Buy ethereum uk

2456713

Comments

  • Maelzoid
    Maelzoid Posts: 16 Forumite
    Coinbase sell Ethereum but I have had some bad experiences with them - purchases failing to go through, and their customer service is legendarily appalling. I've not lost money through them, but I wouldn't use them again.

    For Ether, I recommend getting Bitcoin and using shapeshift.com to exchange it for Ether.

    Even getting Bitcoin is not that easy at the moment. I have used Bittylicious in the past and they're reliable and offer a good service. However, I find their spreads to be quite big at the moment so not the bast VFM. I may give coinfloor a punt on my next purchase

    Yet again, when bitcoin is brought up, you soon start hearing thew words "Ponzi", "Pyramid" and "Tulips". These are usually very uninformed comments, and I recommend that for people who have not read much on crypto-currency to refrain from commenting, as it is pretty unhelpful, and you can reveal yourself to be rather foolish. After all, I don't offer any wisdom on Formula 1, a subject I know little on.
  • economic
    economic Posts: 3,002 Forumite
    Maelzoid wrote: »
    Coinbase sell Ethereum but I have had some bad experiences with them - purchases failing to go through, and their customer service is legendarily appalling. I've not lost money through them, but I wouldn't use them again.

    For Ether, I recommend getting Bitcoin and using shapeshift.com to exchange it for Ether.

    Even getting Bitcoin is not that easy at the moment. I have used Bittylicious in the past and they're reliable and offer a good service. However, I find their spreads to be quite big at the moment so not the bast VFM. I may give coinfloor a punt on my next purchase

    Yet again, when bitcoin is brought up, you soon start hearing thew words "Ponzi", "Pyramid" and "Tulips". These are usually very uninformed comments, and I recommend that for people who have not read much on crypto-currency to refrain from commenting, as it is pretty unhelpful, and you can reveal yourself to be rather foolish. After all, I don't offer any wisdom on Formula 1, a subject I know little on.

    but you can not disagree that its a hugely speculative asset class. its not really a currency per se, and can only be spent in very limited areas. not sure if its a bubble but it seems more and more people are interested in buying onyl because they have seen it go up a lot - a classic symptom of a bubble.
  • realdannys
    realdannys Posts: 39
    First Post First Anniversary Combo Breaker
    Forumite
    economic wrote: »
    but you can not disagree that its a hugely speculative asset class. its not really a currency per se, and can only be spent in very limited areas. not sure if its a bubble but it seems more and more people are interested in buying onyl because they have seen it go up a lot - a classic symptom of a bubble.

    And what isn't a highly speculative asset class? It's not more so than penny stocks, stocks in general, stock ISA's, EIS, SEIS schemes, heck just starting any sort of business with a high initial outlay. They're all high risk. Cryptocurrency is no different.

    People who don't understand it have been foo-fooing Bit Coin for years, and yet it continues to rise and rise. There was a 2014 boom and fall where it evened out for a few years at the same rate - I bought £1000 worth last year, though I bought it to spend rather than invest, even so, I spent about £800 (lots of places online accept it) and now I still have £1400 left due to price increase.

    The more shady side is the mining part - with people selling mining rigs that virtually no one will make their money back on - especially as the Chinese have the mining side sewn up by having server centres full of GPU's to the ceiling, millions and millions of pounds worth of investment to mine the coins...which was paying off before it increased in value.

    A friend tipped his hairdresser off about ETH last week she (quite crazily mind) but her life savings into it, $46,000 - 10 days later she's got $180,000 and is paying her mortgage off. Granted I wouldn't risk that level of capital but at the end of the day, it's just high risk investing like anything else.
  • economic
    economic Posts: 3,002 Forumite
    realdannys wrote: »
    And what isn't a highly speculative asset class? It's not more so than penny stocks, stocks in general, stock ISA's, EIS, SEIS schemes, heck just starting any sort of business with a high initial outlay. They're all high risk. Cryptocurrency is no different.

    People who don't understand it have been foo-fooing Bit Coin for years, and yet it continues to rise and rise. There was a 2014 boom and fall where it evened out for a few years at the same rate - I bought £1000 worth last year, though I bought it to spend rather than invest, even so, I spent about £800 (lots of places online accept it) and now I still have £1400 left due to price increase.

    The more shady side is the mining part - with people selling mining rigs that virtually no one will make their money back on - especially as the Chinese have the mining side sewn up by having server centres full of GPU's to the ceiling, millions and millions of pounds worth of investment to mine the coins...which was paying off before it increased in value.

    A friend tipped his hairdresser off about ETH last week she (quite crazily mind) but her life savings into it, $46,000 - 10 days later she's got $180,000 and is paying her mortgage off. Granted I wouldn't risk that level of capital but at the end of the day, it's just high risk investing like anything else.

    i agree to come extent what you are saying. and yes all what you mention are high risk. however there are varying degrees of risk. a share in amazon is less risky then buying any cryptocurrency.
  • Maelzoid
    Maelzoid Posts: 16 Forumite
    economic wrote: »
    but you can not disagree that its a hugely speculative asset class. its not really a currency per se, and can only be spent in very limited areas. not sure if its a bubble but it seems more and more people are interested in buying onyl because they have seen it go up a lot - a classic symptom of a bubble.

    I certainly wouldn't deny this. Opportunities to spend it at the moment are quite limited and at the moment, it makes no sense to buy it if you wish to spend it - after all there is practically nowhere you can spend it that wouldn't also accept USD.

    Whether its currently in a bubble is something only time will tell. As a fundamentally new asset class, attesting a true value to it is very tricky and it may well be overvalued at the moment. However, that doesn't mean it will drop in the value in the near future. The price of it could keep rising.
  • Maelzoid
    Maelzoid Posts: 16 Forumite
    realdannys wrote: »
    A friend tipped his hairdresser off about ETH last week she (quite crazily mind) but her life savings into it, $46,000 - 10 days later she's got $180,000 and is paying her mortgage off. Granted I wouldn't risk that level of capital but at the end of the day, it's just high risk investing like anything else.

    That is freaking crazy! I'm glad she did well out of it, but it so easily could have gone very wrong for her.

    My own aspirations for Crypto are to invest a modest amount I am comfortable losing if it goes wrong. My hope is that this modest fund would double in value each year. I started about 2 years ago and so far it has out-performed my expectation. I'm also very interested in the technology so its enjoyable to follow developments in the 'industry'.
  • fwor
    fwor Posts: 6,806
    First Post Name Dropper First Anniversary
    Forumite
    Maelzoid wrote: »
    My own aspirations for Crypto are to invest

    I can't understand this idea that anyone could "invest" in something that has no intrinsic value. A crypto-currency has no intrinsic value.

    Sure, you can gamble that its exchange rate against other currencies will go up rather than down - but that should never be categorised as "investing". All you are doing is looking at a past trend and extrapolating it into the future and gambling that the trend will continue.

    No doubt plenty of people have said this before, but the thing that makes it interesting to people as an "investment" is the thing that makes it useless to me as a means of paying for things - because I want to use something that I could be reasonably sure would have the same value, give or take a small amount, over a long period.

    As Economic has said, the historical rise in value of, say, Bitcoin, has all the signs of being a speculative bubble and nothing more. That's not to say that people can't/won't get rich speculating - but in the end there is likely to be as much downside as there is up - because there is no ~fundamental~ value behind it to keep the bubble "inflating".

    The idea that it should, for some underlying reason, keep doubling in value each year seems to have no rational basis.
  • Maelzoid
    Maelzoid Posts: 16 Forumite
    fwor wrote: »
    I can't understand this idea that anyone could "invest" in something that has no intrinsic value. A crypto-currency has no intrinsic value.

    I disagree. Cryptocurrencies have tremendous utility. The ability to move currency across borders with relatively little expense or friction. The ability to hold currency that can be spent remotely despite not having a bank account (2 billion people in the world are unbanked). A currency that is immune to government or banking interference, that is immune to counterfeiting, a currency that cannot be seized from the holder by banks or governments, a currency that is truly international. All these things make Crypto desirable - and if its desirable, it has value.
  • fwor
    fwor Posts: 6,806
    First Post Name Dropper First Anniversary
    Forumite
    Maelzoid wrote: »
    I disagree. Cryptocurrencies have tremendous utility.

    I didn't say it did not. The one thing it ~should~ have is utility. But its utility is undermined because of its volatility.

    Whether it's desirable or not is debatable, but it has no intrinsic value. A Bitcoin is just a series of binary bits, and its value is defined by reference to other currencies.

    I still haven't seen a rational explanation why anyone would think that it (as a currency) should be destined go up in value compared to other currencies.
  • economic
    economic Posts: 3,002 Forumite
    And can be easily hacked, controlled/taxes by government, complicated and confusing to buy - sometimes can lose the money.

    Crypto is a innovative technology but that's all it is. It is not currency as it is not legal tender. It is used in very few places much line you can use vouchers to pay for something.

    I seriously doubt it will go mainstream. Even if it does it's not like the people who have be most automatically will have be most money. They will distribute it according to how much money people have in currency money.

    But you never know if the masses start buying into it it can turn into a bigger bubble! That's if they can be bothered going through the loopholes to buy it.
This discussion has been closed.
Meet your Ambassadors

Categories

  • All Categories
  • 342.5K Banking & Borrowing
  • 249.9K Reduce Debt & Boost Income
  • 449.4K Spending & Discounts
  • 234.6K Work, Benefits & Business
  • 607.1K Mortgages, Homes & Bills
  • 172.8K Life & Family
  • 247.4K Travel & Transport
  • 1.5M Hobbies & Leisure
  • 15.8K Discuss & Feedback
  • 15.1K Coronavirus Support Boards