Sort of a Newbie - Questions I should have asked

[MikeSD]

I think I bought a tiny amount of Bitcoin about 3 years ago.  After fees, it was about $26 (bucks).  Did a little testing to see how this all works and forgot about it. But not before I created a wallet on my computer (to see how that works).  And then transferred some money to it.  That all worked great.

Now zoom ahead. Of course I wrote my info down on a piece of paper but lost it. So that tiny bit of money is gone, if I can't find the wallet.  I can probably guess the password.  But that's not why I came here.

I also had the original $26 in my original account (through a crypto currency exchange). That login info I still have.  But I was surprised to see it was over 6 times what I had to start with.  And it recently had a high of 7x the original amount.  That got my interest.

NOW I have some questions that I should have asked before.  Oh well, better late than never.

1) What are the typical (and lowest) fees to cash out, and have money transferred to bank account? I'm just going to leave the money in that account.  And I might buy some more bitcoin (through the exchange I signed up with).  But before I do, I need some answers.  Fees are high for some transactions.  I do NOT want to only use the option of leaving the money there forever, and just buy from that account.  Mostly I will do that but there may/will come a day, when I want to cash out.  

2) Is there ANY way of parking money, during a decline for instance, that just freezes the $ amount you have in an account?  Like converting it to USD Cash, and just holding it so that a long decline doesn't wipe it out. Obviously it means taking out of whatever crypto currency it's in and putting it somewhere.  But I don't see a "where" to do that.  Obviously, one could begin the process of a transfer but that would cost heavy fees.   And I guess one could just convert to another crypto currency that isn't falling.  But, in general, is there a way to just freeze the dollar amount you have in one of the exchanges?

3) Addresses.  I'm kind of confused about addresses and why they should only be used once.  Easy enough to follow that good practice but I'd like to understand the "why".  From what I have read, using an address more than once can lead to compromise of data, money, or something, because of the history factor of transactions it's used in.  

Last night my daughter got me thinking about all of this. She has a bitcoin account and as a test, I wanted to see how sending worked, how much the fees were, and how long it took.  So, she told me her bitcoin address, I used that to send her $10.  It arrived in only a few minutes, and went through several stages of pending until it arrived.  It took less than 30 minutes to become available.  Fee was minimal. I think less than a buck.  But if that address was to be used again, how could/would that compromise her account?

How does using an address, more than once, create a vulnerability?  It's much easier to remember not to do something, if you know why it's a bad idea.

4) Related to #3: Also, everything I have read says to protect your address and not divulge it.  However, if you need someone to send BTC to your account (as in paying you for something they bought), you have to tell at least them, don't you?  If you send anyone your address, can that allow someone/anyone to take money out, instead of putting it in?

5) Partitioning money/Multiple accounts. What is the best way, or is there a way, to split up your money, into several accounts, such that a single address does not point back to ALL the money you have in BTC?  I'm using CoinBase and I don't see a way to have multiple accounts, other than multiple crypto currencies. But that is counter productive, if you have a preferred crypto currency you want to use.

6) What if? Prices go up on BTC, when people are buying and go down, when people are selling. So I've read.  I like to consider extreme cases.  So, what happens if tomorrow, EVERYONE just stops using Bitcoin (hypothetically). Does bitcoin suddenly start a long decline?  Is the price of BTC frozen and unchanging? What specifically happens, if everyone left there money in BTC, but just stopped buying or selling and there were no new buyers?  What does the value of BTC do?

6) Login problems Kind of off-topic: I'm using coinbase.  Every time I login, the website says the password is incorrect, and I have to go through the "Forgot Password" link to reset it.  Even then, the next time I try to login, it says the password is wrong again.  Why? and how do I fix it?  This doesn't happen on my phone, only my desktop.  I suspect it's a browser cache thing but not sure.

[masulum]

Well, congrats because you are get profit for hold your coins. To answer your question:

1. What are the typical (and lowest) fees to cash out, and have money transferred to bank account?
It depend where you put money and exchange. If you want to cash out from BTC and from your personal wallet (not exchange wallet), you can use P2P transfer with reputable member in this forum. Or you can sent to exchange that support your local bank. If your asset on exchange that not support any bank in your country, you need to move your asset to exchange that have a service to withdraw to your bank.

2. But, in general, is there a way to just freeze the dollar amount you have in one of the exchanges?
If you want to save dollar, it just only 2 ways, 1 you can keep on the exchange account (not recommended), you can save on your personal account. Or, you can covert to stable coin, but it's also not really recommended because the service maybe taking down any times.


3. how could/would that compromise her account?
For me, using new address for every transaction will help you keep hiding your real total assets. For example, Your real assets is 1 BTC, since you are have 10 address with @ 0.1, people who checking your address just know @ 0.1, as far as your account not connected each other (transfer between your own address). This is also can help you to prevent losing money because of phishing or other, if one address being hacked becaused of phishing you just lost from 1 account, it will better than lost all of your assets.


If you send anyone your address, can that allow someone/anyone to take money out, instead of putting it in?
You need to know between Private Address (Private key) and Public address, if someone know your Private address they can take your assets. So, maybe they mean keep save your Private Key, you can send Public to anyone and it save.

5) Partitioning money/Multiple accounts. What is the best way, or is there a way, to split up your money, into several accounts, such that a single address does not point back to ALL the money you have in BTC?
Save to Hardware Wallet or any offline wallet, this is the best way to keep your asset save,you can split asset to any of coin as you wants as far as it supported with the wallet.

6) Login problems
Contact coinbase support, they may help you and will ask verification to make sure it's yours.

[Upgrade00]

I do NOT want to only use the option of leaving the money there forever, and just buy from that account.  Mostly I will do that but there may/will come a day, when I want to cash out.  

An exchange wallet is not ideal to store bitcoins. Download a desktop wallet like electrum or a hardware one like Trezor

2) Is there ANY way of parking money, during a decline for instance, that just freezes the $ amount you have in an account?  Like converting it to USD Cash, and just holding it so that a long decline doesn't wipe it out.

The suggested options of converting to a stable coin or fiat are possible solutions, but this practice has it's downsides. For one, you cannot game the market, there's no huge indicator for when a bear season would hit, the price is always fluctuating and it's impossible to decide which decline would lead to a price dip. You would likely end up switching to fiat at a loss and jumping back in when the bull run has already taken off.

How does using an address, more than once, create a vulnerability?  It's much easier to remember not to do something, if you know why it's a bad idea. Cheesy

It doesn't create a vulnerability per se, but it allows hackers and scammers to identify a wallet and all the transaction linked to it. If you use one address for purchases, trades, gambling and so on, there would likely be a link between it and your offline personality eventually.

Also, everything I have read says to protect your address and not divulge it.  However, if you need someone to send BTC to your account (as in paying you for something they bought), you have to tell at least them, don't you?  If you send anyone your address, can that allow someone/anyone to take money out, instead of putting it in?

No one can take money out of your address without the private key. The reason for protecting your address is to prevent others from knowing exactly how much Bitcoins you own. This can attract a $5 wrench attack.
You can always create a completely new address to receive bitcoins, while having a separate private one for the bulk of your funds.

What is the best way, or is there a way, to split up your money, into several accounts, such that a single address does not point back to ALL the money you have in BTC?[/b]

Use multiple addresses. If you're buying from only one platform, you can use a coinmixer to avoid detection.

So, what happens if tomorrow, EVERYONE just stops using Bitcoin (hypothetically).

If there's no demand, then there's no value.

[friends1980]

OP Newbie asking not one single question about Merits. Is this possible? Am I dreaming?

Respect.

This subboard is for Beginners who want to learn about crypto, not about ranking up.

To other newbies: watch and learn.

[Harlot]

2) Is there ANY way of parking money, during a decline for instance, that just freezes the $ amount you have in an account?  Like converting it to USD Cash, and just holding it so that a long decline doesn't wipe it out.

The suggested options of converting to a stable coin or fiat are possible solutions, but this practice has it's downsides. For one, you cannot game the market, there's no huge indicator for when a bear season would hit, the price is always fluctuating and it's impossible to decide which decline would lead to a price dip. You would likely end up switching to fiat at a loss and jumping back in when the bull run has already taken off.

If he is looking a way to freeze his money or just stop from trading at all then converting/liquidating it to fiat is the only option and not to some kind of stable coin because in his scenario we don't even know if stable coins will also be vulnerable is some kind of decline. Aside from that @OP if you are planning on freezing your fund you better take it out from an exchange because it is more safe for your money lying around in a bank rather than an exchange.

[Findingnemo]

If he is looking a way to freeze his money or just stop from trading at all then converting/liquidating it to fiat is the only option and not to some kind of stable coin because in his scenario we don't even know if stable coins will also be vulnerable is some kind of decline. Aside from that @OP if you are planning on freezing your fund you better take it out from an exchange because it is more safe for your money lying around in a bank rather than an exchange.

It seems OP wants to HOLD the profits or actual portfolio value at the time of DUMP so it is not going to be a long term HODL for sure in that case a truly decentralized crypto like DAI which is actually backed by ethereum smart contracts unlike other fiat backed stable currency so it can be an alternative to converting into fiat because converting to fiat instantly is not actually possible but to a stable coin can be so he can later convert that stable coin into fiat can give more profits than direct fiat conversion.

[Pmalek]

The problem with centralized exchanges like Coinbase is that they will overcharge you on transaction fees. If you want to withdraw your bitcoin from Coinbase to a personal wallet, you will probably have to pay a transaction fee of approximately 0.0005 BTC. I don't know how much Coinbase is charging exactly because I don't use that exchange, but 0.0005 BTC is pretty much the standard bitcoin withdrawal fee nowadays. If you convert that to a US$ value, you would notice that you are paying almost $20 in fees. That's not a big difference from what you originally invested. Not exactly convenient and cost-effective is it? Exchanges pocket most of these fees because they batch transactions together to save on fees, but they still overcharge their customers.

Since you asked about converting your coins to a stable $ value, you could do as suggested by other members and exchange your bitcoin for USDT (Tether). I would suggest converting and withdrawing USDT via the Tron network because you won't be paying any withdrawal fees or just a minimum sum. The only problem is that you need to fund your Tron address with native Tron tokens otherwise you won't be able to send them out of your address when that time comes.

USDT can be sent over the Omni network, Ethereum, or Tron network. As I said, doing it over Tron is free. The omni network requires about the same fees as you would pay for a bitcoin transaction. Sending via Ethereum will cost you $5-10 and just like with the Tron Network, you will need ether tokens when the time comes to move your tokens elsewhere.     

[MikeSD]

OP Newbie asking not one single question about Merits. Is this possible? Am I dreaming?

Respect.

This subboard is for Beginners who want to learn about crypto, not about ranking up.

To other newbies: watch and learn.

I'm so new, I don't even know what that means. 

My total point in asking these questions is because I want to put some money into BitCoin. Not much. Maybe $1000 or so. I see more and more are accepting bitcoin for payment.  but
* I don't know the best way/place or why one exchange is better than the other or why (I guess I could have asked that first). I can read what the exchanges say the reasons are but that's marketing. I'd rather ask actual users.

* but more importantly, I want to understand fees. The fees are clear as mud. I don't like mud.

* Because market is so volatile I'd like to understand ways of mitigating losses, where possible, but especially losses because of ignorance.  The only time I would be considering cashing it out, is if I'm totally done with bitcoin system.  Otherwise I'd just leave it there and use the funds for buying and selling things, or transferring to friends or family.

The last thing I want to do is put money into something when I don't understand fees or how to get it out, and without being eaten up by fees on the way out.  The only reason I have any money in it now (albeit tiny) was to understand the process of how transactions worked.  I put $50 into Coinbase. Then I created a desktop wallet. Then transferred $some to that wallet.  If I recall it ate up over half just on the transfer.  I eventually lost the password to that wallet (created 3 years ago). So that's gone.  No big loss. It was just a test.  I had $25 left in the original Coinbase.

Now, if I decide to put a larger amount in bitcoin, I definitely want to know
* fees (for all types of transactions)
* best ways to get out if and when I'm ever done with it (maybe never. But need to know just the same)
* ways to avoid losses through ignorance

Seems like reasonable things to wonder about.

[nakamura12]

No matter how much money you want to use in buying bitcoin then the fee will still be the same amount if the price of bitcoin is same or not increased or decreased. In electrum wallet, you may be able to adjust the fee that you will pay when transactions are made. If you are looking to cash out that pay less fee then better exchange your bitcoin to other cryptocurrency that you don't need to pay higher fees.

[Jawhead999]

* I don't know the best way/place or why one exchange is better than the other or why (I guess I could have asked that first). I can read what the exchanges say the reasons are but that's marketing. I'd rather ask actual users.

There are 2 kind of exchanges:
1. Centralized exchanges (CEX) ) (e.g. Binance, Kucoin, Kraken, Huobi)
2. Decentralized exchanges (DEX) (e.g. Bisq, Hodl hodl, localbitcoins)

Centalized exchanges is a third party who has control of your funds so you need to rely your funds to them, while Decentralized exchanges doesn't. So if the CEX got hacked or exist scam, your funds will be gone. DEX didn't hold your coin and has better privacy since you didn't need to submit KYC, on CEX KYC is mandatory... so you can be forced to submit KYC or your funds will be stuck.

Some CEX (e.g. Binance) offer no KYC if withdraw less than 2BTC, but as I said above KYC is mandatory on CEX.

Now, if I decide to put a larger amount in bitcoin, I definitely want to know
* fees (for all types of transactions)
* best ways to get out if and when I'm ever done with it (maybe never. But need to know just the same)
* ways to avoid losses through ignorance

There's a lot fees and it's vary from each platform (exchanges nor wallet)
1. Fee maker/taker (trading)
2. Withdrawal fee
3. Transaction fee (sending)

If you want cheap fee you can use Binance since the fee trading only 0.1% and withdrawal to fiat is 1%. As said above to reduce transaction fee you can use electrum wallet and create segwit address, adjust the fee based on the mempool size https://core.jochen-hoenicke.de/queue/#1,24h

[Murpheus]

6) Login problems Kind of off-topic: I'm using coinbase.  Every time I login, the website says the password is incorrect, and I have to go through the "Forgot Password" link to reset it.  Even then, the next time I try to login, it says the password is wrong again.  Why? and how do I fix it?  This doesn't happen on my phone, only my desktop.  I suspect it's a browser cache thing but not sure.

When you reset your password you are always given the opportunity to create a new password right?? on your device am sure you use the "auto-save password" settings turned on... it could be the case.... maybe your desktop browser does not have the setting or its not turned on at all....

2 or better still the password you had saved the first time on your desktop auto inputs itself each time you open the coinbase site.... but since I have never used coinbase I dunno if its from their site

[masulum]

* I don't know the best way/place or why one exchange is better than the other or why (I guess I could have asked that first). I can read what the exchanges say the reasons are but that's marketing. I'd rather ask actual users.

For Me, I have 2 Exchange Options, 1st exchange supported local bank transfer or local fiat trading pair, 2nd exchange overseas to get BTC pair to increas my btc if possible. but for holding, it will be better on your own wallet with your own key.

* but more importantly, I want to understand fees. The fees are clear as mud. I don't like mud.

There are 3 kind of fees
1. Bitcoin fees: the fee that you need to pay when transfering BTC to other wallet. this fee is flexible, sometime very cheap and sometimes expensive, this happens because of network condition. this fees for miner
2. Exchange fees: this fee you must be paid for withdrawal amount, this fee for miner and exchange provider (of course maybe 80% going to exchange provider)
3. Trading fee: this fee you need to pay for every trade you made. this fees for exchange only