDT trading pairs on the altcoin exchange so you don't have to go through another currency conversion while you buy the altcoin.
Type your email and click 'Next'. Make sure you provide your real name as UpHold will need it for account and identity verification. Choose a strong password so that your account isn't vulnerable to hackers.
You will receive a confirmation email. Open it and click on the link within. You will then be required to provide a valid mobile number to set up two-factor authentication (2FA), it is an extra layer to the security of your account and it is highly recommended that you keep this feature turned on.
Follow the next step to finish your identity verification. These steps are a bit daunting especially when you are waiting to buy an asset but just like any other financial institutions, UpHold is regulated in most countries such as the US, the UK and the EU. You can take this as a trade-off to using a trusted platform to make your first crypto purchase. Good news is that the whole so-called Know-Your-Customers (KYC) process is now fully automated and it shouldn't take more than 15 minutes to finish.
Step 2: Buy USDT with fiat money
Once you finished the KYC process. You will be asked to add a payment method. Here you can either choose to provide a credit/debit card or use a bank transfer. You may be charged higher fees depending on your credit card company and the volatile prices when using cards but you will also make an instant purchase. While a bank transfer will be cheaper but slower, depending on the country of your residence, some countries will offer instant cash deposit with low fees.
Now you are all set, on the 'Transact' screen under the 'From' field, select your fiat currency, and then on the 'To' field choose USDT, click preview to review your transaction and the click confirm if everything looks good... and congrats! You've just made your first crypto purchase.
Step 3: Transfer USDT to an Altcoin Exchange
- Gate.io
But we are not done yet, since EQ is an altcoin we need to transfer our USDT to an exchange that EQ can be traded, here we will use Gate.io as our exchange. Gate.io is a popular exchange to trade altcoins and it has a large number of tradable altcoins pairs. Use the link below to register your new account.
Gate.io is an American cryptocurrency exchange that launched 2017. As the exchange is American, US-investors can of course trade here and we recommend US traders to sign up on this exchange. The exchange is available both in English and Chinese (the latter being very helpful for Chinese investors). Gate.io’s main selling factor is their wide selection of trading pairs. You can find most of the new altcoins here. Gate.io also demonstrates an impressive trading volume. It is almost every day one of the top 20 exchanges with the highest trading volume. The trading volume amounts to approx. USD 100 million on a daily basis. The top 10 trading pairs on Gate.io in terms of trading volume usually have USDT (Tether) as one part of the pair. So, to summarize the foregoing, Gate.io’s vast number of trading pairs and its extraordinary liquidity are both very impressive aspects of this exchange.
After going through a similar process as we've done before with UpHold, you will be advised to set up 2FA authentication as well, finish it as it adds extra security to your account.
Step 4: Deposit USDT to exchange
Depends on the policies of the exchange you might be required to go through another KYC process, this should usually take you from 30 minutes to possibly a few days maximum. Though the process should be straight-forward and easy to follow. Once you're done with it you should have full access to your exchange wallet.
If this is your first time making a crypto deposit, the screen here may look a bit scary. But don't worry, it's basically simpler than making a bank transfer. At the box on the right, you will see a string of random numbers saying 'USDT address', this is a unique public address of your USDT wallet at Gate.io and you can receive USDT by giving this address to the person to send you the funds. Since we are now transferring our previously bought USDT on UpHold to this wallet, click on 'Copy Address' or right-click on the full address and click copy to grab this address to your clipboard.
Now head back to UpHold, go to the Transact screen and click on USDT on the "From" field, choose the amount you wan to send and on the "To" field choose USDT under "Crypto Network", then click "Preview withdraw".
On the next screen, paste the wallet address from your clipboard, for security consideration you should always check if both addresses are matching. It is known that there are certain computer malware that would alter the content in your clipboard into another wallet address and you will be essentially sending funds to another person.
After reviewing, click 'Confirm' to proceed, you should receive a confirmation email instantly, click on the confirmation link in the email and your coins are on the way to Gate.io!
Now go back to Gate.io and head to your exchange wallets, don't worry if you haven't seen your deposit here. It is probably still being verified in the blockchain network and it should take a few minutes for your coins to arrive. Depending on the network traffic condition of the USDT network, during busy times it may take even longer.
You should receive a confirmation notification from Gate.io once your USDT has arrived. And you are now finally ready to purchase EQ!
Step 5: Trade EQ
Go back to Gate.io, then go to 'Exchange'. Boom! What a view! The constantly flicking figures might be a bit scary, but relax, let's get our heads around this.
In the right column there is a search bar, now make sure "USDT" is selected as we are trading USDT to altcoin pair. Click on it and type in "EQ", you should see EQ/USDT, select that pair and you should see a price chart of EQ/USDT in the middle of the page.
Below there is a box with a green button that says "Buy EQ", inside of the box, choose the "Market" tab here as that is the most straight-forward type of buying orders. You can either type in your amount or choose what portion of your USDT deposit you would like to spend on buying, by clicking on the percentage buttons. When you have confirmed everything, click "Buy EQ". Voila! You have finally bought EQ!
Last Step: Store EQ securely in hardware wallets
Ledger Nano S
- Easy to set up and friendly interface
- Can be used on desktops and laptops
- Lightweight and Portable
- Support most blockchains and wide range of (ERC-20/BEP-20) tokens
- Multiple languages available
- Built by a well-established company found in 2014 with great chip security
- Affordable price
Ledger Nano X
- More powerful secure element chip (ST33) than Ledger Nano S
- Can be used on desktop or laptop, or even smartphone and tablet through Bluetooth integration
- Lightweight and Portable with built-in rechargeable battery
- Larger screen
- More storage space than Ledger Nano S
- Support most blockchains and wide range of (ERC-20/BEP-20) tokens
- Multiple languages available
- Built by a well-established company found in 2014 with great chip security
- Affordable price
If you are planning to keep("hodl" as some may say, basically misspelt "hold" which get popularised over time) your EQ for a considerable long time, you may want to explore ways of keeping it safe, although Binance is one of the safest cryptocurrency exchange there had been hacking incidents and funds were lost. Because of the very nature of the wallets in exchanges, they will be always online("Hot Wallets" as we call them), therefore exposing certain aspects of vulnerabilities. The safest way of storing your coins to date is always putting them into a type of "Cold Wallets", where the wallet will only have access to the blockchain(or simply "go online") when you send out funds, reducing the chances of hacking incidents. A paper wallet is a type of free cold wallet, it's basically an offline-generated pair of public and private address and you will have it written somewhere, and keep it safe. However, it is not durable and is susceptible to various hazards.
Hardware wallet here is definitely a better option of cold wallets. They are usually USB-enabled devices that store the key information of your wallet in a more durable way. They are built with military-level security and their firmware are constantly maintained by their manufacturers and thus extremely safe. Ledger Nano S and Ledger Nano X and are the most popular options in this category, these wallets cost around $50 to $100 depending on the features they are offering. If you are holding your assets these wallets are a good investment in our opinion.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I buy EQ with cash?
There is no direct way to buy EQ with cash. However, you can use marketplaces such as LocalBitcoins to first purchase USDT, and finish the rest of the steps by transferring your USDT to respective AltCoin exchanges.
LocalBitcoins is a peer-to-peer Bitcoin exchange. It is a marketplace where users can buy and sell Bitcoins to and from each other. Users, called traders, create advertisements with the price and the payment method they want to offer. You can choose to buy from sellers from a certain nearby region on the platform. is after all a good place to go to buy Bitcoins when you can't find your desired payment methods anywhere else. But prices are usually higher on this platform and you have to do your due diligence to avoid getting scammed.
Are there any quick ways to buy EQ in Europe?
Yes, in fact, Europe is one of the easiest places to buy cryptos in general. There are even online banks which you can simply open an account and transfer money to exchanges such as Coinbase and Uphold.
Are there any alternative platforms to buy EQ or Bitcoin with credit cards?
Yes. is also a very easy to use platform for buying Bitcoin with credit cards. It is an instant cryptocurrency exchange that allows you to exchange crypto fast and buy it with a bank card. Its user interface is very easy to use and the buying steps are pretty self-explanatory.
Read more on Equilibrium's fundamentals and current price here.