Last night, I bought Bitcoin and Ethereum. Whoa, why the heck did Urgen buy Bitcoin and Ethereum? Well, I am having this FOMO thing in my head (Fear of Missing Out). I am only human. Will I regret my decision? Some say fear of missing out is a powerful motivator to make bad investing decisions. Only, time will tell. Just to be 100 percent clear: I want you all to know I am okay with losing this 1K ($1000), okay with this money being flushed in the toilet or however you want to phrase it. Honestly, I believe it is an excellent way to learn about any kind of investment, put in a little bit of money you are willing to lose. This way you will have some skin in the game and is a lot easier to focus your attention and then, learn how it works especially if you are a millennial like me. When you are in your 40’s, 50’s, and 60’s you will already have some kind of exposure.
However, please don’t do this, people are mortgaging their homes to buy Bitcoin. Total Insanity. Plus, please keep this stuff far away from your retirement fund. My advice would be to spend atleast 20 hours reading about blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies. There are also lots of YouTube videos online where you can learn if you are a total newbie. You will easily find hundreds of articles online explaining cryptocurrencies are illegal, are primarily known as a currency for online drug dealers, it is a bubble. There is some truth to it but everything you hear is always not true. There is so much information especially in the online world, you need to do your homework and make your own damn decision. Bill Gates, Richard Branson, Mark Cuban, et cetera all had good things to say about Bitcoin. In contrast, Warren Buffett, Elon Musk and Ray Dalio think otherwise. They are saying it is a bubble. Many have rightly drawn comparisons with past economic bubbles such as the tulip mania and the dotcom bubble in the late 1990s. I don’t want to talk about the tulip mania but think back what it was like in 1990s with the Internet. Everyone was saying Internet is a fad but obviously, it’s an integral part of our life right now. Sure, the vast majority of the companies from the dotcom bubble doesn’t exist anymore but remember some do. Fuck, in 1994, when Jeff Bezos said he was going to start Amazon, people said it was a scam, it was a fad, etc etc. Well, guess what Bezos reached a net worth of $100 billion this year. I believe blockchain will be a very important technology going forward and cryptocurrencies are here to stay but I don’t know which one will be the next amazon.
It could be Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin or one of the other hundreds of cryptocurrencies available. Again, spend some time researching and make your own decision. But, I will say this – everything has to evolve. I don’t think we will be using cash and credit cards as a form of payment forever. No way. Additionally, some argue that they will never ever use blockchain because they just don’t understand how it actually works. K, how many of you actually understand how the Internet works? Are you using the Internet? (Spoiler alert: Yes, you are).
How to buy Bitcoin and Ethereum?
There are a number of online sites such as QuadrigaCX, Coinbase, Kraken and Coinsquare where you can buy Bitcoin and Ethereum. Personally, I used Coinbase so I will walk you guys through the process here.
1.Go to https://www.coinbase.com/
2.Create your account
Your screen will look like this after confirming your email address.
Then, you have to verify your payment method. You can use Visa or Debit. I used Visa. You have to verify your card by entering the amount (in cents) of the two withdrawals as they appear on your card statement. 
I am dumb so I just guessed the amounts for the two boxes on my first couple of attempts. WTF? Rookie Mistake. Had to wait for 24 hours and try again. 
After realizing my silly error, I checked my online visa statement via easyweb and was able to verify my card. Verification was super quick, maybe a couple of minutes. This is one of the reason I choose Coinbase. However, I do have to let you guys know that you can’t currently sell in coinbase using your Canadian bank account. So, you might want to open an account with QuadrigaCX which is based in Vancouver. I plan to do the same in the near future. Coinbase is based in San Francisco. But, the problem with QuadrigaCX is it takes about at least 4 days for verification. My brother has opened an account with QuadrigaCX so I can transfer to his a/c and sell if I want to. But, the plan is not to sell for another 10 years.
Anyhow, after you card is verified, you can start to buy. The weekly limit is $250 so I bought $200 worth of bitcoin and $50 worth of Ethereum. Next week, I plan to do the exact opposite. $200 worth of Ethereum and $50 worth of Bitcoin. Obviously, I am only buying a tiny fraction of both.
Then, you confirm your transaction.
Boom. You bought your bitcoin. Remember bitcoin is limited and finite. In fact, there are only 21 million Bitcoins that can be mined in total.
Same buying process for Ethereum.
At the end, this is how your portfolio screen will look like.
Lastly, if you do plan to open an account through coinbase, I would recommend using this affiliate link where both of us will earn $12 of free bitcoin when you buy $128 of digital currency or more. There’s no shame in asking for help especially when it helps both parties.
That’s it. Happy Holidays 🙂