Digital currency; Getting started.

[2530Ubon]

So I've been looking at getting started in digital currencies as they seem to be taking off. I've done a lot of reading but I still wouldn't consider myself anywhere near enough informed to begin.

 

So my question is, how do you get started? I think Bitcoin is pretty much impossible to mine, but what other currency options are there? Do people still mine themselves, invest in a lot of equipment, hire cloud mining services, or do people purchase and sell?

 

Any suggested reading would be great too. Thanks or your replies!

[1FinickyOne]

4 minutes ago, 2530Ubon said:

I think Bitcoin is pretty much impossible to mine, but what other currency options are there?

I am looking forward to some answers too...

 

Wondering if there is an ETF or something easily bought and sold on the open market... 

[KannikaP]

Simply go to say Coins.co.th. Deposit some THB, buy Bitcoin. Watch it regularly/constantly and when it is up in value decide whether or not to sell or keep, or down in value...buy some more.

Now which numbers shall I choose for next week's lottery?   LOL

 

Edited February 9, 2021 by KannikaP

[Barnabe]

Forget mining, you’ll require a lot more knowledge to jump into it.

 

The recommended way is to buy coins off some exchange like BitKub, Binance, Coinbase, etc. Keep them in the exchange wallet (NOT recommended for BitKub) or in your own wallet and buy / sell as you wish.

 

If you’re looking for off the shelf financial products, look for Grayscale Trust in your broker.

Another option is to buy MicroStrategy stock, they own so much Bitcoin that they have become a proxy for it.

 

I don’t recommend the off the shelf approach, you’ll be paying a premium and won’t have full ownership of your coins.

[2530Ubon]

7 minutes ago, Barnabe said:

Forget mining, you’ll require a lot more knowledge to jump into it.

 

Thanks for your reply.

 

I'm happy to learn, and have a fair knowledge of IT systems - mining is attractive as the electricity rates here are so low and doesn't require so much upfront investment when considering the price of bitcoins right now!

 

Definitely not looking for off the shelf, hoping to dive in myself!

[Barnabe]

Another point: if you’re serious about investing (not gambling) then make sure you don’t buy any coin besides Bitcoin and Ethereum. 
 

Many of the current crop of coins will die a painful death. There will be some survivors but it’s a toss up at this point. Bitcoin and Ethereum will survive.

[Barnabe]

2 minutes ago, 2530Ubon said:

Thanks for your reply.

 

I'm happy to learn, and have a fair knowledge of IT systems - mining is attractive as the electricity rates here are so low and doesn't require so much upfront investment when considering the price of bitcoins right now!

 

Definitely not looking for off the shelf, hoping to dive in myself!

If that’s the case then you’ll find plenty of materials online on how to mine. At the moment only ETH is worth it at Thai electricity rates.

 

However unless you already own several powerful nvidia cards you won’t be able to buy them right now, as all the miners have pushed their prices so high that you won’t make a profit for a year or longer.

[2530Ubon]

Any thoughts on Dogecoin? I know it started as a meme, but it's shot up in value and may be worth mining - Elon Musk gave it a big boost 2 days ago and it's been reported that it could hit 1 coin = 1 USD by the end of this year.

[Jack Hna]

Maybe a good thing to discuss would be all the different types of crypto.

 

On these crypto review sites they use this example of metric info on each crypto:

 

Ticker: STG

Available for token sale:12000000

Token type:Native New Blockchain

Private-sale/pre-sale token price:/

Accepts:BTC, USDTPrivate-sale/pre-sale bonus:no info/ no info

Prototype:YESPre-sale min/max personal cap:

Team:10 personsCrowd-sale token price:0.025 USD

Team residence:GlobalCrowd-sale min/max personal cap:200 USD (8000 STG) / 200 USD (8000 STG)

Company residence:Switzerland

 

Seems like some cryptos piggy back on bigger cryptos, seems like some are even more anonymous than others and like any emerging markets, new players will definitely come and go.

 

 

 

[fdsa]

1 hour ago, 2530Ubon said:

 do people purchase and sell?

this.

You are quite late for mining :)

 

58 minutes ago, Barnabe said:

Another point: if you’re serious about investing (not gambling) then make sure you don’t buy any coin besides Bitcoin and Ethereum. 
 

Many of the current crop of coins will die a painful death. There will be some survivors but it’s a toss up at this point. Bitcoin and Ethereum will survive.

arguable considering the current environmental hysteria.

Mining Proof-of-Work coins waste so much electricity that I believe in the future the Proof-of-Stakes coins will prevail.

Despite you are too late for staking the mainstream PoS coins such as DASH (it will require $100k investment) you could take a look at ETH 2.0 stacking which will require "just" 32 Ethereum (mere $50k )

Also there is masternode sharing, where people invest a part of total cost and receive a part of staking reward.

google:// proof of stake coins

google:// masternode coins

 

[Barnabe]

What is not arguable is that most of these coins will disappear, with the last bag holders taking the losses.

 

BTC and ETH are going nowhere for at least a decade,. The rest, who knows, but some 50 to 90% will disappear.

 

Obviously the ones which survive will make their owners a lot of money, but at this point picking one is gambling. As long you’re not deluded about that, I see no problem with it. 
 

You’ll find people peddling all kinds of <deleted>coins for millions of “technical” and emotional reasons. It’s still a casino, don’t buy the FUD.

[fdsa]

53 minutes ago, Barnabe said:

What is not arguable is that most of these coins will disappear, with the last bag holders taking the losses.

and new <deleted>coins will appear

Just don't be that last holder and dump when <deleted> seems to hit the fan. And do not underestimate the amount of fools and spare money in the world :)

[Jack Hna]

I like a few of the newer ones not yet available for purchase. Truly anonymous one and a really small file size one. 

[malathione]

Sign up with a broker, fund your account, buy the inevitable dips. Transfer to your own wallet. Don't leave your holdings with the broker. I've used Bitkub in the past and it's been easy enough.

[Dazinoz]

Mining started out easy, an average PC could do it. Mining requires high power graphic processing units (GPU) not CPUs. I have a friend who mined over 50 BTC in the early days. No idea how many he has now. Miners only get paid if their "rig" solves a blockchain transaction first. The faster the mining equipment the better the chance of being first and thus rewarded. Initially the reward was 50BTC. Around every 4 years that halves. Last year in May was the third halving so now the rewards is only 6.25BTC. Specialised mining rigs were needed and consume a considerable amount of power. Even then you needed a pool with a lot of mining capacity to solve the transaction and then share the reward between pool members. I looked into buying a mining rig last year more for interest as a guy had 2 for sale. I got the specs of the rig and entered the info in a website and it came back with it was going to cost me more in power than what I would get in rewards. That was when BTC was around $10,000. Could be more viable now but doubt it. The guy who was selling the rigs was upgrading to more powerful ones. Spoke to him recently and he is out of mining since last halving and he has a sizeable solar system to make it cheaper.

 

So in short forget mining.

 

As far as what coins to buy.....who knows? Everyone will give their recommendations. Just need to do your home work.

 

I only have 3 different coins. I bought 100,000 ADA/Cardano at $0.15 AUD last year. Today they hit $1.00+. So if I sold today and nice profit of $85,000 in just over a year. But I will hang on as they are improving their system and many many people predicting $3 to $5usd this bull run. But again its all crystal ball stuff with some analysis thrown in.

 

I use an exchange in Australia as that is where my bank accounts are kept. I don't particularly trust exchanges for the fear of hacking so my BTC is stored on a hardware wallet. My Cardano is on a more secure software wallet that earns interest in the coin itself. I have earned over 2000 ADA in just over 5 months so at a $1 each not bad interest. Yes and, before anyone says it, it can be hacked but is dedicated to ADA alone unlike exchanges so more is devoted to security.

 

So get into and have a bit of fun and never invest any more than you can afford to lose. I should listen to my own words and get out now, but.........

 

Good luck.

[Dazinoz]

Oh, and on cloud mining. BE VERY CAREFUL. A typical scam avenue. I should know I lost $680aud on one.

[rwill]

On 2/8/2021 at 9:31 PM, 2530Ubon said:

Any thoughts on Dogecoin? I know it started as a meme, but it's shot up in value and may be worth mining - Elon Musk gave it a big boost 2 days ago and it's been reported that it could hit 1 coin = 1 USD by the end of this year.

Doge is like buying Gamestop to run the price up before it goes bankrupt.  Doge has no utility.  It was made as a joke.  A block completes in 1 minute and there is no limit to how many can be made.

[rwill]

On 2/8/2021 at 8:27 PM, 2530Ubon said:

So I've been looking at getting started in digital currencies as they seem to be taking off. I've done a lot of reading but I still wouldn't consider myself anywhere near enough informed to begin.

 

So my question is, how do you get started? I think Bitcoin is pretty much impossible to mine, but what other currency options are there? Do people still mine themselves, invest in a lot of equipment, hire cloud mining services, or do people purchase and sell?

 

Any suggested reading would be great too. Thanks or your replies!

You can buy Bitcoin still.  You don't have to buy a whole one.  You can purchase $10 worth if you want too.

[Antiparovian]

You've definitely come to the best place for advice. Everyone on Thai Visa is a Bitcoin Billionaire, not a single loser.....

[Dazinoz]

4 minutes ago, Antiparovian said:

You've definitely come to the best place for advice. Everyone on Thai Visa is a Bitcoin Billionaire, not a single loser.....

Sometimes people can help from experience like my post. I don't claim to be an expert and definitely not an expert. Just offering my experience.

 

Why bother having the forums if thats your opinion of posts? Yes some people offer stupid advise like one have just replied to someone in another thread but sometimes people can offer good insight. 

 

So I ask why are YOU here?

[karunasup]

if you want more info..can send you. If American not easy to open account in Thailand.

Good luck

Info on Bitcoin Dec 2020.docx

[Pushbiker]

VanEck Vectors Bitcoin ETN

ISIN: DE000A28M8D0 | WKN: A28M8D

[Dazinoz]

2 minutes ago, Pushbiker said:

VanEck Vectors Bitcoin ETN

ISIN: DE000A28M8D0 | WKN: A28M8D

The OP is a newbie investor in crypto. I doubt if he knows what you posted. I sure don't.

 

[rwill]

1 hour ago, Antiparovian said:

You've definitely come to the best place for advice. Everyone on Thai Visa is a Bitcoin Billionaire, not a single loser.....

Lol.  Not even close here.  But I do hope to make a million or 2 on crypto.  So far I have invested around 12K and it is currently worth 85K.  Mostly in altcoins, not bitcoin.

[seancbk]

On 2/9/2021 at 11:59 AM, 2530Ubon said:

Thanks for your reply.

 

I'm happy to learn, and have a fair knowledge of IT systems - mining is attractive as the electricity rates here are so low and doesn't require so much upfront investment when considering the price of bitcoins right now!

 

Definitely not looking for off the shelf, hoping to dive in myself!

 

Suggest you ask one of your trusted Thai friends to help you read posts in the Thai crypto mining groups on FB.  
Mining Ethereum seems to be the thing now.   One of my Thai colleagues is quite into it, I'll ask him tomorrow for some links you can check out.  

Personally however, I just buy Bitcoin whenever I have some spare cash and plan to hold it for 10-20 years.  I quit drinking over a year ago so all the money I used to spend on booze has gone to that instead.   Never use money you are not willing to throw away.  If I lost it all it would not really matter.

[seancbk]

1 hour ago, Dazinoz said:

The OP is a newbie investor in crypto. I doubt if he knows what you posted. I sure don't.

 

 

Most people know how to use Google.  

[CH1961]

Forget mining? 

With a ordinary 5700 graphic card (15k baht) you still make 6.50 usd/day ????

 

Calculate with your own graphic card (GPU) here you profit ... 

https://www.nicehash.com/profitability-calculator/amd-rx-5700-8gb

[Dazinoz]

9 hours ago, CH1961 said:

Forget mining? 

With a ordinary 5700 graphic card (15k baht) you still make 6.50 usd/day ????

 

Calculate with your own graphic card (GPU) here you profit ... 

https://www.nicehash.com/profitability-calculator/amd-rx-5700-8gb

How come my friend who had 2 specialised high capacity mining rigs with solar power on house to reduce running costs just got out of mining as it was no longer viable? I think I will believe him.

[Dazinoz]

10 hours ago, rwill said:

Lol.  Not even close here.  But I do hope to make a million or 2 on crypto.  So far I have invested around 12K and it is currently worth 85K.  Mostly in altcoins, not bitcoin.

I played around for awhile then settled on 4 coins. When I settled down I had invested roughly $31,000 aud. Today as I type my balance (on paper) is $187,000aud. I have 1 BTC but most of the increase came from Cardano. I bought 100,000 at $0.15aud. Today $1.18aud and has been higher.

[seancbk]

On 2/9/2021 at 11:27 AM, 2530Ubon said:

So I've been looking at getting started in digital currencies as they seem to be taking off. I've done a lot of reading but I still wouldn't consider myself anywhere near enough informed to begin.

 

So my question is, how do you get started? I think Bitcoin is pretty much impossible to mine, but what other currency options are there? Do people still mine themselves, invest in a lot of equipment, hire cloud mining services, or do people purchase and sell?

 

Any suggested reading would be great too. Thanks or your replies!

 

Further to my other reply and mention on Ethereum mining.   You might find this interesting. 

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/rtx-3060-laptop-mining-farms