Bitcoin Forum

I want to give my niece some bitcoin, but she has to be 18 to have a Coinbase account. Is there a way for a 13-year-old to sign up somewhere for bitcoin, or is it strictly for over 18-year-old's? Good to get them familiar with this from a young age!

you should get her started right with a real bitcoin wallet---no 3rd party services! after all, bitcoin was designed to eliminate trusted intermediaries like coinbase. they could get hacked and become insolvent, or they could freeze your/her money.

teach her to be her own bank instead!

here's a list of recommended wallets: https://bitcoin.org/en/choose-your-wallet

i use both bitcoin core and electrum for different purposes. for beginners, i highly recommend electrum. it's very easy to use and intuitive.

Before getting other people to be involved with Bitcoin, I heavily suggest that you make sure that you actually know what you're doing first. Leaving your funds in Coinbase is a bad idea. Coinbase is an exchange, and only treat it as it is, an EXCHANGE for Bitcoin<->fiat. Not as a wallet for storing your funds.

Read:

• Topic: [General] Bitcoin Wallets - Which, what, why? https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1631151.0
• Bitcoin/Cryptocurrency Wallets & it’s Risks https://cryptosec.info/cryptocurrency-wallets/

You can create a wallet for your niece. We do not need to send bitcoin to the coinbase, there are many different bitcoins. Or you can send it to Binance trading platform and give your account to your niece. When your niece wants to sell it, it will be faster instead of transferring the bitcoin from the coinbase to the trading platform. ;D

I think first you must do is you can teach your niece about what is bitcoin and how you can do with it maybe invesment or trading. And after that you can help to make some of bitcoin wallet that easy to you and i agree with

you can read that thread and choose what is better wallet for your niece don't keep bitcoin at exchanger maybe it not safe and i prefer to use electrum wallet.

You are aware that storing your cryptocurrencies on exchanges is a bad thing to do right?

Cryptocurrencies are for all ages. Only exchanges want you to be on a legal age because they are centralized and that is not what cryptocurrencies are built for.

I suggest that you gift her a paper wallet (Check this link for reference : https://www.coindesk.com/information/paper-wallet-tutorial/)
Having a paper wallet is pretty secure, bad thing about it is that it's a paper and getting wet or being torn is it's disadvantages and in order for her to withdraw the funds in the future, she needs to know how to transfer and being a kid herself, doing those things might interest her curiosity and eventually she'll do the research and might find it fun which is a good thing. I think giving her cryptocurrency is teaching her about responsibility.

This is not a good suggestion at all. You just pretty much suggested a different exchange. It looks like you also need some research and reading to do.

Also, "there are many different bitcoins"?

Having a paper wallet is only secure when it was actually made in a secure manner.

Seriously? What is the difference between a Coinbase account and a Binance account in the aspect of a centralized wallet? It seems a lot of people do not even have an idea what makes some wallet centralized and some decentralized. As long as you are making use of an exchange, there is no way you can have full control of what you are holding. Make sure you are making use of a wallet where you have your private keys.

Secondly, what the OP will need to do is to even understand everything about the space first as well as the security of the space, a lot about wallets, and a lot about blockchain before even pushing out bitcoin to a 13 year old kid to hold. In a way, she has to understand what she is holding as well as everything that pertains it for her to at least be able to do well in the space without messing things up.

I think if a 13-year-old does not need a bitcoin, but you need to create a separate account and keep it secret until your grandchildren grow up, give it as a work and all. What feelings for your grandson. That's the best thing I think of right now, and it's not really necessary for a young kid at the moment.

Most people make paper wallets wrong and this exposes the wallets to vulnerabilities even before they’re loaded and out of the printer- to make them correctly, you need to follow several precautions to ensure that they’re made securely. I feel This wiki post (https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Paper_wallet)covers the topic relatively well if you still choose to go down the paper wallet route. A hardware wallet is also a good solution for securely storing coins, though they do cost anywhere from $80-100 in most places.

This. People always suggest using paper wallets because it's a good offline storage solution for bitcoin, not knowing that the process itself of creating the paper wallet in an unsecure manner can easily expose the private keys. Hardware wallets are easier to prepare for the casual non tech savvy bitcoin holder in my opinion.

Owning bitcoins or cryptocurrencies doesn't really require any age nor any permissions from other people or legal tender, as long you do have the knowledge on how it works
then you can own it anytime. Here are some good read ups about wallets. https://www.buybitcoinworldwide.com/wallets/. Don't make use of web-based wallets or any other wallet that doesn't give out your own private keys.

We are assuming that you are giving bitcoin to your niece to store for at least 5 years until her 18th birthday. In that case, a paper wallet, created in a secure fashion and stored safely is your best bet. If you do not have the knowledge or ability to create a paper wallet, then a hardware wallet is the next closest thing.

As mentioned, you can buy a Trezor or Ledger for less than $100. You would probably want to securely and safely store the seed for her until she is 18, but you can then safely gift her the actual wallet with however many bitcoin you want. If she loses it or breaks it, then no problem because you have the seed.

Signing up an exchange account in her name or gifting her your own account is awful security at best and probably illegal at worst.

We have other means you can get her started you don't have to wait till she clocks 18yrs before you can get her in besides we have some third party wallets around which is a pretty good start. All is just for you to look out on the best option and let it be the one you really recommend. And all the best with it all.

They can be familiar with crypto without giving them at the moment.

Ok let's say if ever that 13 year old does have an exchange account now, what's next on your teachings? How to send ? How to received?

You can done that by using a desktop or mobile wallet and it's way more better since you primarily hold your funds here. No need to undergo to an exchange wallet. But still if you really like to do it on exchanges then you can share your account at the moment or setup another account because in the first place you can do transactions on Coinbase even with no verification.

Anyone in the world can have crypto, just use a wallet, you don't have to use 3rd party's such as coinbase.

Use an offline software wallet for example, like Electrum or Jaxx.

There is no harm in giving your niece bitcoin, but you need to let her understand what bitcoin is all about, the need to keep somethings secured, and how to at least manage herself in the space in the long run and if you cannot get all those done, with her not being able to make decisions on her own, or even understand what you are giving her, it is better you just simply keep the bitcoin for her until she is of age and she can understand what it is all about on her own easily.

You may give her a hint or at least commit yourself to let her know what you are giving her, and probably push her to go learn some few things on her own to come ask you any question, and when you are confident enough that she can be her own bank conveniently, you can push it to her. She does not need a centralized exchange before she holds bitcoin.

I am agree with the reply of other members that you should need to teach her first about bitcoin, and i think she only wants is to spend it online make sure you already tell that she need to be more careful transacting with online because there are many scammers specially right now the Christmas is near to come they will be active to scam more people to earn money.

You have to wait for the age to be up to 18 so that you can give them as you open the account with coinbase. It has to follow the age of legality. All the other exchange sites like Luno .com  also will demand the age to be 18 before you can open and operate account with them. Just hold the coin in her name and give out  in five years time.

I have given Bitcoin to my sister in the past, than I just gave her a paper, showing how much I have given her, and told her I will take care of keeping it safe. But you can also give an account name, and a prive key, no need for coinbase at all.

I would suggest getting her a paper wallet if you want her to have bitcoin legally without any troubles or headaches. She will put it somewhere safe hopefully and when the time comes she will cash it out or keep saving it for future who knows. Wallets that are paper is the best way to gift someone because it literally can be stored anywhere you want without searching too far, just put it between some book pages and you are good to go.

I have done the same for couple of my friends back in the day and gave them small amounts just so they would be interested in it, when the price reached 20 thousand dollar levels they were still around 70 dollars or so in value, nothing major but they were really glad and happy to know they had some bitcoins at least and did not missed out. Some of them cashed it in and turned it into some other coins and of course bear market killed their profits but others just kept on checking the price for it and not using it.

You could create a paper wallet for her while she learn how to to use bitcoin provided she has interest to learn now.  The paper wallet work so well should could access her funds anytime and the how to is all over cryptocurrency or Bitcoin website!

Please don't send her bitcoin with a Coinbase account, set her up with a simple online web wallet (which is going to fit her needs fine) Or if you want to get a little more into it, then you should go ahead and get her a hardware / paper wallet and hold it for her. I'd only suggest this cause I doubt she's going to know what to do with it / actually go ahead and use it anyway.

Bitcoin is a wonderful gift, though I don't think your niece is going to use it at all as of yet.

If you want to gift bitcoin to your niece which is minor you can use other wallet that you think minor is acceptable in your wallet. Better teach to your niece better if she hold the bitcoin that you give to her until the price increase very high.

Do you think that when donating a Bitcoin wallet to a child or a loved one when it suddenly rises you will not take back the wallet and sell Bitcoin? Say something that will make you ready to give someone some time and let the receiver of your gift decide everything.

That is actually what I was going to address. It seems actually that the OP does not even understand the importance of cold storage when it comes to holding for long term to be thinking of coinbase account for holding which in this case is centralized and in that case, anyone using it does not have any control over their wallets.

Also, it is very imperative to let the niece understand what he is giving her, the importance, what makes it tick, why it is going to be a good hold for the long term, and how she can always keep it secured. This is a jet age and you will be surprised at how these kids can quickly catch up. At least in such case, a paper wallet will even do, but at least make sure she understands how well she will need to keep it secured.

after all for what you give bitcoin to a child who is underage, yes unless you can outsmart it, maybe it is legitimate. It's better to give something useful than to give bitcoin, we should understand that there is a certain limit for someone to understand about things that should not be time for them.

Give your niece a smartphone to keep contacting with you i think its better.