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A crypto wallet is created by using an asymmetric algorithm, normally Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC). It generates a pair of keys, known as the public key and private key, which are mathematically related. The public key encrypts things and verifies signatures, and the private key decrypts things and creates signatures. Safeguarding the private key is paramount, as it grants full control over the wallet and its associated funds.
Each wallet needs to have its own identity, which is called an “address”. The address is public, and it is derived from the public key being hashed. Hashing scrambles things so that they cannot be unscrambled. It is a one-way process.
To receive crypto in a wallet, the sender only needs to know the address. To send money out of the wallet, the public key is attached to the data to create the transaction, and the private key is used to sign the transaction which provides cryptographic proof of ownership. The receiving wallet then hashes the public key to verify the sender’s wallet address and then uses that same public key to verify the signature of the transaction to authenticate that the transaction was signed by that wallet.
In the end, when people refer to the “keys” when talking about a crypto wallet, they are talking about the public key and private key pair. Your wallet does not “hold” anything, not even tokens. The wallet can only verify its identity. The ledger shows that wallet 12345 has made 10 transactions and it “owns” or has the right to use 6,789 coins. The only way for those coins to “leave” that wallet or be transacted is by signing a transaction with your private key. If there is no private key, there is no signature, which means no transaction, so no coin/tokens will be “leaving” that wallet. So do not lose your keys, and do not share your keys.
A hot wallet is when your keys are stored on a device that is connected to the internet. This increased the odds of those keys getting stolen or compromised. Cold wallets are devices that store your keys and are not connected to the internet which eliminates the risk of keys being stolen unless the device itself is stolen or when the transfer from hot to cold or cold to hot takes place.
Some exchanges are set up so that you own an account and are given access to their wallet which holds your funds. So, you never truly “own” that crypto in that circumstance which is why you should not store crypto on the exchange.
The risk you take by storing “your” crypto on the exchange is that if the exchanges shut down, are frozen by a government, or have an error, you lose access to those funds. You do not have the keys to their wallet and the transaction history on the ledger has that crypto going to their wallet and not yours.
Remember that the crypto blockchain cannot get shut down, the ledger continues to add transactions, no matter if an exchange disappears. An exchange is just a place to trade fiat currency for cryptocurrency.
So, if your crypto was stored in your wallet instead of the exchange, you have the keys to the wallet, which means you have the ability to sign transactions to use your crypto.
When it comes to cryptocurrency, we currently accept Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Polygon (MATIC), and Solana(SOL).
There are two main ways to get crypto:
The price of our subscription is based on US dollars. The cryptocurrency you choose will be based on that USD price and converted to the cryptocurrency of your choice to equal that USD amount.
In an overly simplified explanation of how crypto works;
Each cryptocurrency has its own ledger (a list of transactions). The ledger is the master/main document that contains all the transactions that have ever taken place.
When a crypto transaction takes place, a new record is created and added to that publicly available document saying wallet #123 moved 456 tokens to wallet #789. This is recorded in the document, other people verify this, which takes 10 to 40+ minutes depending on which cryptocurrency is used, and then it is verified and validated.
The people who verify these transactions are called miners and they receive compensation for the energy and computing resources they use by what is called a “Network”, “Gas”, or “Transaction” fee. Different cryptocurrencies have different Transaction Fees. Bitcoin can have higher transaction fees because it can only have 7 transactions per second. So, there is more competition and incentive to tip or pay a higher fee to get a miner to consider your transaction over another. Some transactions may cost a fraction of a cent, while some may cost $5 or $50. It all depends on the cryptocurrency used and the demand or volume of trading occurring at that point in time.
In the end, we want to recommend a currency that costs you the least. For those who are specifically buying crypto just to purchase our service, we recommend purchasing Polygon(MATIC), or Solana(SOL). Currently, MATIC and SOL has some of the cheapest Network/Transfer Fees out of the crypto we accept.
Since you will be purchasing the crypto and then purchasing our service all in the same hour, you shouldn't be too worried about whether the price is going to drop or go up, or if you even believe in it. If you purchase our service and have some left over, you can then sell it on the exchange.
- Yes. Then you are already familiar with cryptocurrency.
- No. Then you need to become familiar with crypto. Continue on.
If you don’t want to dive deep into cryptocurrency, PayPal made the process a little easier to purchase cryptocurrency. To oversimplify it, make a wallet on the Meta Mask app, then purchase the cryptocurrency Ethereum through PayPal and tell them to send it to your Meta Mask wallet. Then, go and purchase a DPA subscription by scanning the QR code with your Meta Mask app.
To complete the objective of turning fiat currency into cryptocurrency, you need to use an exchange. An exchange is a place where you deposit fiat currency into your exchange account so that you can trade it for the cryptocurrency of your choice. There are many differences when it comes to exchanges, but there are normally three major factors that people consider.
Most of the well-known cryptocurrency exchanges use the custodial wallet type. This is fine, but it is highly recommended that you do not store your cryptocurrency on the exchange.
If you are going to deposit a fiat currency into a cryptocurrency exchange, they will likely require KYC. It is similar to opening a bank account. They will require personally identifiable information like your ID, address, etc… to follow the laws that are required of them depending on the user’s location and/or residency.
If you do not want to participate in or support KYC, you will need to conduct more research for yourself.
If you are using the exchange just to trade crypto to crypto, then KYC may not be required. Only when the trade is fiat to crypto or when you are depositing fiat currency into your exchange account is when KYC is normally required.
When working with exchanges, there are going to be fees. Below will be the different types of fees you will come across:
Keep these fees in mind when you research the exchange you plan to use.
If a person wanted to save as much as they could when it comes to “Gas” or “Transaction” Fees for cryptocurrency transactions, they would have the best odds on the weekends, before 08:00 EST or after 16:00 EST. During the week, Friday after 17:00 tends to be good, and Monday morning before 8:00 is good. Other than that, try to avoid the mornings during the week. Even at 2 in the morning the prices are high. If you have to buy during the week, do so on a Monday or Wednesday night at 22:00.
In short, purchasing between 20:00 and 23:59 on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday night has the best odds of getting the cheapest gas fee price. To verify, check these two websites. These specific links are for ETH gas price charts - https://beaconcha.in/gasnow & https://etherscan.io/gastracker#heatmap_gasprice
Below are examples of how fees are calculated for each currency we accept as payment. The main concept is that the gas/transaction fee does not depend on how much currency is transacted. Only the current demand on the market to get the transaction completed:
BTC = Transaction Size (in bytes) * Fee Rate (sat/B). The normal transaction size is 250 bytes. The average fee rate is 50sat/B. Transaction Fee is measured in “satoshis”. 1 BTC will equal $35,000 for this example.
250 * 50 = 12,500 satoshis → 12500 * .000 000 01 * $35,000 = $4.375 for the transaction fee in USD.
ETH = Gas Limit * Gas Price (in GWEI). The normal gas limit is 21,000. GWEI varies from 4 to 50+. Currently, for the last couple of months when writing this (2024/07/27), a GWEI of 10 or less is easily done. Anything under 5 is possible during slow times like the weekends after 20:00 EST. 1 ETH will equal $3,400 for this example.
21,000 * 10GWEI = 210,000 GWEI → 210,000 * .000 000 001 * $3,400 = $0.714 for the transaction fee in USD.
MATIC = Gas Limit * Gas Price (in GWEI). The normal gas limit is 21,000. Typical GWEI is similar to ETH. We will use 10 GWEI. 1 MATIC will equal $0.55 for this example.
21,000 * 10GWEI = 210,000 GWEI → 210,000 * .000 000 001 * $0.55 = $0.000 115 for the transaction fee in USD.
SOL = Generally fixed, typically less than 0.000 005 SOL per transaction. 1 SOL will equal $177 for this example. The normal purchasing price for users is $44.94 which is .253 898 SOL.
0.000 005 SOL * 0.253 898 SOL = .000 001 269 SOL = $0.000 225 for the transaction fee in USD.
Here is our list of recommended exchanges based on your residency:
United States - Kraken Pro. If you use the “instant purchase” methods, then you will pay a 3% or more fee, but when you use the trading platform that fee is reduced to .4%(Kraken) or less. Do your research. Binance and Crypto.com are also popular options. We no longer recommend Coinbase due to seeing claims of people having their accounts locked and not being able to contact and resolve their issues with customer service in a timely manner.
Outside of the United States - There are many options. We ordered our list based on our experience with their interface, how easy they are to use, and their trading volume. The trading volume greatly plays a role in how easily you can purchase a cryptocurrency and the price at which you can purchase or sell it.
Reasonable mentions to research if you desire: CoinEx, ProBit, MEXC, and Apex
If you plan to really get into cryptocurrency and you take your privacy serious, take a look at Bisq.
There are also mobile apps that make it possible to purchase crypto with a credit card so that may be another possibility.
If you don’t want to dive deep into cryptocurrency, PayPal made the process a little easier to purchase cryptocurrency. To oversimplify it, make a wallet on the Meta Mask app, then purchase the cryptocurrency Ethereum through PayPal and tell them to send it to your Meta Mask wallet. Then, go and purchase a DPA subscription by scanning the QR code with your Meta Mask app.
Please do your research. In the end, we want you to understand how crypto works, and be comfortable using it. Once you have everything created, then it is ready to use for any future crypto purchases or investments.
We currently accept Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Polygon (MATIC), and Solana(SOL).
When you are ready, view the Pricing Page to purchase your subscription with cryptocurrency.