Almost complete newbie, I need help with BTC

[Ignatius_Reilly]

Yesterday, I logged into an old Exodus account and saw some small transactions I made in the past. When I checked the current value of those transactions, my mind was blown xD

That's why I want to start saving BTC and I have some doubts, let's see if you can help me out.

1. Do you recommend buying a Trezor? What's the difference between a Trezor and a smartphone with a wallet like Exodus? If I use a smartphone exclusively for this purpose, without connecting it to any insecure network or downloading any other app than Exodus, wouldn't it perform the same functions as a Trezor?
2. My idea is to buy a small amount every month, without even checking the current price. Buying about $100-150 every month and leave it there. Any advice I should consider?
3. This is important. Can I buy through Exodus/Moonpay without having to go through any KYC? In the past, I bought there, but I don't know if they've changed it. If yes, any suggestions?

Thanks

 

[ralphnsk]

My 5 cents:

You can go without a hardware wallet at all, especially if you don't need to access that wallet for spending on a regular basis. You can create a new wallet using electrum on an offline machine, backup the seed phrase and then just send funds to your addtress without even connecting that wallet to internet before you need it.

One downside to that though is that with current fees you will be spending a nice chunk of those $100-150 just to cover the transaction fees.

I can suggest another thing, create an offline TRC-20 wallet, register at some exchange that supports BTC TRC-20 token, go through KYC (i don't see this as something bad), buy BTC through p2p and deposit them to the TRC-20 address, this way you'll only have to pay like 0.5 - 0.7 per transaction

Or you can go with BTC over lightning network, the transaction costs will be almost zero, but in that case you'll have to keep your wallet connected when you are about to receive funds.

 

[DavidG1510]

Yesterday, I logged into an old Exodus account and saw some small transactions I made in the past. When I checked the current value of those transactions, my mind was blown xD

That's why I want to start saving BTC and I have some doubts, let's see if you can help me out.

1. Do you recommend buying a Trezor? What's the difference between a Trezor and a smartphone with a wallet like Exodus? If I use a smartphone exclusively for this purpose, without connecting it to any insecure network or downloading any other app than Exodus, wouldn't it perform the same functions as a Trezor?
2. My idea is to buy a small amount every month, without even checking the current price. Buying about $100-150 every month and leave it there. Any advice I should consider?
3. This is important. Can I buy through Exodus/Moonpay without having to go through any KYC? In the past, I bought there, but I don't know if they've changed it. If yes, any suggestions?

Thanks

I do Recommend you will purchase a Trezor, But not in the situation you just wrote. So I will say use a Hot Wallet like Exodus

regarding your idea, There is a problem with that. your purchasing power is very small for it to be moved to a Hot/Cold wallet outside of an exchange.
Bitcoin Transaction fee is expansive and its not something that you should do under 1000$ in my opinion.

You won't be able to purchase Without KYC, if you will buy without kyc the % you will pay with be 20% +.

You better off buy the Bitcoin on the Street for cash with 2-3% commission.

 

[Ignatius_Reilly]

My 5 cents:

You can go without a hardware wallet at all, especially if you don't need to access that wallet for spending on a regular basis. You can create a new wallet using electrum on an offline machine, backup the seed phrase and then just send funds to your addtress without even connecting that wallet to internet before you need it.

One downside to that though is that with current fees you will be spending a nice chunk of those $100-150 just to cover the transaction fees.

I can suggest another thing, create an offline TRC-20 wallet, register at some exchange that supports BTC TRC-20 token, go through KYC (i don't see this as something bad), buy BTC through p2p and deposit them to the TRC-20 address, this way you'll only have to pay like 0.5 - 0.7 per transaction

Or you can go with BTC over lightning network, the transaction costs will be almost zero, but in that case you'll have to keep your wallet connected when you are about to receive funds.

I do Recommend you will purchase a Trezor, But not in the situation you just wrote. So I will say use a Hot Wallet like Exodus

regarding your idea, There is a problem with that. your purchasing power is very small for it to be moved to a Hot/Cold wallet outside of an exchange.
Bitcoin Transaction fee is expansive and its not something that you should do under 1000$ in my opinion.

You won't be able to purchase Without KYC, if you will buy without kyc the % you will pay with be 20% +.

You better off buy the Bitcoin on the Street for cash with 2-3% commission.

Hey, thank you very much to both of you, some things you mentioned I hadn't taken into account (like the fees)

 

[ralphnsk]

You're very welcome.

I fact, for amounts below $1k i would rather not withdraw them from an exchange at all. Or indeed, use some cheaper withdrawal methods (lightning / trc-20)

 

[Juhku]

Do you recommend buying a Trezor?

Trezors are superb. I own 3 - that's how much I like them. Just don't ask why I have so many.

What's the difference between a Trezor and a smartphone with a wallet like Exodus?

Trezor is a cold wallet.
Exodus is a hot wallet - it needs internet connection to function properly.

Any device that is connected to a network is subject to attacks, even if you don't touch it. Just being connected to a network makes any device vulnerable to malicious actors.
A smartphone that is connected to a network that is only used as a crypto wallet is a lot less secure than most would think.

If I use a smartphone exclusively for this purpose, without connecting it to any insecure network or downloading any other app than Exodus, wouldn't it perform the same functions as a Trezor?

No. The above + Trezor also has physical safety.
It's much, much easier to crack into a smartphone than it is to Trezor/other cold wallets.

If you aren't super tech savvy, you also most likely won't know which networks are actually secure.

1. My idea is to buy a small amount every month, without even checking the current price. Buying about $100-150 every month and leave it there. Any advice I should consider?
2. This is important. Can I buy through Exodus/Moonpay without having to go through any KYC? In the past, I bought there, but I don't know if they've changed it. If yes, any suggestions?

The fees there are insane. Not worth it. That's the cost of not doing KYC.

If you absolutely require not doing KYC and plan on buying monthly, you should do your own research and find reputable dark web exchanges/exchangers. They offer the best rates, but be vary that any crypto that has public blockchains and is traded there is very likely to be monitored by government officials.
If you at any point then proceed to make the connection with your identity and the wallet, your name is likely to be placed on 'infamous lists' and you might be further monitored.
If you've fancied yourself a bit of tax evasion or other cyber crime, you'd probably be caught at that point when you get audited by the 3-letter government guys.

Swapping crypto on dark web is not illegal by any means, but they're somewhat highly monitored for obvious reasons.

 

[Ignatius_Reilly]

If you at any point then proceed to make the connection with your identity and the wallet, your name is likely to be placed on 'infamous lists' and you might be further monitored.

Thank you so much for all the information. From everything you've said, I pick up on several interesting points, but this one really catches my attention.

What do you mean? Are you referring to the tax authorities in my country? Is every cryptocurrency holder included in that list, or is it something that only affects those who make very large transactions?

Avoiding KYC is mostly because I don't get along well with the tax authorities, but there's nothing illegal about my income.

 

[Juhku]

Is every cryptocurrency holder included in that list

No.

is it something that only affects those who make very large transactions?

Those who make very large transactions + get transfers from so-called 'blacklisted'/questionable wallets.
Blacklisted/questionable wallets could for example, be middleman wallets for well-known dark web forums, forum admins, dark web services and so on.

Due to the nature of the dark web, well-known entities' wallets are monitored by government agencies for further investigation. That investigation might be a part of a case where they're busting down other sketchy people or are just somehow connected to the operators of questionable wallets.

From a legal authorities' standpoint, it's very interesting to know who is behind a wallet that is receiving monthly payments from a known wallet of sketchy dark web figures.

If you get yourself into this kind of list and being monitored, and you later make the mistake of somehow connecting your real identity to your monitored wallets, the agencies can check your tax information and cross-check if you've some extra money laying in some crypto wallets. At that point, they might report to tax authorities directly if the sum exceeds the line of being worth their time, or you could just be given a phone call/get a small 'interrogation' about why you have received X amount of crypto from known dark web entities/cyber criminals.

Pssst... Monero is king in crypto.

I have to mention that I'm definitely not endorsing crime. I'm just very deeply interested in cyber security and privacy...

 

[Ignatius_Reilly]

I have to mention that I'm definitely not endorsing crime. I'm just very deeply interested in cyber security and privacy...

I see we share a fondness for similar topics

Thank you very much for the extensive response. I knew some things, imagined others, and was unaware of some xD

 

[awesomewebsites]

You should now but Bitcoin when there is 20-30% correction from current prices. Never invest at high prices. Your time of entry in the market will determine your profits to large extent.

 

[10zen]

You should make yourself familiar with bitcoin transaction fees, exchange withdrawal fees. Both are high very high if you want to invest small amounts.

If crypto isn't illegal or prohibited in your country you shouldn't worry too much about kyc, imo. Binance is available in most countries or you can choose any highly reputable crypto exchange. They will have recurring investment option. You can choose how much to buy monthly and forget it.

or you can buy through p2p, but you should also notice how is the exchange rate there. Some have high USD value rate.

Once you have big chunk, then you can transfer out to your hardware wallet.

This was found from comment exodus team from a year ago:
"
In my case, if I were to buy $100 in BTC using a debit card, the transaction fee would be $0.42, and the processing fee would be $3.92. I would receive $95.66 in BTC.

I also used swaps in Exodus years ago and found the exchange rate to be pretty significant. Always seemed like I got way less crypto when swapping vs just setting a few orders on an exchange. Has this function improved price wise? any one using it?

We made some heavy improvements to swaps over the summer. The average fee has been reduced by 50%.
"
So, fee should've changed now and I don't if that also include btc network fee itself.

So, research around, try buying it now and see how much are the fees or just read it on their website.

 

[cTED]

Yesterday, I logged into an old Exodus account and saw some small transactions I made in the past. When I checked the current value of those transactions, my mind was blown xD

That's why I want to start saving BTC and I have some doubts, let's see if you can help me out.

1. Do you recommend buying a Trezor? What's the difference between a Trezor and a smartphone with a wallet like Exodus? If I use a smartphone exclusively for this purpose, without connecting it to any insecure network or downloading any other app than Exodus, wouldn't it perform the same functions as a Trezor?
2. My idea is to buy a small amount every month, without even checking the current price. Buying about $100-150 every month and leave it there. Any advice I should consider?
3. This is important. Can I buy through Exodus/Moonpay without having to go through any KYC? In the past, I bought there, but I don't know if they've changed it. If yes, any suggestions?

Thanks

1. Yes, definitely recommend a hardware (cold) wallet if you’re going to stack BTC long term. The difference between a cold and hot wallet is a cold wallet generates a seed phrase offline, and a wallet like exodus doesn’t.

2. Perfect strategy, DCA and chill. I’ve been doing it for years and it’s been working out great.

3. Almost all platforms are bound to KYC/AML. If you’re looking for non-KYC options you could look into P2P platformschikte Bisq.