So, I found myself with some spare cash and immediately decided to buy extra Bitcoin. Living the expat life in Germany without a passport, I wanted to share my journey, especially since more folks are ditching Binance these days. Hopefully, my experience helps someone out there.
Now, I've been championing four services for Bitcoin buys, kinda no-KYC style (you know:). But let's be real, true no-KYC only happens at meetups or through mining. Anyhow, here's my list, in no particular order:
- Relai (relai.app) (use code REL35668)
- 21Bitcoin (21bitcoin.app) (use code 39PDA)
- Coinfinity (coinfinity.co)
- Pocket (pocketbitcoin.com)
Within the 950 EUR daily limit, life's good with these apps. But if you're feeling a bit more adventurous and want to go beyond that, brace yourself.
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Relai: Want to go big? Upgrade to Account Level 2. But, here's the catch - only certain nationalities can do it. So, even if you're a permanent resident like me, no passport, no upgrade.
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21Bitcoin: Quick 2000 EUR transfers? No problem. But try going higher, and suddenly your money's on lockdown. They hit you with some personal questions about where the money's from, and you've got to play detective with all the supporting documents. Took me a few extra days to sort that out, but no more questions after that.
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Coinfinity: Tested the waters with a 10K transaction, got my Bitcoin within 48 hours, no interrogations. Went back later, and there was a warning about hitting the total transaction limit. No clue what the max is, so I left it be. Still use them for lightning with those instant SEPA transfers, like 2-3 minutes, and you're set.
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Pocket: 950 EUR daily limit and no way to crank it up. Ran out of money by then, so not a big deal.
In the grand scheme of things, I'd recommend Coinfinity for those speedy lightning buys and 21Bitcoin for the moderate BTC splurges. I get it, the whole no-KYC allure is strong, and I was a Relai fan myself (and still am, love those guys), but the process got a bit too fancy for this expat.
So, that's my two sats for you โ hope it adds a dash of real-life flavor to your Euro Bitcoin escapade!
And yes, was edited by Chat GPT a bit, but just a bit;)