Cheapest way for Europeans to get USD into Mt. Gox

[runeks]

Hello all

I'm writing here to find out which way is currently the cheapest for Europeans to get USD into Mt. Gox. The first and only time I tried this using an international wire transfer, the $200 I sent ended up as $170 on my Mt. Gox account. First Bank of America, New York charged me $24 for the payment being routed through them, then Mt. Gox' bank in Hong Kong charged $6.

I want to fund my Mt. Gox account again soon, so I'm looking for the cheapest way for a European (inside the SEPA zone) to fund a Mt. Gox account with USD.

EDIT: By the way, my bank charges about $3.5 for a SEPA transfer, but this is only possible in EUR. Maybe this is the cheapest way? To transfer in EUR, buy BTC, then buy back USD?
For transfers in currencies other than EUR or to a country outside the EU, my bank charges $9.

[dancupid]

Hello all

I'm writing here to find out which way is currently the cheapest for Europeans to get USD into Mt. Gox. The first and only time I tried this using an international wire transfer, the $200 I sent ended up as $170 on my Mt. Gox account. First Bank of America, New York charged me $24 for the payment being routed through them, then Mt. Gox' bank in Hong Kong charged $6.

I want to fund my Mt. Gox account again soon, so I'm looking for the cheapest way for a European (inside the SEPA zone) to fund a Mt. Gox account with USD.

EDIT: By the way, my bank charges about $3.5 for a SEPA transfer, but this is only possible in EUR. Maybe this is the cheapest way? To transfer in EUR, buy BTC, then buy back USD?
For transfers in currencies other than EUR or to a country outside the EU, my bank charges $9.

Buy bitcoins in Europe (eg Intersango) - send them to mt.gox and sell them for $. If you time it right you can easily make money on this (or at least have virtually zero fees).

Edit - why do you have USD in europe?
Edit2 - I posted before I saw you edit - but the whole point of Bitcoin is that it makes international transfer of value very easy.

[runeks]

Thanks for your input! Here's an example of how much it would cost me if I were to do this right now.
Intersango's order book (BTCEUR):

Code:

2.50999 0.00177
2.51000 1.00000
2.52000 3.88232
2.52995 158.10000
2.53000 1.00000
2.54000 10.00000
2.55000 6.91902
2.56000 2.02400
2.60000 37.93251
2.61510 0.00003
2.64701 0.00001
2.65000 82.00000
2.69500 74.00000
3.01000 0.53200
3.02150 0.00001
3.44370 0.20350
3.49000 20.00000
3.49990 0.03755
3.54500 0.26000
3.56400 0.17234
3.57100 0.00050
3.59600 0.27700
3.63800 0.08400
3.65990 0.26200
3.72360 0.08320

If I bought for €412.28 Bitcoins I would get 162.98 BTC for an average price of €2.53 per BTC. If I then transferred this amount to Mt. Gox and sold them (right now) I would make $518 (avg. price 3.1816 BTC/USD). This would mean I would convert €412 to $518 for a USD to EUR exchange rate of 1.25728 USD/EUR. The current market price for USD (according to Google) is 1.3138 EUR/USD and VISA has an exchange rate of EUR to USD of 1.3326. So using Google's exchange rate as a reference I'd be paying a fee of 4.5%. Using VISA's rates I'd be paying a fee of 6%.

So this seems to be more expensive than using AurumXchange (which is the cheapest I can currently find) who offer a EUR to USD rate of 1.2799. This is equivalent to a 2.6% fee using Google's exchange rate reference and 4.1% using VISA's exchange rate as a reference.

So it seems this method isn't viable at the moment. Seemingly because of Intersango's low order depth in its BTCEUR market.

[dancupid]

Thanks for your input! Here's an example of how much it would cost me if I were to do this right now.
Intersango's order book (BTCEUR):

If I bought for €412.28 Bitcoins I would get 162.98 BTC for an average price of €2.53 per BTC. If I then transferred this amount to Mt. Gox and sold them (right now) I would make $518 (avg. price 3.1816 BTC/USD). This would mean I would convert €412 to $518 for a USD to EUR exchange rate of 1.25728 USD/EUR. The current market price for USD (according to Google) is 1.3138 EUR/USD and VISA has an exchange rate of EUR to USD of 1.3326. So using Google's exchange rate as a reference I'd be paying a fee of 4.5%. Using VISA's rates I'd be paying a fee of 6%.

So this seems to be more expensive than using AurumXchange (which is the cheapest I can currently find) who offer a EUR to USD rate of 1.2799. This is equivalent to a 2.6% fee using Google's exchange rate reference and 4.1% using VISA's exchange rate as a reference.

So it seems this method isn't viable at the moment. Seemingly because of Intersango's low order depth in its BTCEUR market.

Mt.gox now have a sepa account - you can either just transfer as euros or I think they charge 1% to convert to usd.

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/MtGox#EU
https://mtgox.com/press_release_2011_12_01
(you need to be verified to do this)

[ovidiusoft]

If you can buy LRUSD cheaply, you can convert them to MGUSD for free at AurumXchange.

[runeks]

Hey dancupid, yeah I saw that too when I visited the funding page of my Mt. Gox account. This seems to be the cheapest method. Wiring Euros, buying Bitcoins for Euros and selling for USD. Using Mt. Gox' order book I can see that I would be able to convert Euros to Dollars at an exchange rate of 1.3023 EUR/USD using this approach. That's only a 0.1% fee when using Google's conversion rate as a reference, and -0.4% fee (0.4% cheaper) when using VISA's exchange rate as a reference. My bank's fees need to be added to that though. But it's still cheap.

I'm going to do a wire transfer now and see if the money indeed arrives without any added fees (except those charged by my bank), and report back.

[sonba]

MtGox charges 2.5% for currency conversion if they didn't change it in the pat 2 weeks.

[runeks]

Not when buying Bitcoins with Euros and then buying Dollars with Bitcoins. They only charge a maximum of 0.6% doing this. But I had even forgotten that. That should be taken into account when calculating the actual exchange rate using this method.

[dancupid]

Not when buying Bitcoins with Euros and then buying Dollars with Bitcoins. They only charge a maximum of 0.6% doing this. But I had even forgotten that. That should be taken into account when calculating the actual exchange rate using this method.

You can always put in a price that you want taking into account any fees etc -you don't necessarily need to buy from the orderbook at that moment - in my experience the price will usually move through the price you want over a few hours - though there's a little risk if there is a sudden price drop.

[runeks]

^ I prefer to assume I can only get the prices in the order book. Otherwise it'd be speculation, and not really "the cheapest way to get USD into Mt. Gox", since it might not be repeatable. Using current orders I can see what price I would actually be able to get right now.

Still waiting for my EUR to get into Mt. Gox, by the way (sent them Friday at noon).

[runeks]

My Euros arrived at Mt. Gox today. Only 387.77 of the €390 I sent made it there, so no fees isn't quite true. I bought Bitcoins for these and sold them for a total of $496 (including Mt. Gox' fees). This gives an exchange rate of 1.2719 EUR/USD which is 2.6% less than what Google says the exchange rate is, and 2.1% less than what VISA's rates are.

[sonba]

well, if you want to buy MGUSD I could sell some for SEPA. Just send me a PM.

Cheers,

sonba

[runeks]

Well what are your prices? Are your fees cheaper than 2% of reference exchange rates?