Make Crypto Trading Easy-as-Pie — at the Click of a Mouse
The main way most investors buy and sell crypto is via a crypto-currency exchange (like Coinbase, Binance or Kraken).
Recently, however, payment-service companies have been adding "buying and selling crypto" to their menu of services.
As such, they bring to the table some benefits that crypto currency exchanges rarely, if ever, offer. Imagine a Paypal account you could also use to buy and sell crypto — that’s the basic idea.
Among crypto-enabled payment-services platforms, one of the easiest-to-use is: Uphold.com. It allows you to:
• Buy, sell and trade Bitcoin (BTC, Tech/Adoption Grade “A”), Ethereum (ETH, Tech/Adoption Grade “A”) and 32 other cryptos — including popular stablecoins like USD Coin, DAI, and Tether.
• Buy, sell and trade virtual gold, silver, platinum or palladium. In addition to Bitcoin, precious metals are also desirable stores of value in a world where flagrant money-printing runs wild.
• Buy, sell and trade U.S. dollars, Canadian dollars, Euros and two dozen other fiat currencies.
• Transfer cryptos, precious metals or fiat currencies held in your account to any of Uphold's other 1.7 million account holders for free. Plus, the assets you send arrive in minutes.
• Link your bank and Uphold accounts so you can directly transfer money back and forth. And also spend the wealth you accumulate in your Uphold account using a virtual debit Mastercard. The latter option makes buying crypto assets as easy as shopping on Amazon or eBay. Sadly, though, its currently only available for U.S. citizens.
There are a few other “fine print” details to note should you decide to open an account on Uphold. Namely, the fees.
Miscellaneous Fees
Direct bank transfers: Uphold charges no fees for accepting incoming funds directly from your bank. (However, your bank may charge a wire-transfer or other fee for sending.) To transfer dollars directly from your Uphold account back to your bank, Uphold imposes a $3.99 transaction fee. Also: at present, Uphold can only link to U.S. and Euro-zone country banks.
Trading fees: When exchanging fiat for crypto, the trading fee is 1.05%. Fees can vary from 0.5-1.05% depending on trade volume. Generally speaking, we find Uphold's trading fees neither cheap nor excessive, but pretty much middle-of-the-road.
Withdrawal fees: For fiat withdrawals, fees are incurred in only certain countries. For a complete list of fees, please see this. If you want to transfer crypto out of your Uphold account to some other account, or a personal digital wallet, Uphold charges a $2.99 transaction fee.
Why transfer crypto from Uphold to a personal wallet? Like crypto exchange accounts, your Uphold account is always connected to the Internet. And such accounts have been hacked in the past. We think Uphold has good security, so this risk is small.
But it is not zero. For this reason, it is prudent to use a self-custodial wallet. We spoke about a few such wallets here.
European Alternative to Uphold.com
With roots in California, Uphold.com naturally looked first to the North American market to grow its business. By contrast, London-based Skrill.com is a payment services platform that offers crypto, but largely to Europeans.
Like Uphold, it accepts both individual and business accounts. Skrill has been in business since 2001 and is regulated by Britain's Financial Conduct Authority.
Both Uphold and Skrill provide yet another way investors can access the world of crypto asset trading. And they both have unique benefits not found on traditional cryptocurrency exchanges.
That said, while we at Weiss Cryptocurrency Alert believe these to be good options to get started in the crypto markets, only you can decide if either is right for you.
Just like with our ratings, Weiss Ratings accepts no compensation whatsoever for steering readers to any crypto exchange, payment-services company, website or app developer, digital wallet or any other vendor mentioned in this report. This information is provided purely for educational purposes, not as investment advice.
We can’t give personalized recommendations for which platform you should use to trade crypto. But we can make sure we provide you with the information needed so you can make an informed decision.
Best,
Juan Villaverde and Bruce Ng
