Bitcoin Forum

I'm probably not alone in this, but I had lots of struggles in the past week, with trying to first take some bitcoin and cash it in for my local Australian currency, then wanting to buy some of those cheap bitcoins today, I struggled to find a way to buy in with Australian dollars. It's quite frustrating when you have good money in your bank and there are people on MtGox and TradeHill screaming to sell, yet I cant get a look in. In the first instance (getting AUD for bitcoin), I tried selling on MtGox and opened a liberty reserve account, then I opened an offer on Exchange Zone to sell my liberty basic USD for USPP, until I realized all the difficulties that go with depositing PayPal and that nobody would want to go near a reversible transaction. So I backed out of that pathway and put my money back on the Mt. By the time I bought back in with bitcoins still soaring, they had gained $4 USD so I lost some ground there.  :'(

I then discovered BitPiggy, but they only handle the lesser of $500 or however much is in their pot and now they are also down for servicing for a few days. Somebody pointed me towards e-ForexGold but the seem to require a 24 hour waiting period, at the time It was because I had a new desire to buy bitcoin while the price was low. Now the prices are going back up, it seems I missed bus again.

This is really quite frustrating. I have bitcoin in my wallet, money in my bank and accounts with PayPal, Liberty Reserve, Exchange Zone, e-ForexGold, MtGox and TradeHill, Yet I still can't easily just pay AUD anywhere, to buy BTC or vice versa. Anybody with the same problems or a reliable solution?

Convert your AUD to USD, do your Bitcoin trades in USD, and put another % into DXY puts to hedge against currency fluctuation. :)

Oh! I have no problems converting between currencies on the exchange. I had bitcoin in MtGox and traded for USD and vice versa, but the problem is getting the dollars of regular currency in or out of the market. I can't spend USD while it sits in MtGox, so I want to buy something in AUD, how do I get it out? Likewise, if I want to buy up some bitcoin, but I only have AUD, how do I get that in? The only options on MtGox were Liberty Reserve and Dwollar, the latter being available only for transacting with US bank accounts. Liberty Reserve doesn't appear to offer any payment pathway to and from bank accounts, but a bewildering array of even more intermediaries. So where do you go from there?

TradeHill offers more currency choices but I think it's the same problem with getting some money ($AUD) in or out of the exchange. Note: Paying by percentage is expensive for larger amounts, while fixed fees are expensive if you are limited to the size of transaction. I had to do two transfers to LR over two days to get $2000 into LR, being charged a fee each time. Of course I didn't want money in LR anyhow. I just wanted my money on my bank account. All of these middle-men, pseudo-currencies and escrow services want a piece of the pie to handle your funds and having to use them, kinda defeats the purpose of bitcoin P2P transactions. There must be a better way.  :-\

Or else I'll have to set something up myself.

I'm in the same boat as you mate.  It's easy enough to get money into MtGox but near impossible to get it out for us Aussies!

I'll be watching this thread and will post if I find any good methods.  In the mean time I guess we need to wait for bitpiggy to come back online!

Hmm... "easy enough to get money into MtGox" you say. Wondering how you do that even? Well, I am trying to set up something myself so watch this space. :)

+1

Same here.

Easy to deposit, almost impossible to get AUD back out.

I emailed Mt Gox and they wanted to charge me $8 for a manual deposit (In the grand scheme of things that's the cheapest offer but everyone else gets it cheaper!)

Perhaps this is an option for my fellow Australian Bitcoiners? info@mtgox.com

Yea its easy enough to get Aussie dollars into Mtgox..I did a manual deposit at a NAB branch straight into their account.

The problem is getting it out which I emailed them about a few days ago, but still yet to get a response.

For small amounts as you say just transfer your Bitcoins to Bitpiggy who will then transfer into your bank account but obviously this is still not ideal with fees and max $500 limit.

I'll be following this thread for any update. Obviously theres an opportunity here for a budding entrepreneur out there to make some cash :)

Yeah the easy way to get in is deposit into a bank account (the NAB one mentioned above) and is on their site somewhere.

I also emailed mtgox a couple of days ago about withdrawing and haven't heard back yet.  If they can in fact do it manually then I'd be happy about that, but waiting 2+ days just to get a response isn't really good enough.

$8 is OK, if you're trying to liquidate $2000 dollars worth. That's the way I should have done it in the first place then. Considering that I cashed out to USD at $14 and tried to withdraw over two days to LR, then, when I realized I was going about it the wrong way, I put it back and ended up buying back in to the market at $17. There's a good investment strategy for ya; sell low and buy high - NOT!!  ::). Anyhow I managed to burn myself on a rising market an in those two days I lost about 50 BTC or $1,400 (well over half the amount I was trying to withdraw). I'll learn to play this game yet, but the thing is, bitcoin it's like sex. One you miss out on, is one you never catch up on. ;D

Oh! Thanks for the info BTW Ruckus.  ;)

Again, Oldminer, thanks for the info. I have registered the domain 'australinbitcoin.com' and I'm working on the site. Truth is I'm not a real pro at web development, and I'm really on a steep learning curve with the economics too. I am inclined to take any good advice I can get and may collaborate with the right people. Just a little overwhelmed at both the challenges and the opportunities here for a fair and honest entrepreneur. I looked at the idea of setting up an Australian exchange, but the problem is not with being able to trade in AUD (MtGox already supports this). The issue is with liquidity in the AUD cash economy. We need liquidity LIKE NOW!!

TO ALL:

At the moment I am just looking for a reasonably efficient transaction pathway to put Aussies on the right track. Anybody is welcome to join the site (using Drupal for now) and I will try to set up some forum/feedback system so that users can contribute their ideas. I will look into registering a proper business tomorrow. Until I have the proper legal entity in place, consider what you may have to offer in 'sweat equity' (I'm not looking for any money or bitcoins), but to offer the most helpful 'ideas people', the first option on one third of the equity. That means if you help to make it better with ideas or skills, you will be in line to invest in a team project you helped to build.

If there's ONE thing I have confidence in, it's that Aussies know how to just 'muck in' and just make things happen.

If your interested I have had quite a bit of work done on a web site I owned (up until recently) by this guy http://www.vietdesign.com.au/

He's very cheap but very good too. Good luck with it all.

Yeah. I guess the 'eruption' of MtGox put them on the back foot for just a little while. With the increased volume of trade, I expect we have to expect some hiccups and some delays in communication all over the place. At least we've still got this forum. ;)

So I just got a reply from Mt Gox:

Hi,

We will support Australian withdraws soon. In the meantime we can process your withdraw request manually, however there is a cost of AU$10.

Thanks,
Mark
MtGox.com Team

 8)

thats great news. thanks for letting us know. FYI theres a #bitcoin-aus channel on freenode where theres always a few aussies talking bitcoin and stuff. come check it out, we'd be happy to see some more users.

(as for the MT Gox withdraw)i did heard they were working on a generic withdraw api that i imagine would be worldwide, and that some aussies had been helping tests it. this confirms that.

Awesome news.

Thanks Mt Gox! This'll make it so much easier  ;D

How long are these supposed to take?

I've made a withdrawal on Monday the 11th and the MtGox USD came out of my account. I specified the ACCT number and BSB and I'm sure I entered these correctly. It's now Monday the 18th and I just checked my bank account at the ATM only ten minutes ago and its and its still not in there.
Have PM'd Mark but no reply as yet. I know it says it needs to be manually processed but i'd at least like an update on what's happened.

Has anyone tried withdrawing via this method? How long did it take?

Hi Karmicads,

We opened up AUD/BTC trading about two weeks ago.

You can find AUD deposit/withdrawal methods here : https://www.tradehill.com/WithdrawRequest/18

The bank account is local so AUD to AUD bank transfers are accepted. They take 2 days at most.

If you have any problems feel free to ask by sending an email to info@tradehill.com for assistance.

Thanks!

Regards,
Adam - Tradehill

It takes some time as we are waiting on Technocash to provide us with automated withdrawals.

In the meantime we process those manually, which takes slightly more time than what we'd want. All withdraws are tracked and will be eventually processed, we have waited a bit to see if we could spare ourselves the need to input manually each withdraw, but it looks like we'll have to.

All pending AU withdraws will be processed on our side today, which means Technocash will send them today or tomorrow, and you get your funds by Thursday.

As for people wondering why it costs us more than regular people in Australia to accept payments/send funds, you'll note we've been open with our bank in AU and explained exactly what bitcoins are. The resulting pricing is linked to the risk factor they evaluated.

Thanks Mark. That's good news!

If I get a technocash account can I use that instead of my account number and BSB?

We have plans to allow direct deposits to other technocash accounts. In that case the transfer is instant (well, as soon as we receive it and confirm it to technocash) and can even happen during weekends.

I can confirm the money has come through now having just checked my online banking a few minutes ago. Thank you!

Has anyone tried withdrawing to your Aussie bank account through Tradehill?   

just deposits personally,

I'm looking to buy up BitCoins for AUD.  I'm looking for some aussie traders or miners that are looking for consistant BtC -> AUD.  Prefer to work with a small group of people I can trust.  I'm looking for a consistent weekly supply, which is likely to increase over time.

Safest method is probably Bank account transfers, but if you have another preference let me know.

Contact me via PM to discuss.

I was helping someone yesterday with a similar problem.  They wanted Gox USD and had local currency.  Easiest was for them to buy coin and transfer direct to the exchange.  Even with different currencies on different exchanges, it is hard to move it around - coins are easy.  It would be similar for AUD trades (I have a ComBank account I use when I'm in Aus).  Fastest is an OTC among a group that has built mutual trust - like ebay perhaps - and I have several people I trade with like that.

For example, if you want AUD100 in TH, then easiest is buy by local internet transfer and receive coins and I can execute the trade directly in the exchange to cover the position.  Having a market maker helps, or realising you pay for the speed and ease.  For instance, last time I move some money around took six days from my bank to LR (including a weekend) and then between 10 minutes and a few hours into the different exchanges.  Somewhere along the way I lost 3% to 5% in conversion fees because of forex spreads and handling charges.  At least trading directly I can use mid-rates.

Similarly, if you wanted AUD for BTC, having someone happy to buy the coin direct and transfer is handy, but it doesn't work if they're trying to make a business of it, then the fees kick in.