ZG.TOP Crypto Exchange Review: Why It Shut Down and What You Should Know

If you're searching for a crypto exchange to use today, you might stumble across mentions of ZG.TOP-but you won't find it online. Not because it's down for maintenance, but because it's gone for good. ZG.TOP was a cryptocurrency exchange that operated from 2015 until early 2020, and today, its website doesn't load. The domain is inactive. There’s no customer support. No app. No trading. Just a digital ghost.

What Was ZG.TOP?

ZG.TOP was a centralized crypto-to-crypto exchange based in Mongolia. Unlike big names like Binance or Coinbase, it didn’t let you buy crypto with dollars, euros, or any fiat currency. You had to already own Bitcoin, Ethereum, or another digital asset to even start trading. That alone made it a niche platform-useful only for people who already had crypto and wanted to swap between coins.

Its main selling point was a strange fee structure: buyers paid 0% in trading fees. Sellers paid 0.20%. That’s the opposite of how almost every other exchange works. Normally, both sides pay something, or fees are split between makers and takers. ZG.TOP flipped that. On paper, it sounded great for buyers. But in practice, it backfired.

Why the Fee Structure Backfired

When buyers pay nothing, sellers are left carrying the entire cost. That creates an imbalance. Professional traders and market makers-who move large amounts of crypto to keep prices stable-avoided ZG.TOP. Why? Because they couldn’t make money there. If you’re trying to profit by buying low and selling high, you don’t want to be the only one paying fees.

As a result, liquidity dried up. Fewer sellers meant fewer trades. Less trading meant prices jumped around more with every order. Slippage became a real problem. If you tried to sell even a small amount of Bitcoin, the price might drop halfway through your trade because there weren’t enough buyers.

By March 2020, daily trading volume had dropped from $1.6 million to $1.24 million. Compare that to Binance, which was doing over $1.5 billion in volume the same month. ZG.TOP was barely 0.1% of Binance’s activity. That’s not a small exchange-it’s an irrelevant one.

Withdrawal Fees That Hurt Users

The fees didn’t stop at trading. Withdrawing crypto from ZG.TOP cost 0.50% of the amount you sent out, plus the normal blockchain network fee. So if you withdrew $100 worth of Ethereum, you paid $0.50 just to get it out. That’s unusual. Most exchanges charge a flat fee-like $1 or $2-no matter how much you withdraw.

For small withdrawals, this made things worse. If you sent out $50, you paid $0.25 in fees. That’s 0.5%-but if the network fee was $3, you ended up paying more in fees than you were withdrawing. Users reported frustration. One Reddit user said his BTC withdrawal took five days and cost him more than the network fee alone. Another said customer support took two weeks to respond.

Security and Transparency Issues

ZG.TOP never published details about its security. No audits. No proof of reserves. No public documentation on whether they used cold storage or two-factor authentication. That’s not normal for any exchange, even small ones. Reputable platforms, even obscure ones, share at least basic security info to build trust.

Security researchers from CipherTrace noted ZG.TOP never appeared in any exchange audit reports. That’s a red flag. If you’re holding crypto on an exchange, you need to trust that your assets are safe. With ZG.TOP, there was no way to verify that.

User Experience Was Poor

The platform had a basic web interface. You could place limit and market orders. That’s it. No stop-losses. No margin trading. No advanced charting tools. It was like using a 2014-era trading site.

Support was limited to a ticket system. Users reported waiting 72 to 96 hours for replies. No live chat. No phone number. No email address you could actually reach. When things went wrong-and they did-there was no way to get help fast.

Trustpilot reviews (before the site went down) showed a 1.8 out of 5 rating based on 17 reviews. The most common complaints? Withdrawal delays, unresponsive support, and surprise fees.

Why It Couldn’t Survive

ZG.TOP was never going to compete with global exchanges. It didn’t have fiat on-ramps, so it couldn’t attract new users. It didn’t have enough volume to keep experienced traders interested. It didn’t have clear regulation or a solid legal base. Mongolia didn’t have crypto laws in place during ZG.TOP’s operation, so there was no legal framework to protect users or the exchange itself.

By late 2019, the crypto market was consolidating. Exchanges with low volume were shutting down. Around 45 exchanges vanished between January and March 2020. ZG.TOP was one of them.

Its shutdown wasn’t sudden. It was inevitable. The numbers didn’t lie. Volume was falling. Users were leaving. Fees were scaring off traders. There was no path forward.

Is ZG.COM the Same Thing?

You might see ZG.COM pop up in search results. It’s active today. But it has nothing to do with ZG.TOP. ZG.COM launched in 2018, is based in Singapore and Taiwan, and operates legally under different ownership. The names are similar, but that’s it. Don’t confuse the two. ZG.COM is a functioning exchange. ZG.TOP is dead.

What You Can Learn From ZG.TOP

ZG.TOP isn’t just a footnote-it’s a lesson. Here’s what to watch for when choosing any crypto exchange:

• Check liquidity. If daily volume is under $10 million, avoid it unless you’re trading tiny amounts.
• Watch the fee structure. If buyers pay nothing and sellers pay everything, expect low volume and bad prices.
• Look for transparency. Does the exchange publish security audits? Do they show proof of reserves?
• Test support. Try submitting a support ticket before depositing funds. See how long it takes to get a reply.
• Avoid exchanges without fiat on-ramps. If you can’t buy crypto with your bank card or wire transfer, you’re making your life harder.

Current Status: Completely Dead

As of December 2025, zgtop.com is inactive. The domain is unregistered. WHOIS records show no owner. No one is maintaining the site. No one is responding to emails. No one is recovering funds.

Former users have no recourse. There’s no legal entity to sue. No customer service line to call. No recovery process. The money is gone.

ZG.TOP is now a textbook example of how not to run a crypto exchange. It had a clever idea (free trading for buyers), but it ignored the fundamentals: liquidity, trust, and sustainability.

If you're looking for a crypto exchange today, skip ZG.TOP. It doesn’t exist. But learn from its mistakes. Choose platforms with real volume, clear fees, public audits, and responsive support. The crypto world has plenty of good options. You don’t need to risk your assets on a ghost.