Cryptocurrency trading from the get go! Newbie to Newbie.

Hi Steemit community,
my name is Thomas and I recently signed up to a Bitcoinwallet and basically got my basement for doing transactions on the crypto currency market. That is mainly what i want to share with you in this Post to help other newbies getting into the game.
It all started with two good friends of mine Hive account@masterthematrix and Hive account@eutetico who recently told me about the block chains and showed me Steem as and example. I instantly signed up though I have never been an active member of the whole social media stuff. From that day on I spent almost all of my spare time getting into the crypto currency market. (Sounds long but was actually on the 18th of June.)
In my near enviroment I start to feel like an ambassador of the whole blockchain thing though i only participate for some days now, just to get a picutre of how enthusiastic I am about these whole new opportunities. The volantility of the market is awesome, gamechanging ideas, and interesting applications got me. I have been trading CFD's for quite some time so i know how to read charts, red some books about marketanasysis and psychology throughout my time at the stockmarkets. Thats basically all knowledge i bring to cryptos.

Ok, lets get started.
Understand what you Invest your hard earned money in! Read something like this to get some basic info about Blockchains.
This is an article of Collin Thompson (Blockchain Product Designer & Growth Marketer) called How does the Blockchain Work (for Dummies) explained simply
https://medium.com/the-intrepid-review/how-does-the-blockchain-work-for-dummies-explained-simply-9f94d386e093
So far so good, got to get my feed wet. Where to sign up?
In order to trade with Altcoins meaning all crypto currencys other than Bitcoin you need to get Bitcoins first. (It is possible to get some currencies "directly" but just a few.) What that means is that your Altcoin is connected to the Bitcoin witch is in my opinion a pain in the as! Besides that Bitcoin itself varys in value you need to walk this way: buy Bitcoin - get Altcoins - make profit :wink: - trade your Altcoins for Bitcoins and the Bitcoins for your Euros or Dollars witch means fees fees fees. (please correct me if got something wrong)
So the first thing you need obviously is an account to store your Bitcoins called Wallet.
I tried http://blockchain.info . The rates are quite good and if you Sign up you will get a wallet as well. I did one transaction just to check rates and fees. I spend 50€ and got 49.92€ worth of BTC. witch is around 2% fees. After doing this I wanted to get a decent transaction, but it takes 7 days before the account at Blockchain.info is totally verified. So I got to wait.
http://kraken.com is good way transfer your real money (called fiat) because their Bitcoin price and fees are reasonable. Only problem, it takes a lot of time to be verified, 2 to 4 weeks! I Signed up.
I tried https://anycoindirect.eu/de they offer 13 crypto currencies to buy and sell. Quite nice but their fees and buying prices are off the hook. Before the real verification you can easily get 100€ worth of Bitcoin, witch i did today at one BTC(Bitcoin) is 2490€ while kraken is 2332€. Ok just got 100€ but won't advise anybody to buy there. I have 90€ worth of bitcoins so i lost 10%.

Ok, I have a BTC wallet. A small amount of BTC (waiting to do a bigger transaction). whats next?
Signing up at some trading platforms.

http://poloniex.com - nice interface and an decent amount of currencies to trade with. Signed up.
http://bittrex.com - not that nice but a s... load of Cryptos to trade. I think they got them all. Signed up.

I advise you to get the Google Authenticator witch gives you an extra security for your logins!
To not get crazy on all this new logins and passwords i am using Truecrypt on my desktop-pc in order to store accountinformations on an external sd-card. I personally feel comfortable with this solution.

Ready to do some test trades.
A big nice platform to get good overview on all those crytos is https://coinmarketcap.com. There you can check the currency you want, read their whitepapers check their website. Get as much Info as you can about a currency as you can!
First few Dollars went into Steemit, for sure just to know how to. I will add some money when my verifyings are done. You can easily do the transaction using your Steemit wallet. ( Press the Arrow next to Steem or Steempower)
After two days i did 4 very small trades, again to know about fees, execution time, limit orders, platforms and so on, two at poloniex and two at Bittrex. To keep track of my portfolio i got the Blockfolio app on my mobile phone. it does it's job but I am still looking for something better. I think i go for https://www.coinigy.com on my desktop first - will try it today.

Thank you guys for you attention and I hope it helps somebody to do his first steps. On the other hand in case you know better trading-platforms / places to open a Bitcoin wallet and so on please let me know in the comment section. I do appreciate everything which helps me and my fellow newbies on our journey into crypto currency trading.

I am new to cryptos and have to read very much in order to do arguable decisions and investments. I think right now I will do a Blog of my journey into Crypto currency trading in order to share my experience. Stay tuned!

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