Into the world of Crypto Trading in India

So, You all might have heard about Bitcoin and the fomo behind the crypto currencies. Even though Crypto currencies were started in the year of 2009, it had very limited exposure in India. Mostly because of the fair warnings by RBI about the crypto bubble that is rising, and for some one like me who were born in this developing nation would really know the value of each paise you make and don't want to risk it on something so unpredictable. Even though from 2015, companies like UNOCOIN started their crypto exchanges, I never thought about this until early 2018 when Bit coin hit the all time high. Without thinking much and just after reading the basics of crypto currencies, I started an account in Uno Coin and invested a very small amount , just like a toe dipping in the ocean. Unfortunately, I jumped into the train on totally wrong time and let's say, I lost 60% of my money invested. Anyway the RBI ban on crypto currencies in that year in the month of April solidified my thought that cryptos were never a good investment.

Even though I burned my tongue in the first trial, I was little excited when the Supreme Court of India ruled in favour of Crypto currencies in the month of March 2020. At the exact moment, COVID happened , and this gave me some extra time on some research to this new interest. As i am working in financial sector, I was keen on learning about this and doing it right. But after reading a lot of articles and watching a lot of videos (a lot of them are waste by the way), I got a feeling that, I am too late on this trend. If you also stumbled upon this article , while doing your research on jumping into the crypto train, let me assure you that you are not too late.

Ok... So after that little big introduction, let's get to the point. I am writing this blog, so that it will help to save some time for those who are just like me who want try their hand in the crypto world, but is afraid/ hesitant to jump in. Let me remind you, unless you try, you are never going to learn. Moreover you will have that regret, if Crypto currencies become the next big thing in future, and you were afraid to exploit it. In order to buy Crypto Currencies in India, You should have an account in Exchange houses like Unocoin, WazirX, Zebpay , Coinswitch and Coin DCX. If you are planning to invest in a big amount in crypto currencies, I would suggest you to have a separate Crypto wallet other than that of exchange houses., because by that way, it will be more secure. If you didn't knew much about crypto currencies , I think the above part may be little confusing. But for those who want to know about crypto wallets, my next blog will be about that. So please go through that. Even though most of the above provide similar services, I would like to do a comparison among some of those exchange apps , that I have used.

Unocoin, being the first app I used to buy my first Bitcoin, let's start there. Once you register, you have to send your KYC details along with Bank details, to get the account activated. The only crypto currencies available on Unocoin are Bitcoin, Ethereum and Tether. You can deposit INR into Unocoin via NEFT/RTGS/ IMPS/ UPI or using Mobikwik wallet. Mobikwik wallet charges you 2% extra for depositing where as NEFT/ RTGS /IMPS takes time to get updated in your account for the UNOCOIN to validate your reference number and add the money to your account. The price of Bitcoin or any ethereum in Unocoin is on the higher side compared to Wazirx and Zebpay which provides the similar services. Also Unocoin only has the feature to Buy/sell at spot rate. They have introduced Unodex which is a trading platform, which I have not tried out yet. They also have the feature called SBP (Systematic Buying plan) where you can buy daily/weekly/monthly, a fixed amount of Bitcoin /ethereum, which is a very good way to average out the uncertainty of price fluctuations. For those who want to know more about benefits of systematic purchase , I am planning to write an article about that too in the near future. Once you purchase any Crypto currencies, in unocoin, either you have the option to leave it in the wallet provided by unocoin and sell it when the price increase or to withdraw the crypto currencies to your other wallets. This is the part where I prefer other apps more than Unocoin. According to my observation , the difference between buy price and sell price in Unocoin is on the higher side. This makes us to wait more to make even a small profit while during the trading. They charge almost 0.7% over each trade and if you traded a significant amount of transactions for more than 60 days they will convert you into gold membership but still you have to shell out 0.5% as charges. Moreover they charge 25/- for imps withdrawal and 15/- for NEFT. It's little too big when compared to zebpay and wazirx. But for a beginner, unocoin's interface is the easiest when you get into the crypto world. If you found out that this blog was useful for you in some way and return me a favour for my unbiased review and you want to try out Unocoin, please use my reference U-776401. By using my Referral, I will be getting 15% of your trading commission. Similarly you can also refer your friends to get some referral bonus. But I would suggest you to try out the other options as soon as you get a pretty good idea about the crypto currencies.

The next one in the line was zebpay. Even though I deposited my first amount into zebpay with a little doubt due to the fact that even though it was one of the earliest crypto exchange houses in India, They were one of the first few to stop its operation after the RBI Ban. But they have returned back to the market with a new management after the ban was lifted. But frankly saying, I was impressed by the experience. First of all, creating an account, kyc verification and account verification is easy and so fast. I signed up to zebpay on a saturday evening and i expected to get my account verified on the next working day. But I was astonished when they verified my account on Sunday itself. I had also started an account in wazirx to test it out but 3 days afterwards my wazirx was not verified.compared to Unocoin, zebpay provides a great choice in crypto currencies. A lot of coins are available for trade. Both trade with limit/ market and stop loss option is also a plus point for zebpay. In case if you don't know limit, market and stop loss, which are common terms in share trading , Limit means you can set a particular value and amount of coins you want to purchase/ sell and the app purchases/ sell the coin when that particular value reaches. Stop loss means you can set a limit for the maximum loss you can survive thus if the market goes in the opposite way you expected, it will sell the coins at the limit you set , so that you will control the loss .Market means you purchase/sell the coin at current market rate. Coming to the charges, charges to deposit money to zebpay is absolutely free. They have mentioned they will charge Rs.10/- for NEFT/RTGS/IMPS in future but still UPI is free. Withdrawal of INR will cost you 10/- but still its cheaper. The buy price and sell price difference is one of the smallest I have seen in the Indian Market and the charges taken by zebpay is maximum .25% . But for intra trade its just 0.1%, which are reasonable if you consider with crypto exchanges in the world. But zebpay charges a 0.001 BTC which is equivalent to 60 Rs. per month as "wallet security charges" , if you haven't done even a single transaction in that month. It's a creepy way to make sure people trade using their system, but still we can let go of it.But people's trust is something they have to earn. So if you wish to join zebpay, please use my referral RFR74501081. According to zebpay referral system, if some one joined using your referrals, you will get 50% of their trading fees for one year. So thats a nice motivation to invite some one who are really into trading.

So after 5 business working days of creating an account, Wazirx has verified my KYC and bank details, which when compared with zebpay is too slow. Even though my first impression about Wazirx was not good enough, waxirx had surprised me with the number of crypto currencies you can trade and the features.. Compared to zebpay, charges are less in wazirx if you trade wisely. Why I said that because, the trading charges in wazirx is 0.2% but if you pay charges using Wazirx tokens , which is a crypto created by them, there is 50% discount. There is also no monthly membership fees like zebpay. Moreover you have the option of p2p where you can directly buy USDT coins from other sellers without the interference of exchange. They also provide STF or smart token fund which is somewhat equivalent to mutual funds. You purchase tokens of different traders who infact trade using your money , which will increase the value of token as per the profit they make . Whenever you require the money back, you can sell the smart token and take your money back. Wazirx will charge 25% of the profit you made through this. This is a great option who are afraid of trading but want to make profit out of cryptos. I haven't tried this feature till now but planning to do soon.If you are interested to try out Wazirx, you can install the same from https://wazirx.com/invite/e98amk4u or use my code e98amk4u. If you refer your friends using your referral code, you will get 50% of the trading charges of your friend. Wazirx also provide good perks to invite your friends ti Wazirx.

I have also tried Coin switch , which allows you to trade anonymously as there is no kyc verification and bank account linking. You can fund your account using credit card/debit card and purchase coins. Its a nice feature and fastest way to get into crypto world. but I thought to stick with Wazirx for trading now as I found that little more convenient and profitable compared to others. I hope this article will help you choose the right trading platform for you, when getting into the crypto world. Lets hope RBI wont kill the Crypto buzz in India again and this turns to be successful alternative investment/trading option.