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Article Summary
Learn how River sets its bitcoin exchange rate using multiple U.S. exchanges and why a small spread is applied.
River sources conversion rates from different U.S. exchanges, aggregators, and over-the-counter desks, combining their prices to set our bitcoin rate. Each of our liquidity providers can periodically advertise different prices on their respective platforms.
Since River is a brokerage, you are buying and selling bitcoin directly with River. As a result, River charges a small spread to mitigate our risk due to the price volatility of bitcoin and any slippage. Slippage means that the quoted buy price or sell price differs from the bitcoin price seen on the price chart.