What it means
GDAX began as the Coinbase Exchange and was renamed GDAX in 2016. Unlike Coinbase's basic app, which sells assets at a quoted price, GDAX showed a live order book of bids and offers and allowed traders to place their own orders.
This is how traditional stock exchanges work, and it appealed to more active and professional users. Order types included market orders, which trade immediately at the best available price, and limit orders, which trade only at a price the user chooses.
Limit orders that sit in the book and provide liquidity are called maker orders, while orders that take existing liquidity are called taker orders. Fee schedules often charged makers less than takers, to encourage people to add liquidity.
For businesses and investors, the main appeal was cost and control. Fees were typically lower than on consumer buying services, and the order book let a trader see how much could be bought at what price.
The trade-off was a more complex interface and a greater need to understand how orders work, so newcomers often practised with small amounts first. In 2018, GDAX was rebranded as Coinbase Pro, and later the Pro product was phased out in favour of newer trading tools within Coinbase.
The name GDAX therefore appears mostly in older articles, tutorials and trading records. If you see it in an account statement or historic data, it refers to trades made on that earlier platform.
The nuance is that digital asset exchanges differ from traditional ones in regulation, custody and risk. Assets held on an exchange can be exposed to platform failures, hacking or regulatory changes, and prices can differ between venues.
Finance teams dealing with such trades need clear records of dates, quantities, prices and fees.
In practice
Real-world examples.
Example
An active trader wanted to buy bitcoin at a specific price and placed a limit order on GDAX. The order sat in the book until the market reached her price, and it was filled as a maker order with a lower fee. She saved money compared with buying instantly.
Example
A small fund moved its digital asset purchases from a retail app to GDAX to cut costs on large trades. The fund's analyst compared the fees across both platforms for a month. The savings were enough to justify the extra effort.
Example
An accountant preparing a client's tax records finds trades labelled GDAX in a spreadsheet from several years earlier. She traces them to the Coinbase platform and uses the transaction history to calculate gains and losses. She keeps a note of the platform's later name changes so that the records stay consistent with the exchange's own statements.
Formula
Calculation
Trading fee = trade value x fee rate
Total cost of a purchase = trade value + trading fee
Suppose a trader buys $10,000 of a digital asset using a taker order, and the fee rate is 0.30%. Trading fee = 10,000 x 0.0030 = $30, and the total cost = 10,000 + 30 = $10,030. If the same trade had been a maker order at a fee rate of 0.10%, the fee would be 10,000 x 0.0010 = $10, which is $20 cheaper. The fee rates in this example are assumptions chosen for illustration.Case study
Seen in the real world.
Copperfield Ventures is an illustrative, fictional investment club that began buying digital assets through a simple retail app. As its purchases grew to tens of thousands of dollars each month, the treasurer noticed the fees were taking a large share of its returns.
The treasurer researched alternatives and moved the club's purchases to a professional exchange platform of the GDAX type. She trained two members to place limit orders and set a rule that every trade needed a second person's approval.
In the illustrative outcome, annual fees fell by roughly 40%. The club also gained a clearer record of every trade, which made its year-end accounts and tax reporting much simpler. Members agreed that the savings paid for the time spent learning the new platform.
Watch out
Common mistakes.
- Treating GDAX as a current product, when it was renamed Coinbase Pro and later replaced by newer services.
- Using market orders for large trades and accepting a poor price, when a limit order could have controlled the cost.
- Forgetting to record fees, dates and prices, which are needed for accurate accounts and tax reporting.
Questions
People also ask.
What does GDAX stand for?
It stands for Global Digital Asset Exchange.
What happened to GDAX?
It was renamed Coinbase Pro in 2018, and that product was later phased out in favour of newer Coinbase trading tools. Account histories were generally carried across, but users should keep their own copies of old statements.
What is the difference between maker and taker fees?
Makers add orders to the book and often pay lower fees, while takers remove existing orders and usually pay more.
From the founder's library
Take it further with the book.
Build your financial confidence beyond this definition. Shihan's full-length guide, Accounting Fundamentals, takes the same plain-English approach and turns it into a complete, practical playbook for non-finance managers, business owners and students - with chapter-end quiz answers and presentation slides included.
25% off with code MMHQ25, applied at checkout. Priced in USD - checkout may show the equivalent in your local currency.
View the book and save 25%Related