I’m in a position where I’m going to fund a forex trading account again. I’ve been dealing with forex for some 13 years but haven’t been live in some time, so I’m trying to wrap my head around the new process of funding an account with crypto. Researching the crypto scene has really been dreadfully confusing and honestly swamp-like, and from everything I have seen so far, ridiculously expensive. It feels like the “wild west” mentality that plagued forex years ago. All I really want to do is buy some Bitcoin (or whatever coin) send it to my broker who will use it to fund my trading account in my base USD currency.
I have an air gapped cold wallet for my personal storage of any crypto I may keep on hand. The issue is I have visited at least 8 or 10 exchanges trying to figure out the most reasonable way to purchase the bitcoin, move it to my personal wallet, and then send it to my broker. It seems the spread prices these exchanges are showing are just insane, like it’s going to cost me $150 to $200+ in spread fees to purchase $4k in bitcoin, to me that’s ridiculous. I have bitcoin on a demo chart so I see the current price, yet the bid and ask prices on these exchanges are way out of line. I have opened accounts with bitFlyer and Uphold so far, to try and get a look at the inner workings, though I have not funded either account yet. I’ve also looked at all the major players. There’s a growing dislike for Coinbase even though they are by far the most commonly used, with most explanations or tutorials using them as the example. I’m not really interested in a “trading” platform, if I decide to actually trade crypto I’ll do it with my broker, I just need a simple exchange where I can buy bitcoin from my bank account with USD.
This is really frustrating, for a concept whose purpose, I thought, was suppose to be to avoid the fees and restraints imposed by the banks. Apart from interest on a loan, I have never seen fees or costs at this level when dealing with a bank, so I’m left wondering what I’m doing wrong.
If you folks could steer me in the right direction, or either confirm that this is what it costs to buy and move crypto, I would surely appreciate it, I’m really at a roadblock trying to choose an exchange that’s not going to beat me over the head with fees, time delays, and other costs that erase 20 to 40% of your money.
Thanks for the help…