Some of you that are only starting on their crypto journey to financial freedom asked about details on where to buy your first coins/tokens. You will find the list of centralized exchanges (CEX) that I and many others use with some pros and cons for each, but would like to start first with some helpful tips for FIAT on-ramping.
Open an account with one of the exchanges that offer FIAT deposits via bank transfers, alternatively if none offer this in your country one that allows you to buy crypto directly with Visa/Mastercard and lowest fees
Complete KYC, no way around this with CEX’es
Increase your security to at least have 2 factor authentication
Do you first bank transfer or deposit with card.
If depositing isn’t an option and you can buy directly with bank card you choice might be limited to BTC, ETH and stablecoins on some exchanges. In this case buy one of the established stablecoins like USDT, UST, USDC, BUSD.
With your FIAT now exchanged for stablecoins you are ready to buy any other crypto available and/or transfer it to another exchange/wallet
You can find resources on most exchanges and YouTube videos that can help you with the process too. I will try to keep the list below updated and add more resources when time allows.
Exchanges
Below are ones I use myself and can recommend, read the descriptions before signing up as each has slightly different pros and cons. Links below include my referral, meaning if you use them for buying/selling, I will get a tiny share of fees you pay. Some of the below are not available in certain jurisdictions or have limited token availability, so if you are from USA please check carefully (for example Binance has its own US version), EU can pretty much use all of these without issues as far as I am aware.
Always good to have accounts on few exchanges and funds spread across all of them. Consider hot wallets like Metamask or Trust Wallet once you get more adventurous and cold storage for those of you that plan to hold your digital assets for a longer period of time and larger sums. I’ll explain wallet options separately.
Binance - Sign up (5% fees rebate)
Pros
This is a must have exchange, by far the largest out there, best liquidity
Good mobile app and web UI
Wide selection of collateral for loans (some can be staked while used as collateral)
Great flexi and fixed term staking options
With SEPA transfers back it ticks all the boxes for your FIAT on/off-ramping needs
Cons
Hard to really find any, maybe tempting users to try margin and futures trading, that can lead to big losses, but every other exchange does the same
Kucoin - Sign up
Pros
A good mix of established and lower cap coins, in general its a step higher from gate.io, anything that gets listed here pumps
Nice, clean looking trading panel especially on mobile app
good liquidity
Cons
Lacks bank transfer options
In my opinion not enough passive earning options
Gate - Sign up (10% fees rebate and few other extras)
Pros
Absolute must for those that want to buy into early projects and low caps that a lot of times are not available elsewhere
Multitude of finance products from lending, borrowing, liquidity mining and staking
Well working web UI and mobile app
Cons
No good FIAT on/off-ramping
No Market orders
Can be overwhelming for beginners
Coinbase/CoinbasePro - Sign up to get 9€ in BTC
Pros
Great for FIAT on-ramping (SEPA transfers included)
Good CEX for beginners, established company listed on US stock market
Mostly quality crypto assets available, no low mcaps (but that might be a con for some)
Recommend using CoinbasePro as it works good bit faster than basic one
Cons
Coinbase way too slow, especially during volatile market movements
Higher transaction fees than other exchanges
Can be subject to US regulations
Lack of finance options like loans, staking etc.
XT.com - Sign up (20% fees rebate)
Pros
Buy crypto with Visa/Mastercard, GPay and ApplePay, P2P
Operating since 2018 on Asian markets
Good web UI, similar to Binance
100+ digital assets and decent liquidity
Cons
Not enough saving/staking options
Other CEX’es of note - FTX, Crypto.com, Huobi, Kraken
DEX’es - Decentralized exchanges - These are exchanges as name suggests outside of any regulations, will not ask you for anything, but connecting your wallet and then transact as you please. I am not listing any at this moment as it is not recommended for any beginners. Often these are only places you can buy early listed projects or some more obscure altcoins.
Technical analysis
Babypips - free technical analysis course - while this is outlined as Forex course it will guide you through universal principles and techniques that apply to all markets. (Beginners please start from Kindergarten, Three types of analysis)
TradingView - essential platform for anyone wanting to have better control over their investments, set alerts, follow other trader’s ideas (including me - gigisulivan). You will find charts for most digital assets as well as any other traditional market. If you wish to upgrade to Pro to be able to set more alerts, use more indicators and many other features, using that link will give you up to 30$ off the subs)
CryptoQuant - Sign up - my go to place for on chain analytics
Research
Always, let me say that again, ALWAYS, do your own research when it comes to investing your money. Don’t just trust some YouTuber because they have 500k subs, 9/10 get paid for talking about crypto projects and many are just scams.
Coinmarketcap or/and Coingecko - great place to start exploring the world of digital assets. You get free access to rankings, wide of range of stats, basic charts and most importantly links to the projects websites and “whitepapers”.
Market news
Coindesk and Cointelegraph - dedicated to crypto news
FX Street - probably one of the best one stop shops for global economic news, live commentary during US market session and main events on major markets. Make sure to visit their Economic calendar. They also have crypto category, but I would not recommend that.
Other
Fear and Greed index - measures crypto market sentiment, low values indicate fear and likely panic selling, high values extreme greed and FOMO in the market. I will write about this a bit more in one of the weekly episodes.