In our last article, we recommended using Kraken to make your first crypto purchase. In this tutorial, we will set up a new account at Kraken, fund the account, and make our first crypto purchase.
- Go to the Kraken.com website and click on “Create Account”
2. On the next screen, enter your email address, username, password, country of residence and state/province.
3. You will receive a verification email to activate your account. Click on the link in the email to verify. Then go to Sign In to your new account.
4. Once logged in, we are ready to fund the account. Click on the “Funding” link on the top menu and then on the “Deposit” button that is highlighted in blue. From the ensuing popup window, click on “US dollar” in the Cash menu.
5. There are now 2 options to fund deposit money on Kraken. You may fund directly using Plaid, or Fund manually using a wire transfer. Let’s look at the Plaid option first.
6. Click on the “Connect bank account” button. A popup will appear. Click on “Continue”
7. On the next screen, pick the institution you would like to transfer the money from. There are quite a few that are supported by Plaid. Use the search bar to find yours.
8. Click “Continue” and provide your login details for the institution you have selected. Note that Plaid does not store your login credentials.
9. Enter your username and password for your banking institution. There may be additional verification required by your bank such as a one time passcode.
10. Complete the additional verification process and you should receive a success message. Click “Continue”.
11. You are now ready fund your account. On the deposit screen, enter the Deposit amount you wish to transfer to Kraken. Then click on the blue “Deposit USD” button. Then, click “Confirm”.
12. You are now ready to make your first purchase. Click on the search icon directly under the “Trade” menu.
13. A popup window will appear. Click on the “Trade” button next to BTC/USD trading pair.
14. On the Order screen, enter the amount of BTC you wish to purchase. Below, I have entered .1 BTC
15. Next, you have the option to select the Order type from the drop down menu. You may choose to do a market order or a limit order.
16. If you select a market order, you will receive the current price that someone is willing to sell .1BTC to you. If you select Limit price (and enter a price in the limit field), the order will execute at the price that you specify. Click on the “Buy BTC with USD” button and then wait for your order to execute.
17. Click on the “Trades” menu to see if your order has executed. Congratulations! You are now a proud owner of Bitcoin.
