The crypto thread

[warpus]

Don't take my posts as personal criticism, as I will never tell somebody what to do with their own money (as long as it's legal or whatever). It's more of a hope that somebody will read my post and one day might end up in a situation where they are investing in something like this.. and don't end up investing in a coin just because it is low in value right now (not saying that is what you are doing). It's tempting to look at all the zeroes and think: "Hmm imagine if I bought 2 million of these and the price went to $1". But that's just not how it works, so it's an important lesson to learn, IMO.

 

[RobAnybody]

Don't take my posts as personal criticism, as I will never tell somebody what to do with their own money (as long as it's legal or whatever).

Oh, no worries on that front. We are having a friendly discussion (I peruse this forum much, much more often than I post, & I like you as a poster - it's actually fun to have a discussion with you).

It's more of a hope that somebody will read my post and one day might end up in a situation where they are investing in something like this.. and don't end up investing in a coin just because it is low in value right now

OMG, I hope you don't think I'm advocating for, like, anyone, anywhere, investing in crypto, like, at all, much less following my path. Literally all I'm doing is saying that if someone has disposable income, this is something they can throw it into. I've said many times, this is Beanie Babies, or it could be comic books, or baseball cards. I'm not advising anyone to do this.

Just saying what I'm doing. Someone who has money to play with, AND has money to lose if it all goes *poof* tomorrow. This is *my approach*. I honestly think we are saying the same thing. I appreciate your perspective. I'm just *in*, & saying what I'm doing.

EDIT: I've said this in probably every other, maybe third or fourth post, but DON'T invest anything in crypto THAT YOU CAN'T AFFORD TO LOSE. (I don't know how much I can stress that - I'm playing with disposable income)

 

[warpus]

I wouldn't have said you were advocating for it, but it seemed important to add some context for people reading. Maybe I shouldn't stick my nose in it either, but I just happen to have learned a bunch of stuff about this, and it seemed to be worth pointing out those details

To maybe explain a bit better by what I meant.. Something worth $200 can increase in value by 4,000% just as easily as something worth $0.002. The nature of potential future growth is not dependent on the price (alone). It's counter-intuitive and it leads to a lot of people seeking out tokens worth very little. It can mean that a project is early, but there are other things it can mean too. And being early is usually more risky anyway. So either way the price by itself doesn't help at all.

Having said that, if my goddaughter's dog-themed coin add a bunch of zeroes in 15 years time there will be a big party

 

[RobAnybody]

Oh, no, stick your nose in it! I'm pushing one POV, & you are pushing the other (although not really - we are both saying "temper your expectations", I think). I'm hyping the *upside*, you are pointing out the realistic side. We are on the same page.

EDIT: All I'm pushing is if someone who is not your goddaughter wants to get in on this, I'm just saying what that person might wanna gamble, literally gamble, on.

 

[warpus]

I read that some guy wrote a script to report on new coins that have just appeared on an exchange he uses. He'd then throw whatever small amount of money ($20? $50?) at each one of them "just in case", before others really got a chance to invest (on that particular exchange). I forget the exact numbers, but most of these ended up fizzing out and not amounting to much, at least in the timespan of a couple months.. but a small handful would blow up and yield decent profits.

That's an interesting strategy, but from what I understand many newly created coins have an IDO where early investors are able to get in at a supposedly cheaper price (it doesn't always work out that way). So by the time a coin hits a centralized exchange they are usually established to some degree.. just might not be that mainstream yet.

It seemed to be working for him and he wasn't throwing a ton of money at it anyway. So.. maybe some food for thought. I can't find his post again though. You'd think that if it was wildly successful more people would do that sort of thing though.

 

[Kyriakos]

It seems that those sites (like coinbase) need actual ID, not just something like email/paypal. I think that if one is so committed to the point of sending such documents, they should at least have studied the market a bit.
Is it only for trading e-coin, or can you get involved in riskier stuff like insurance for other people's loss? (I doubt the latter can happen)

 

[Samson]

It seems that those sites (like coinbase) need actual ID, not just something like email/paypal. I think that if one is so committed to the point of sending such documents, they should at least have studied the market a bit.
Is it only for trading e-coin, or can you get involved in riskier stuff like insurance for other people's loss? (I doubt the latter can happen)

Poloniex needs only an email address, and accepts free ones.

 

[Kyriakos]

Poloniex needs only an email address, and accepts free ones.

Ok, maybe I will become a Shiba millionaire.

Edit: no, it seems that there is a minimum buying price of $50 (before fees). Moreover it apparently doesn't accept paypal and only works with (bank) credit/debit cards or something called ApplePay, and there's also a disclaimer that down the line you may still be asked to provide ID. Not very inviting at all, last thing I need is to link my actual bank account to an online stock market, thanks.

 

[warpus]

Look up what people in your own country are doing. Here in Canada for instance we have something known as e-transfer. Every Canadian who has an account at a Canadian bank can make use of this free service to e-mail money to any other person who has a Canadian bank account. Apparently there is nothing like this in the U.S. so things are different there.

Anyway, my point is that there are Canadian-specific exchanges that allow you to purchase bitcoin, ethereum, and other blockchain coins and tokens. They are targeted at Canadians, so they allow you to e-transfer money right from your Canadian bank account into their exchange (for free). Canadians are currently unable to deposit money into American exchanges (like binance or what have you) because they do not support e-transfer (or didn't last time I checked). And the American-centric methods they do allow do not seem to be compatible with Canadian banks.

In the U.S. you are also able to use your credit card to buy crypto. In Canada this is basically banned. Canadian Credit cards will block your transactions when you try to do that. Some people have reported that they were able to get their transactions to go through with very specific credit cards, but most people report that it's pretty much locked down. Maybe in Greece you could use your CC though? Worth looking into.

Greece is a smaller market than Canada, but it's worth looking into if there is something that's Greek or EU specific that works better with the type of bank you might have your money in. A lot of exchanges are built around American needs in mind, and America is a weird place. For instance, requirements to sign up and get started on American sites seem to be really lax. It seems that I could easily set up my dog to buy dogecoin, even though I don't even have a dog. Here in Canada you have to jump through a bunch of hoops to prove that you are who you claim you are. You have to photograph your passport or some other ID and provide other documentation. It can take over a week to get access. It sounds cumbersome, but I appreciate the added layers of security.

What some people seem to do is move their hard earned money to such an exchange and then withdraw their ethereum or bitcoin (or whatever) to a personal wallet and/or to other exchanges. Canadian exchanges will charge you about $35 canadian for that privilege. Depositing or withdrawing your money is free though. There are also usually fees involved when you trade, but on some exchanges they are very minimal. If you can find a good decentralized exchange running on the polygon network (that has the coins you want), then you will be paying pennies for every transaction. Centralized exchanges will often charge overhead costs when you trade or buy (or sell).

Back when I was doing research, KuCoin seemed like a decent centralized exchange with very low fees and seemingly solid enough security. Do your own research though. This company is headquartered in Singapore. Which doesn't mean anything by itself, but FYI

 

[Samson]

Ok, maybe I will become a Shiba millionaire.

Edit: no, it seems that there is a minimum buying price of $50 (before fees). Moreover it apparently doesn't accept paypal and only works with (bank) credit/debit cards or something called ApplePay, and there's also a disclaimer that down the line you may still be asked to provide ID. Not very inviting at all, last thing I need is to link my actual bank account to an online stock market, thanks.

The way I do it is buy bitcoin at the big KYC exchanges (eg. coinbase.com) and then transfer it an more anonymous exchange such as polinex or bisq. If you really want to be anonymous, you then convert bitcoin to monero, transfer the monero to one wallet, then transfer from that to a wallet that you only access over tor (if you use tails you do not need to think about it). You can then transfer from that to another account on an exchange and do what you want (over tor).

 

[warpus]

You should also be aware of how your country taxes such investments. In Canada crypto gains are taxed the same way as stock gains, from what I understand. Essentially, every single trade where you make money is a taxable event. So if you buy some Bitcoin and 5 months from now it's worth double.. and you trade half your bitcoin for a warpuscoin.. Then you will be taxed on your gains. So basically.. Let's say you bought $10 worth of bitcoin and 6 months later it's worth $20. You sell half and invest it in something else, so you now have $10 of bitcoin and $10 of warpuscoin. The act of you selling that $10 worth of bitcoin is a taxable event since it represents you realizing some gains. IIRC in Canada you'd be taxed on 50% of your gains, at the usual tax bracket that looks at your income. But if you wait over a year before selling then it's considered a long-term investment and you are only ever taxed 10% on 50% of your gains. Or something like that.

It's tempting to think that you only need to pay taxes on money you end up pulling out of the system and converting back into "real" money. But that's not how it works, at least here in North America. It's important to look up your own country's tax laws to see how these trades would impact you.

Depending on how competent your country's tax collectors are, it might or might not be a good idea to attempt to hide your profits, as a way to not pay taxes on them.

In some countries you do not have to pay any taxes on crypto gains, so maybe Greece is like that. I doubt it, but it's worth checking and definitely worth looking up your local tax laws as they apply to you. The worst thing you can do is have fun trading and then be slapped with a crazy tax bill at tax time.

 

[Kyriakos]

I don't think it's for me.

 

[Drakle]

Australia's CommBank is now officially holding and trading Crypto. So stupid.

I think all Crypto Currencies should be banned. It's environmentally destructive, it helps criminals money launder, ransomware and other crimes and the small number of people who get super rich from the pyramid scheme (that is what it is) are generally obnoxious idiots. And the most devoted cultists for it, are even dumber and more annoying than the ones who actually make money.

 

[Samson]

Australia's CommBank is now officially holding and trading Crypto. So stupid.

I think all Crypto Currencies should be banned. It's environmentally destructive, it helps criminals money launder, ransomware and other crimes and the small number of people who get super rich from the pyramid scheme (that is what it is) are generally obnoxious idiots. And the most devoted cultists for it, are even dumber and more annoying than the ones who actually make money.

If the revolution comes after TPTB manage to get rid of physical money it will become very important, but I expect your wish will come true and they will criminalise it.

Proof of work is very environmentally destructive, proof of stake should not be.

 

[warpus]

I don't think it's for me.

I knew you'd never be stupid enough to invest in something as silly sounding as a warpuscoin

Australia's CommBank is now officially holding and trading Crypto. So stupid.

I think all Crypto Currencies should be banned. It's environmentally destructive, it helps criminals money launder, ransomware and other crimes and the small number of people who get super rich from the pyramid scheme (that is what it is) are generally obnoxious idiots. And the most devoted cultists for it, are even dumber and more annoying than the ones who actually make money.

Tell us how you really feel

 

[Kyriakos]

I knew you'd never be stupid enough to invest in something as silly sounding as a warpuscoin

I'm sure there are worse-sounding e-coins than warpuscoin.

 

[El_Machinae]

It kinda shows how stupid tax codes are if they count crypto as capital investments for tax purposes.

 

[Kyriakos]

Greece is (not very surprisingly, but it's not like it's the citizens' fault) not very favored in e-commerce. For example, game assets market sites will tax you to hell (Itch, combined with country tax automatically removed - that's a first - and other services applied, will take away an incredibly ridiculous 65% of what you earn, so it's meaningless for me to sell there), and many (or all?) of the crowdfund sites don't allow you to start a fundraiser if you are from this gau.
Patreon is better, but it's not like I have a large patreon site. I think that takes away something like 30-40%.

 

[warpus]

It kinda shows how stupid tax codes are if they count crypto as capital investments for tax purposes.

I bet it's set up this way (in many countries), because the old farts that run our countries just haven't had time to catch up with the tech. So they took what was already in place and slapped it on this, so that at least they had something.

One "trick" is to on purpose sell a token for a loss, so that you get negative gains errr aka losses. You can write those off, in some capacity, but from what I understand American taxpayers are very limited in how they can make use of this. In Canada we are more flexible. So by that I mean - if you bought a warpuscoin last year and unfortunately it's 50% of the price right now.. You could sell your holdings and buy them back right away, basically only losing a small amount for the gas or other fees. In the end you will have almost exactly as many warpuscoins as before, but on paper you would have incurred a loss, which you can take advantage of at tax time.

This "trick" is illegal when you're trading stocks (from what I understand), but it is allowed when trading blockchain tech coins and tokens. I suspect this is because the laws have not yet caught up with the technology, but I'm not really sure.

 

[El_Machinae]

Yeah, it's stupid that a tax incentive that's supposed to encourage capital investment is actually subsidizing purchasing a nothing that was produced elsewhere. Unless you successfully milk the Greater Fool, these purchases merely encourage economic growth elsewhere. GPU producers rejoice, I guess. I found it interesting that China banned it, since it was basically a way for US stimulus dollars to stimulate the Chinese high-tech industry.

You're probably right about that tax trick being illegal in Canada. I know that we swap out our losers at the end of the year to buy a similar stock in the same sector (in order to actualize loses), but that's not the exact same thing as selling it and then rebuying it. Of course, if your crypto is held in a TFSA-eligible instrument, it doesn't matter.