do we have any other options? btc-e's descendent, wex was an option for a while, but they shut down withdrawals for everything but XMR and USDT. not sure if they were hacked or what, but they've been silent about the whole thing. there's bisq, which i like, but there's not many people using it.
i'm certainly looking forward to the day when a DEX can replace these things, but it seems like we're still years away.
Yes. Unfortunately, centralized exchanges continue to dominate the cryptocurrency ecosystem, despite that crypto was created to eliminate the middleman after all. Day by day, centralized exchanges are becoming worst as they require KYC to do nearly anything on them. As for Shapeshift, it was a good exchange for quickly trading a cryptocurrency to another without the need to create an account, making it completely anonymous. However, once they've implemented KYC, they've turned out to become like any other centralized exchange, IMO.
Nevertheless, the only options right now are decentralized exchanges like Bitshares, CryptoBridge, Bisq, and Waves DEX. They may not have the same amount of liquidity as centralized exchanges, but they're still the best bet when it comes to anonymity and privacy. Hopefully, they could continue to advance in terms of development and mainstream adoption, as people become interested in privacy and security.
As for me, I'll just use VPN + Tor to access the Bisq decentralized exchange for some of my crypto trades. Exchanging Bitcoin to Monero would be the most ideal option right now, especially since Bitcoin lacks privacy.