Disclaimer: The following is for informational purposes only and is not intended as financial or investment advice. You should not rely on this information as a substitute for professional guidance tailored to your personal circumstances. I am not a financial advisor, and the views expressed here are my own and do not represent the advice of a qualified financial professional. Beware, investing involves risks, including the potential loss of principal.
“How do I buy eCash?”
It’s a question I get asked regularly. If you’re lucky enough to have an account with an exchange that lists native XEC (not the fake Bep20 version), you probably don’t need to read this article. But what if you’re one of those unlucky people who doesn’t have access to an XEC friendly exchange? Just use an instant exchange!
Keep in mind using an instant exchange will require a couple of more steps than usual, but are you really going to let that stop you from getting your hands on some cold hard eCash?
First, let’s discuss the difference between buying on a centralized exchange versus an instant exchange. On centralized exchanges you are generally able to deposit fiat currencies like dollars, euros, or won and trade them for whatever cryptocurrency you want. They also let you set limit orders to ensure you are buying and selling at the price you desire. Instant exchanges, on the other hand, typically do not have fiat on/off ramps. Nor do they allow you to set limit orders. Instead, the way instant exchanges work is that you choose which cryptocurrencies you’d like to trade, and they give you the current exchange rate. For example, in the below image I’ve set it to sell 1 BCH in exchange for ~7.67M XEC:
This means that before obtaining your XEC, you will first need to get your hands on some other cryptocurrency like BCH, which is where the extra steps I mentioned earlier come in. The first being having access to an exchange where you can get another cryptocurrency to trade for XEC, and the second being the need to create an eCash wallet where you plan on holding your newly acquired XEC. Please familiarize yourself with private keys and how eCash wallets work before using this method so as not to lose your funds.
Once you’ve created your own eCash wallet, click on exchange and it will take you to another screen asking you to input the eCash address where you would like to receive your funds. This is because instant exchanges are non-custodial, meaning they don’t hold onto your funds:
After you’ve entered your payout address and click next, you will then be shown a qr code and related address telling you where to send your funds. In this case, I would need to send 1 BCH to the address shown and I will be sent ~7.67M XEC to the address I’ve designated. Keep in mind depending on which instant exchange you use, and which trading pair you choose, the time it takes to receive your eCash may vary from anywhere between near instant, to an hour or more if you’re unlucky with block times. You will find a full list of instant exchanges that list XEC on the eCash website.
That’s pretty much it! Personally, I have used about half of the instant exchanges listed on the eCash website and they all worked fine and seem to have excellent customer service. Some will have better rates than others so shop around if you want. My current favorite is Changenow.io since they have a pro version that keeps track of each of your trades and can be helpful for tax reporting purposes. But try them out for yourself and see which work best for you.
Helpful tips:
- Choose a cryptocurrency that has low fees like BCH or LTC so you don’t waste money on transaction fees.
- Whichever cryptocurrency you are using to swap for XEC, send the funds to your own wallet before sending to the instant exchange in case anything goes wrong. That way they can refund you the money to your wallet and not an address owned by your centralized exchange.
- Always start with a small amount first to make sure everything works as expected.
- Keep in mind that some instant exchanges might require a VPN to access or will ask you to KYC if you buy above a certain amount.
Below are some other additional links to help you buy eCash:
scorecard.cash
buyecash.com
e.cash