How Online Trading Platforms Can Use Transaction Timestamps to Build Trust
A lack of trust will quickly lead to a lack of growth for an online trading platform. Unfortunately, fraud exists in many aspects of financial services, and online trading is no exception. Even in 2022, sleazy brokers and platforms create scams and deceive unsuspecting traders. For example, the online trading site RagingBull.com was recently forced to pay over $2.4 million for fake stock-earning claims and hard-to-cancel subscriptions.
It is no wonder that consumers are cautious when depositing funds with online brokers and trading platforms. The question for these brokers is how can your trading platform work to build trust with new customers?
Your customers need to trust that their money is safe. One way to help reassure them is with a transaction timestamp. In automated trading platforms, millions of trades can happen in a single week. An accurate transaction timestamp is necessary to prove reliability, show customers when and where their money is going, and in turn, increase deposits.
What is a Timestamp?
Timestamping is not a new idea – historically, people have always searched for ways to track and authenticate documents securely. Post stamps are viewed by many as the precursor and first utilisation of timestamping. But from this early and somewhat crude authentication method, transaction timestamps have dramatically evolved.
Within modern financial services, transaction timestamps can now have millisecond precision. They are a monotonically increasing number, sometimes tied to the system clock of the system on which they are created.
Typically, timestamps are used so that the transactions within a system are organised and appear in timestamp order. However, within trading, they can also give consumers the confidence to know when their money will appear and when they made a purchase – down to the second.
How do Transaction Timestamps Build Trust?
A timestamp for every transaction creates a form of ‘Proof of Existence’ to reassure your customers. Your business, customers, and all parties involved in the transaction will know exactly at what point a transaction started and its contents.
Why does this matter? Let’s say Business A sent a payment to Customer B. The customer claims that they received no money. Business A (the sender) could then use the timestamps as evidence of the money being sent.
Timestamping solves other issues too. For example, it eliminates the possibility of double-spending – where your platform user could spend the same assets more than once. Greater transparency also reduces the number of counterfeit products in the market and improves compliance and visibility for businesses. These are all major positives for trading platforms.
Why Transparency Matters in Trading
Customers have more product choices than ever when it comes to online trading. It is becoming harder for platforms to differentiate themselves and establish trust with new customers.
Transparency is one way to do this, and it’s becoming increasingly important. According to Salesforce, 74% of customers say communicating honestly and transparently is more important now than before the pandemic.
Transaction timestamps increase your platform’s transparency and give your customers what they want. Inaccurate timestamping not only breaches trust, but can also result in cancelled transactions, which is costly to your business.
Consumers will have greater trust in your trading platform when they know when they will receive their payments, and that trust grows further if those payments are instant.
Instant Payouts and Transaction Timestamps
Timestamps are only one transaction element that can help foster customer trust. Customers want to know when they will get their money, and they want it to arrive fast. Our research found that customers within the trading industry are concerned with instant payouts.
Brite surveyed 300 Swedish consumers about how important it is for a trading company to offer instant payouts. Overwhelmingly, respondents across age groups said that it was important:
- 42% Gen Z
- 52% Millennials
- 60% Gen X
Not only did our research find that consumers want instant payouts, but they are also willing to pay more for it. Our survey respondents were willing to pay up to 15% extra to receive an instant payout.
Brite’s Time2Money Feature
Brite Payments offers Instant Payouts that allow your trading platform to deliver instant payouts 365 days a year with a simple, secure, and fuss-free API. Not only will your customers receive their money in seconds, but they will also know exactly when their money will land in their bank account.
Brite Instant Payouts boasts a Time2Money feature that is unique to Brite. Time2Money ensures that every payout is time-stamped, so your customers know exactly when they’ll get their money.
Timestamps are customised to each and every user and are accurate down to a few seconds. This helps your trading platform operate in a fully transparent model, build trust with customers, and save them time.
The Next Generation of Payment Solutions
Brighten up customer experience on your trading platform’ by increasing your transparency. Not only will transaction timestamps foster trust with new and existing customers, but they will also help you differentiate your trading platform from competitors.
Get in touch to learn more about how our simple API integration can offer your trading platform an easy way to offer instant payouts with timestamps.
