How to buy Bitcoin and Ethereum

If you've seen the incredible upward momentum of Bitcoin, Ethereum, and other cryptocurrencies, you've maybe also considered getting in on the action. Now, you're gonna learn how. But first, a disclaimer: Bitcoin, Ethereum, and so many of the other cryptocurrencies out there can be a way to pay for stuff online, sure. And they can also be (if they aren't already more popular as) investments. And investments, you might know, can go up and down. You can gain money on them, or lose it. And those values can fluctuate wildly, as you might've also seen lately. To put it simply: proceed with extreme caution. We're not here to tell you whether or not youshould buy it, just to show you how you can pull it off. That said, the rise of cryptocurrencies are an exciting moment for technology, and even if you don't want to actually buy any, it's worth knowing how it all works. Let's begin where any investment starts—in your own wallet. Just like depositing money in the bank or buying a stock, you keep your cryptocoins in a digital account known as wallet, which lets you store, receive, and send them. But it's a bit more complicated than that, and there's some serious notes of precaution to be aware of with a wallet.




Cryptocurrency won't just magically appear in your wallet out of thin air. You've gotta buy it, first. There are several ways to do that, but the easiest is to exchange a fiat currency—dollars, euros, pounds, etc—for some cryptocurrency. And the easiest place to do that is at an exchange. Think of a cryptocurrency exchange as a stock market for crypto. You register for it, deposit your fiat currency of choice, and then, you can buy yourself some crypto. But the cryptocurrency market is still pretty new—and it's not bound by the same laws and regulations as the stock market. So before you do anything else, remember this: