After Bitcoin, Ethereum (ETH) is the second largest cryptocurrency to buy by market capitalization. But how to buy Ethereum? In this article we explain how you can easily sell or buy Ethereum online.
Before you ask yourself whether an investment in Ether is worthwhile, you should first consider a few other aspects carefully. In principle, one should be clear about the goal of an investment in Ether. The possibility to get rich fast with ether is probably not (anymore) given. But we can reassure you. Patient traders can still make good profits with Ether. Also a long-term investment in ether can be useful. However, you must be so hard-nosed to be able to endure the sometimes high price volatility. Numerous experts forecast rising prices especially in the long term.
For those in a hurry: How to buy Ethereum CFDs in three steps
Before you can buy ETH, the first step is to create an account with a trading platform that supports the currency. Our choice is eToro. Here, opening an account is particularly easy and doesn’t even require verification for trades up to $2,000. Furthermore the provider is state-regulated and therefore subject to deposit protection. To open an account you just need to enter your personal details in the login form on the start page.
Now you will receive an email from eToro with a link that you need to confirm. Then you’re ready to go.
To top up your trading account with real money you have to click on the “Deposit money” button at the bottom left. This will open a window where you can select the desired payment method, such as instant bank transfer.
Depending on the chosen method, the payment can now be made and the trading account can be topped up.
If the deposit was successful, the new account balance is now displayed at the bottom of the screen.
With it now the desired currency, in this case ETH CFDs, can be bought. The easiest way is to enter the currency in the search field and thus find it. Now in the purchase field the desired adjustments can be made. Here it is also determined for you how many Ethereum buy.
If you do not want to trade real Ethereum but rather CFDs, these can also be found via the search field.
67% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money. Cryptoassets are highly volatile unregulated investment products with no EU investor protection.
What is Ethereum (ETH)?
Before we answer the question of what Ethereum is, it is helpful to know the basic idea of the internet. The Internet was developed with the aim of creating a decentralized platform for information. Today, however, much of our personal information is stored on other computers – on servers or in the cloud – at a few companies such as Google, Facebook or Apple.
However, as we have seen in recent years and months, this data is threatened by various interest groups (hackers etc.). Ethereum is a technology that supports the idea of a decentralized Internet. It is based on the Blockchain technology.
Here is an example: Some of us may use online document services or online work platforms to work together on projects. Others store their data such as their photos, insurance letters, invoices, etc. in the Microsoft or Apple cloud. We therefore transfer our data to third parties and trust both the privacy and integrity of the data.
Whether this is really guaranteed cannot be checked by us. Ethereum’s vision is that the same functionality as Google, Apple and Facebook will be created through new decentralized applications based on Ethereum technology, which will return control of our data to us, the owners of the data. No one other than the owner can then access the data or make changes to it. More about this and the technical background later.
How does Ethereum work?
Ethereum wants to decentralize the Internet and break up the current client-server model. But how is this to work? The servers and clouds will be replaced by nodes provided by the community around the world, forming a “world computer”. Ethereum is thus a distributed public block chain network. The central component is the Ethereum Virtual Machine (“EVM”), a computer architecture emulated by many connected computers, on which a public block chain is executed.
Access is provided by various Ethereum clients with which one can participate in the block chain. They are part of a network consisting of many nodes: each node of the network runs the Ethereum virtual machine, executing the same instructions. However, this parallelization of computing is not intended to speed up computing power, but is used to maintain consensus on the block chain. On the one hand, this consensus enables a very high fault tolerance and minimization of downtime (towards zero), on the other hand, it guarantees the immutability of the block chain.
The actual Ethereum price
How to buy Ethereum - trade ETH?
If you want to purchase genuine Ethereum, you should look for a suitable crypto exchange. If you prefer to bet on ETH CFDs, a reputable online broker will help you.
In both cases, you should pay attention to the transparency of the offer and the seriousness of the provider. The crypto market is booming and new offers appear on the market almost daily. For newcomers it can be quite difficult to keep track of the large offer. Unfortunately there are many fraudulent offers and scams among the many really good exchanges and brokers. For your own safety, it is important to research thoroughly before investing, what you should look out for when making your choice and what possibilities the various offers should offer you, you will find out now.
Differences between Ethereum CFD brokers and stock exchanges
CFD brokers
- Regulated by government & depositor protection
- No complicated setup of a wallet necessary
- Leveraged trading possible
- Several deposit and withdrawal options
- Mobile Trading: Apps for Android & iOS available
- Demo account
- Only possession of a certificate, not (ETH)
- Obligation could raise to make additional contributions
- Risky investment
Stock exchanges
- Real ownership of genuine ETH
- Learning how to handle crypto currencies
- (Partial) trading via leverage possible
- (Partial) Mobile Trading: Apps for Android & iOS
- Wide range of crypto currencies on offer
- Whoever wants to hold ETH in the long term has an advantage here in terms of fees
- No regulation & deposit insurance
- You are responsible for the administration of the keys yourself
- Risky investment
The difference between real Ethereum (ETH) and Ethereum CFDs
Since there are two ways to buy ETH, there are therefore also two different types of Ethereum buy investments:
- Brokers trade Ethereum CFDs, as financial instruments that use the ETH price as a basis
- With stock exchanges, one trades with “real” Ethereum
Benefits to use a Broker
Functionality: When you buy Ethereum CFDs, you bet on the performance of the coins and do not receive any real coins. You do not own this crypto-currency in its physical-digital form, but rather deal with the price development. You can imagine the whole thing like this: If the ETH price rises or falls, your CFD also rises or falls. You can choose the ETH price in a 1:1 ratio or work with a lever.
Leverage: For example, if you use a leverage of 10, then your CFD rises and falls 10 times as much as the actual ETH price. This has the advantage that your profit is also 10 times as high. The disadvantage is that this CFD leverage is also associated with great risks.
If you do not cope with price fluctuations and excitement so well, the CFDs are perhaps not the right investment for you.
Top 3 Broker to buy Ethereum CFDs
5/5 | Our first choice for crypto broker | ||
Trading leveraged products such as CFDs carries a significant risk of loss and may not be suitable for all investors. 76.4% of individual investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money. | |||
4.5/5 | Award winning trading platform | ||
Trading leveraged products such as CFDs carries a significant risk of loss and may not be suitable for all investors. 67% of individual investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money. | |||
4/5 | Broker since 1997 and 2.2M customers | ||
Trading leveraged products such as CFDs carries a significant risk of loss and may not be suitable for all investors. 83% of individual investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money. |
How stock exchanges work
Ethereum Token: Buying Ethereum coins has the great advantage that you can hope to increase the value of the currency here. If ETH is developing as rapidly as Bitcoin, an investment could definitely be worthwhile at this point in time. Because at the moment prices are low and hopes are high. To store your coins safely, you need a wallet. When choosing your wallet, make sure you choose a reputable provider.
Crypto bots: this way you can see ETH coins as a long-term investment or you can sell them on at the next possible high, i.e. actively trade them. Here too, there are opportunities for profits. You can also leave trading to a crypto bot. These crypto trading robots are becoming increasingly popular on the crypto scene because they take over trading fully automatically. The disadvantage is that you do not have to do the trading yourself and trading crypto currencies can be quite exciting!
Top 3 stock exchanges to buy Ethereum
5/5 | Our first choice Crypto Exchange | ||
4/5 | High liquidity and low fees | ||
4/5 | Best known US Bitcoin exchange |
What happens after the purchase of Ethereum ?
So, now you bought your ether. But now what? You face two major challenges to get the most out of your investment. First, of course, you must keep your ethers safe. At a later date, you want to sell your ethers – ideally at a nice profit. We’ll show you the best way to do that right now, right here below.
The storage of genuine Ethereum
If you have bought Ethereum, you need, as already mentioned, a digital wallet. If you have already opened an account at a so-called crypto exchange, you also have such a storage facility – but if you do not have an account at an exchange, you have to look for a wallet provider.
The problem here is that the private key with which the wallet is controlled remains in the possession of the exchange. This means that there is actually a small security risk here. Even if today’s stock exchanges are all at the cutting edge of security technology, this does not mean that a hacker cannot succeed in getting hold of the private key.
The sale of your genuine Ethereum token or Ethereum CFDs
If you want to sell your ETH because the price has risen, they can be offered on an exchange at any time. Due to the fact that you don’t have to offer your token on the exchange where you bought them, you can compare fees in advance. The fees charged by the exchanges differ greatly, so it is advisable to get an overview in advance.
Ethereum - the technology of the future?
Perhaps the biggest trend in the crypto sector in 2020 is the topic of decentralized financial services – decentralized finance. More and more start-ups are offering innovative decentralized financial services, and more and more crypto users want to rely on services such as crypto-saving, crypto-lending and crypto-loans. Almost all DeFi projects, such as the well-known ventures MakerDAO and Uniswap and many more, all build on the Ethereum block chain. The DeFi boom strengthens Ethereum’s candidacy for the King of dApps.
Buying Ethereum is profitable because it allows traders to actually own the coin and trade it easily. This could well pay off in the longer term, as the crypto currency is expected to appreciate massively in value in the coming years. Participating in Ethereum could definitely be a strong game. But to really succeed, you need to learn how to set up a digital wallet, how to exchange Ethereum and how to store it. For this reason, many investors choose a broker that makes it easier to handle such technical details.
Frequently asked questions about how to trade Ethereum
Ethereum is a blockchain protocol founded in 2014 by Vitalik Buterin, which has its own cryptocurrency: Ether. Ether is therefore the crypto-currency of the Ethereum blockchain. It has some similarities with Bitcoin, especially the fact that it is operated by a network of miners. These Miners are paid for providing computing power with a network’s own crypto currency: Ether.
However, Ethereum also has its own properties that distinguish it from Bitcoin. The Ethereum block chain is called the “second-generation block chain” because it offers many more possibilities. It has its own programming language -Solidity – which can be used to program automatically executable contract conditions, so-called Smart Contracts, and on which the Ethereum blockchain can be executed. In addition, entire applications that run locally – decentralized apps can be written for the Ethereum blockchain. This feature was revolutionary when it was introduced, because it offers a wide variety of exciting applications.
If you are toying with the idea of investing your money in ETH, you will ask yourself at the beginning how secure the trade is at all. At this point it must be said that the market is extremely volatile – price jumps are simply part of it. This means that the price can rise or fall 15 percent overnight.
If you want to invest your money in crypto-currencies, especially in stellar lumens, you will need nerves of steel. It’s also important to follow the news and watch the markets – in other words, to see how they react to various events.
In order to buy Ethereum, you must register with a stock exchange or broker, so registration is obligatory.
Despite the great predictions for the crypto world, you should not forget that investing in cryptocurrencies involves a high risk. The high volatility does not exist in any other speculative investment objects. Although the ETH share price seems to be quite stable, even inconspicuous news can have a quite strong influence on the performance. The crypto market is sensitive, yet more and more people are abandoning conventional investments and prefer to invest in the promising crypto currencies.
Only you can decide whether or not you want to buy Ethereum (ETH).
For all open questions: Ethereum is only at the beginning, in its second of four phases, and therefore has enormous potential for development. It has the chance to become the programmable money of the future. To achieve this, however, the tasks described above, among others, must be solved. There is also a need for strong cohesion in the Community, which must support the changes to be implemented. The potential is definitely there.
Our Choice | Safer Crypto Trading | ||
Governmental regulation Extensive trading platform Diverse deposit options | |||
eToro is a multi-asset platform offering CFD and non-CFD products. 67% of individual investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money. |
Disclaimer All content on our website is for information purposes only and does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell. This applies to assets as well as products, services and other investments. The opinions expressed on this site do not constitute investment advice and independent financial advice should be sought whenever possible. This website is not intended for use in jurisdictions where the trading or investment described is prohibited and should only be used by persons and in a manner permitted by law. Your investment may not be eligible for investor protection in your country or country of residence. You should therefore carry out your own due diligence. This website is available to you free of charge, but we may receive commissions from the companies we offer on this website. |
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