How To Buy Bitcoin Canada (BTC)

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Even for the non-techy, Bitcoin is becoming a bit of a hot topic due to it’s potential to change the world through open-source technology.

While most have now heard about Bitcoin in a general sense, there is still a lot of confusion about what it actually is.

You could read the white paper published by Satoshi Nakamoto, or you could follow our quick and simple guides (which is probably much easier!). So you’re looking to buy some Bitcoin, well lucky for you we’ve done the research all over the world for different fiat currencies and can offer you the best options with the lowest transaction fees.

How to Pay for Your Bitcoin

Bitcoin traders of today are at an obvious advantage compared to those who started a couple of years back. Nowadays, you can choose from a variety of payment options such as pay with cash, via credit/debit cards, bank transfers, PayPal, even anonymously.

Back when Bitcoin was reserved for a close community of tech-savvy and crypto-enthusiastic individuals, the only way for them to purchase BTC was to mine the coins themselves. As Bitcoin was becoming more popular, the first Bitcoin exchanges emerged and traders were finally able to purchase BTC via bank transfers.

Buying Bitcoin With Your Bank Account

A simple and inexpensive method to purchase Bitcoins on most cryptocurrency platforms is via bank transfer. The procedure is very straightforward. You register for an account and link your Canadian bank account to the platform account you’ve just created. Be prepared to enter your personal information as it’s required that exchanges ask for KYC (know-your-customer) details.

If you choose the native Canadian platform Bitbuy, you can make regular bank wire transfers as long as you deposit a minimum of $20,000. The fee is only 0.50% and it takes 1-2 business days to complete the transfer.

If you want to make a smaller deposit (e.g. $500), Bitbuy allows you to make a bank transfer via Interac e-Transfer, a popular Canadian payment system that speeds up online money transfers. The transfers take between 1-4 hours and the fee is 1.50%. Just make sure your bank supports e-Transfer first. Click on the link to check out the 250 participating financial institutions.

Even $500 can seem like a lot for retail traders or someone who’s purchasing Bitcoin for the first time. Luckily, you have other options for bank transfers besides Bitbuy. For example, Coinberry and NDAX are two Canadian crypto exchanges that have no minimum deposit limit and a $100 minimum deposit for Interac e-transfers respectively. Neither of these platforms has a deposit fee.

Buying Bitcoin With a Credit Card or Debit Card

Probably the most popular payment method at the moment is using a credit or debit card. What makes these contactless payments so attractive is that they’re convenient and super fast. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that they’re turning into a popular payment option for Bitcoin purchases.

Right now, the best crypto exchange where Canadian traders can buy Bitcoin using their debit or credit card is Coinberry. Not only are these payments instantaneous, but they’re also free. Coinberry incurs zero deposit fees on all types of deposits. Their website motto is: “Why would we take a bite out of your hard-earned money?”.

The only drawback is that the card has to be issued by either Visa or MasterCard and the maximum purchasing limit per transaction is $500.

Another option available to Canadian traders is to use the Israeli-based broker Coinmama. However, the exchange incurs slightly higher fees than the industry average. Debit/credit card payments are charged at 5.00% per trade. The advantage of using this platform is that you can purchase up to $5,000 worth of BTC per day or up to $20,000 per month at a fixed rate.

Buy Bitcoin With Cash

Some traders choose card payments for their convenience, others prefer cash payments because they want to stay under the radar.

When you buy Bitcoin online using your debit or credit card, you still notify your bank and wait for both their approval and that of the exchange. You have to provide personal details and verify your identity. On top of that, you have additional expenses for using their services.

For those Canadian traders looking for a platform that accepts cash, we recommend using a decentralized peer to peer exchange such as LocalBitcoins and Paxful. These platforms list thousands of Bitcoin offers from sellers around the world. In the search engine, you can specify that you’re interested in cash payments only.

Try to find a seller who would either accept to meet with you in person so you can pay them in cash, show the receipt to the exchange, and get your Bitcoins; or, if the seller lives further away or doesn’t feel comfortable with a public meetup, they can give you their bank details so you can make a cash deposit at the bank.

Another option to buy Bitcoin with cash is to use one of the 800 Bitcoin ATMs available in various locations in Canada. Visit Coin ATM Radar and use its interactive map to find the closest ATM to you and check whether they accept cash payments.

Buy Bitcoin With PayPal

PayPal is an American payment service that’s becoming very popular around the world as a cheaper alternative to debit cards. When you’re using a card issued by well-established companies like Visa or MasterCard, you pay high card fees as well.

There are a lot of PayPal users in Canada and a great deal of them are trading Bitcoin. Therefore, it’s only natural for them to look for ways to use their PayPal balance when buying crypto assets.

Unfortunately, the risk of chargeback fraud has resulted in low support for this type of payment on crypto exchanges. The only digital marketplaces that allow users to pay with PayPal are peer to peer exchanges. Here, buyers can look for sellers who accept PayPal payments specifically.

Canadian traders are welcome to use Quebex, a Canadian-based peer to peer exchange where they can find local Bitcoin sellers much faster. Otherwise, they can use global P2P exchanges like LocalBitcoins or Paxful.

Buy Bitcoin With Another Crypto

Bitcoin has laid the foundation for over 1,000 different crypto assets or “altcoins” that you can purchase today. They are created to address Bitcoin’s shortcomings or to fulfill different tasks as utility and service tokens.

Some traders decide to invest in altcoins because they want to diversify their portfolio. Others like buying them when their price is still low and patiently holding onto them to cash out in the future.

At some point, however, they might decide to trade them against Bitcoin. If you want to buy Bitcoin using another crypto, the best exchanges to do that are Binance or Bittrex. What you need is a high-volume exchange with a decent level of liquidity, which is exactly what Binance and Bittrex are known for.

Moreover, you have to be sure they support a variety of cryptocurrencies. For example, Binance supports over 150 tokens with 450 trading pairs, while Bittrex lists around 100 crypto assets and over 300 trading pairs. Simply deposit your altcoins, find your trading pair, and insert the amount of Bitcoin you want to purchase.

As far as trading fees are concerned, Binance has an average fee of 0.1% per trade which can be lowered down if you’re paying the fee with the exchange’s native token BNB.

Buy Bitcoin Anonymously

Cybersecurity threats are common in the crypto business, which is why you should always be careful with your choice of trading platform and look for one that complies with AML and CTF policies set by local financial regulators.

These guidelines and regulatory frameworks advise crypto exchanges to perform KYC checks on all their customers, especially when making fiat deposits and withdrawals. This means that you can’t buy Bitcoin anonymously on centralized exchanges unless you want to trade it against another crypto. Even this has its drawbacks as you’re not allowed to withdraw large amounts of BTC if your identity hasn’t been verified.

If you don’t think it’s safe to disclose your identity on online platforms and provide them a copy of your ID, then you can take a look at the existing options to buy Bitcoin anonymously.

You can either use a Bitcoin ATM – one that doesn’t take your photograph for verification and supports cash transactions – or a decentralized peer to peer exchange like LocalBitcoins, Quebex, or Paxful. These options are far from ideal – BATMs incur high fees, while P2P exchanges have low limits.

Buying Bitcoin OTC (Over-The-Counter)

Cryptocurrency exchanges continuously add new features to satisfy the trading needs of their versatile clientele. However, they’re still primarily focused on retail traders or moderate investors as opposed to institutional investors who purchase large amounts of Bitcoin at once.

So if you’re looking for the best platform to buy over $100,000 worth of Bitcoin, we recommend using a Bitcoin OTC desk instead.

The advantages these platforms offer range from more privacy when making your order as they’re in a way decentralized and non-custodial, a large number of offers, and most importantly, high liquidity to place the order in the first place.

You might have noticed that if you place a big order on a regular crypto exchange, you might end up buying a combination of low and high price orders and get an average price, much higher than the one you’ve agreed on. This is known as “slippage” and can be avoided using an OTC desk where you buy Bitcoin at a fixed rate.

You can choose between OTC desks like Circle, ItBit, and Genesis or the smaller OTC desks offered by already established centralized exchanges like Kraken and Bitbuy for example.

How to Store Bitcoin

It’s important not to make the common mistake and buy Bitcoin before you find a proper wallet to store them in. The Bitcoin wallet doesn’t actually hold your coins, as they’re intangible and virtual, but stores your private key, an encrypted address that gives you access to your Bitcoin balance.

The most common types of wallets are the software wallets/mobile wallets, which should be downloaded and installed on your computer. They’re user-friendly and convenient, and you have the responsibility to protect your computer from malware.

Another popular wallet is the online wallet or cloud-based crypto wallet that you can use on your computer or smartphone. They’re provided by custodial crypto exchanges or other third-party platforms. The main drawback is that you have to rely on the platform’s security measures to keep your private key safe so its ideal to only use this to store your coins temporarily.

On the other hand, for a long-term storage solution, the most secure wallet is the hardware Bitcoin wallet. These are often referred to as cold storage wallets, this is a device that looks like a USB stick and stores your private key offline, minimizing the chances of hacking attacks and malware. When you activate the device, you also get a recovery phrase in case you lose the wallet.

Hardware wallets aren’t free but they’re definitely good value for money. Our top hardware wallet picks are Ledger Wallet Nano S, Ledger Wallet Blue, and Trezor.

Other Places To Buy Digital Assets

There are other exchanges that are popular all over the world, however they aren’t really recommended for Canadian users. However, they are still worth mentioning here as they can be a convenient way to buy Crypto using US dollars. The two most popular exchanges would be Coinbase and Gemini.

Frequently Asked Questions