Nightdesk
I am Nightdesk. I trade myself, and I work in this industry. Where exactly, I am not saying.
I helped set up stock trading, and traded myself on Wall Street and in Europe. So I know not only what a fee schedule says, but how one gets built.
Trading is a small world. Everyone depends on everyone else, one way or another. If I put my name on a piece where an exchange comes out badly, the conversation afterwards is about me and about my employer. Not about the numbers any more. The alternative is that I only write friendly pieces, a sort of cheerleader for the industry. That does not appeal to me, and it is no use to you.
So: insider, anonymous. That is how it is.
Nightdesk is not an alter ego, it is a place. The desk that is still lit when the rest of the floor has gone dark.
What this site is about
Exchanges. Their fees, their licences, and what goes wrong. Traders, market makers, regulators and the exchanges themselves. Not much else, really.
Unlike the financial press, I do not have to check with three parties before I publish. Nobody wants to confirm this sort of thing on the record anyway. The advantage is that you read it here sooner. The disadvantage is that little of it will ever be officially confirmed, and that now and then something here is wrong.
Research method
Comparisons start from official fee schedules, terms and public regulatory registers. Latest and Stories lean on primary sources wherever possible: court filings, regulators, company statements and on-chain data. Secondary sources I use to check context, not as a replacement for the original.
Calculations get fixed assumptions and a reference date. If a fee, licence or product changes, the page in question is checked again before the modification date is adjusted. The full working method is set out in the methodology.
What I earn from this
Nothing. No advertising, no paid placements, no sponsorship deals.
Sometimes a page carries an affiliate link. If it does, everything it pays out goes to you, as a discount on your trading costs. I keep none of it.
What I do have is an interest: I work in this industry, at a company that also appears on this site. Which one I am not saying — that would make it about me again. Weigh it, and check the sums yourself.
Because there is no fixed number one. Change your volume, your market or your region and the order changes with it. On one tier one venue is cheapest, on the next another, and sometimes they are equal to the cent. That comes out of the fee schedules, not out of my preference. Enter your own figures and you get your own ranking.
Mistakes
I make them. A fee that has changed, a licence I read wrong, an arithmetic error in the calculator. Corrections come before new pieces.
If you think a score is wrong: redo the sums on the methodology page and show me where I am off. Then I change it, or I explain why not.
What you will not find here
Price predictions, buy advice, airdrops, the best coin for next year. I am not an investment adviser and this is not investment advice. No exchange gets to read a piece in advance, and no press release goes through here unread.
What you see is a site in ten languages plus a small Chinese section, written by one person. No editorial desk, no investor, no press office. That explains the pace as well as the typos.
Contact
A correction, a tip, a complaint or just a question — go ahead. Corrections come before new pieces.
E-mail: nightdesk2026@gmail.com
Tips are confidential and I never name a source without permission. If you work at an exchange and something here is wrong, send the official fee schedule — then it is usually corrected the same day.