KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?
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@blakeyrat said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
This morning I bought about $40 worth of bitcoin, which is the awesome exchange rage of about 8 bitcoin cents.
Maybe you should just calm yourself
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@blakeyrat said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Imagine how awesome I'd feel if my $40 got me like 4,000,000 bitcoins instead of 8 measly cents.)
You're just not investing in the right thing. Your $40 is probably worth about 1 trillion Zimbabwe dollars.
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@El_Heffe Pfft.
You can get 10 trillion for only $2. http://www.ebay.com/itm/like/322082525066?lpid=82&chn=ps&ul_noapp=true
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@blakeyrat said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Your bank doesn't have bill pay?
Yeah, it does (and @flabdablet was talking about a semi-similar thing that's common in Upsidedownlandia).
But then, for stuff like when my kids need something like an art supplies fee or whatever I can just make out a check to the school or the club or whatever and they hand it in. That's probably my second biggest use of checks. #1 would be dealing with Cub Scouts money (fees and expense reimbursements). "Just make it out to the pack." Or to the name of whatever parent paid for stuff. It's like DNS but for bank accounts.
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Wire transfers are probably the most popular method of paying for goods you buy online* or sending someone money in central Europe.
*Yes, more popular than credit cards. Credit cards = debt = bad.Whereas here in the US, wire transfers are often associated with fraud. Pay for something on eBay with a wire transfer? Say goodbye to your money and you probably won't ever see what you bought.
At least credit cards offer fraud protection.
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@abarker Yes, that's a risk. But fraud protection is just an insurance, on average you should lose money from having it (or otherwise the bank is doing something wrong). I rather like the European solution where you have a bank account number with a verified identity behind it as the destination of a wire transfer, in order to minimize the chances of fraud.
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@Grunnen Which is best depends on the exact laws in place. Small regulatory changes can tilt the balance quite strongly one way or the other.
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@Grunnen said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
But fraud protection is just an insurance, on average you should lose money from having it (or otherwise the bank is doing something wrong).
What do you think all those people paying interest are doing? Of course, from those of us who pay our balance in full every month, the card issuer just gets the money for the merchant transactions.
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@blakeyrat said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Your bank doesn't have bill pay?
In Europe, monthly bills are usually automatically withdrawn from your account. You don't have to think about paying them at all. This sounds like a dangerous system, but it actually works remarkably well. I haven't had to contest a single charge so far…
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@asdf Nothing stops people from the US from setting that up.
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@blakeyrat The point is, you don't have to set it up yourself at all. Just tell them your account number (IBAN) when you sign the contract for whatever. Pretty much everyone just uses direct debit to charge you.
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Just tell them your account number (IBAN) when you sign the contract for whatever. Pretty much everyone just uses direct debit to charge you.
Exactly. YOU set it up. Same way I did my mobile phone: Right there in the sales screen I set up automatic bill pay.
Where the difference in the EU is that apparently you can't get services without a bank account...
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
The point is, you don't have to set it up yourself at all.
Wow awesome.
@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Just tell them your account number (IBAN) when you sign the contract for whatever.
Uh.
Huh?
You don't have to set it up, except you do. Ok. Makes sense.
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@Tsaukpaetra said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Same way I did my mobile phone
@blakeyrat said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
You don't have to set it up, except you do.
Ok, maybe I misunderstood how the US system works. It sounded a bit more complicated.
@Tsaukpaetra said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Where the difference in the EU is that apparently you can't get services without a bank account...
Pretty much, but why would you not have one? German banks are now required to give you a checking account. (If they don't trust you, the only thing they can do is set your overdraft limit to zero.)
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
why would you not have one?
Easier for those who wear tin foil to think they're not in the system I suppose.
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@Tsaukpaetra said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Easier for those who wear tin foil to think they're not in the system I suppose.
But how would you even pay for services without a bank account. Send cash in the mail?
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@asdf you go to a shop, or get a mailed bill that you pay in a bank? at least that's what we do here
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@fbmac said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
you go to a shop
One option for sure.
For example, if I so choose to not associate my mobile service to automatic bill pay, they mail me a bill, at which time I can walk into any of the company owned retail stores with it and pay in person. Alternately, I could purchase a prepaid card and associate a one-time transactional payment from that.
I'm not claiming it's easier or more efficient, but the option is there and is possible to do.
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@fbmac said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
you go to a shop
Many companies (e.g. electricity suppliers) don't have shops at all.
@fbmac said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
get a mailed bill that you pay in a bank
I'm not sure whether you can anonymously deposit money in another person's bank account here. I think you need to have an account at that bank to do that. But yeah, that could work.
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Many companies (e.g. electricity suppliers) don't have shops at all.
But they have an office you can go to to pay your bill in person. Not all of them in the US accept cash though, so you're back to needing a checking account...
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@blakeyrat said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
This morning I bought about $40 worth of bitcoin, which is the awesome exchange rate of about 8 bitcoin cents.
(Protip for crypto currency creators: if you want stupid people to invest, make your currency sound like a LOT of money compared to their "fiat" currency. Imagine how awesome I'd feel if my $40 got me like 4,000,000 bitcoins instead of 8 measly cents.)
When bitcoin started, you got about 10 BTC for one USD. But seems the demand was higher than they expected, and since the supply is fixed by the algorithm, one BTC gets more expensive. But you can still use Satoshi instead of BTC (1 Satoshi is the smallest indivisible coin which is 0.00000001 BTC (so 1 hundred millionth BTC). Or if you don't believe in that, you can convert to Dogecoin (1 Dogecoin is about 0.0000005 BTC or 50 satoshi), so you will get about 4400 Dogecoin for one USD (and the typical transaction fee is 1-2 Dogecoin, which is nothing compared to the typical 0.0001 BTC). But I think that was not intentional, it is just caused by nobody really being interested in Dogecoin, so the demand goes down.
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
I'm not sure whether you can anonymously deposit money in another person's bank account here. I think you need to have an account at that bank to do that. But yeah, that could work.
In case "here" refers to Germany, you can (at almost every bank). Just take the "Zahlschein" (which is the standard formatted piece of paper you often get with your invoices that tells where you should wire your money to) and some cash to any bank, and tell them you want to pay that in cash. They will take a horrendous fee (if you are lucky, 5 EUR, but expect more), but will do it. So if you have a bank account and you are near the bank you have it (or one of the same branch), usually it is a better idea to deposit the money (for free) and then wire it (for free) than use that way :).
[I know a student/pupil that was eligible for a fee-free bank account with far too much time who opened an account, deposited money, wired it and immediately closed it again, just to save that 5 EUR fee...]
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@fbmac said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
you go to a shop, or get a mailed bill that you pay in a bank? at least that's what we do here
You could also get a money order at a bank or grocery store.
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@fbmac said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
you go to a shop, or get a mailed bill that you pay in a bank? at least that's what we do here
You could also get a money order at a bank or grocery store.
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Many companies (e.g. electricity suppliers) don't have shops at all.
In the US, most utility providers--especially electricity--are set up so you can pay your bill at a grocery store.
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@Grunnen said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
I rather like the European solution where you have a bank account number with a verified identity behind it as the destination of a wire transfer, in order to minimize the chances of fraud.
That's fine, but in the U.S. there are companies who are not banks who do wire transfers. There is no "account" for the sender or receiver. As a result, wire transfers have come to be associated with fraud, money laundering, terrorists, etc.
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I'm going to make my own cryptocurrency. Here's how it works:
- You go to the signup page, put in an email address and a password, and it'll give you a GUID
- To deposit money, you mail me cash with a print-out of your GUID
- Exchange rate is 1 CAD = 9001 F'quians, minus a 1% processing fee
- To pay someone, you log in, put in your GUID, their GUID, and the amount to transfer, and it'll give you a GUID
- Send me a mail with a printout of that information, and I'll transfer the F'quians to their account.
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@mihi said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Zahlschein
So that's why it says "Überweisung/Zahlschein" on some of those paper slips that you used to use to wire money. I've always wondered. :D TIL.
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
The point is, you don't have to set it up yourself at all. Just tell them your account number (IBAN) when you sign the contract for whatever.
It works exactly the same in the US, except it's an ABA routing number instead of an IBAN.
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@El_Heffe They operate here too and here they are also associated with scams. Lesson one of buying on eBay here: walk away if the seller asks you to use a 'funny' money transfer service instead of a regular wire transfer, to an account number, using your own bank's mechanism.
Question: is this also a reason that PayPal is so popular in the US? Here most sellers won't accept it because the fees are higher than for a wire transfer through the bank.
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@Grunnen said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
fees are higher than for a wire transfer through the bank.
I heard "free" is hard to beat...
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@Tsaukpaetra said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
I heard "free" is hard to beat...
Not at all; “cashback” beats “free”. (And all that means really is that the charges are hidden elsewhere.)
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
That's a shitload of cash, no wonder you were nervous.
Also, the reason I was doing this was because what I was doing (closing a bunch of accounts and ceasing to be a customer of several financial institutions) broke their processes pretty hard; they couldn't move the money for me unless I kept the money in the accounts where it was coming from. Which was dumb, but how it worked out.
Unfortunately, I didn't keep that money for very long, but I did manage to avoid building up a debt while a student. (Pretty rare even then…)
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@Grunnen said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Likewise, here in Europe many people don't have a credit card.
What? 1991 called Yeltsin wants his vodka back. I lived in Ireland. Backwater of the universe and chip and pin was mandatory by 2008 for everything. Where are these people who don't have a credit card. Better yet how did @blakeyrat not have one until recently? or at least a debit card. How do you buy shit online? Has america turned into a backwater now?
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@blakeyrat said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Ok; I'm give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you were trying to help instead of being a snarky asshole: I didn't ask you or anybody for help. This is not the General Help category, this is Side Bar.
You bitch about this constantly and then give me unsolicated advice. You should be ashamed of yourself.
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@Lorne-Kates said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
- Send me a mail with a printout of that information, and I'll transfer the F'quians to their account
Why dont't you charge for the transaction?
@Lorne-Kates said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
- To deposit money, you mail me cash with a print-out of your GUID
Should the mail title be : "Fuck you give me money" or "I am fucked get my money"?
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@DogsB said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Where are these people who don't have a credit card.
Germany. Yes, they're weird.
They probably do have bank cards, just not credit cards.
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@dkf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Germany. Yes, they're weird.
Yes. I always have trouble with my cards in Germany . They should be accepted but aren't half of the time.
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@Luhmann Austria's pretty bad that way too.
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@dkf
I'm not surprised it's practically a part of Germany, no?
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
But how would you even pay for services without a bank account. Send cash in the mail?
If you have a car, most services in the US are local enough that you can just walk/driive there and pay in person.
The only one I'd have trouble with is AT&T, I'd have to go about 12 miles to find the nearest AT&T store. And possibly Geico, they do most business online...
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Many companies (e.g. electricity suppliers) don't have shops at all.
PUD, my electricity supplier, keeps a little office in my town open.
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@FrostCat said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
You could also get a money order at a bank or grocery store.
Or post office, or 7-11, or virtually anywhere.
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@DogsB said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Better yet how did @blakeyrat not have one until recently? or at least a debit card.
Wow, you posed a question and then instantly answered it.
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
But how would you even pay for services without a bank account. Send cash in the mail?
Pre-paid credit cards.
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@DogsB said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Where are these people who don't have a credit card.
All over Europe.
@DogsB said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
How do you buy shit online?
Direct debit. In a country where debit cards (shops) and direct debit (online shops) are accepted pretty much everywhere and many shops don't accept credit cards at all (mostly because of the fees), credit cards are not very useful.
It's also the German mentality: Most people prefer their checking account balance to actually match the amount of money they have left this month, which is not the case if you use a credit card. Credit card = possibility to accidentally spend more money than you have = evil.
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@dse said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Why dont't you charge for the transaction?
It's built into the exchange rate.
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@blakeyrat said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
@FrostCat said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
You could also get a money order at a bank or grocery store.
Or post office, or 7-11, or virtually anywhere.
My bank will print a cashier's check or money order for free, but charges $45 for international wire transfers.
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@blakeyrat said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
But how would you even pay for services without a bank account. Send cash in the mail?
If you have a car, most services in the US are local enough that you can just walk/driive there and pay in person.
The only one I'd have trouble with is AT&T, I'd have to go about 12 miles to find the nearest AT&T store. And possibly Geico, they do most business online...
Welcome to the third world.
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@asdf said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
@DogsB said in KRAKEN BITCOIN EXCHANGE whaaa?:
Where are these people who don't have a credit card.
All over Europe.
Gypsies do get all over the place, true.