Buy Vechain (VET)

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Vechain

Vechain is a blockchain as a service (BAAS) platform that specializes in decentralized supply chain management and logistics. Vechain was founded by former CIO of Louis Vuitton China (a brand owned and ran by multi-billion dollar conglomerate LVMH), Sunny Lu, an executive with first hand experience and knowledge on the importance of product verification (especially when it comes to luxury brands).

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Vechain was designed mainly to be a platform where developers can create smart contracts or decentralized applications and use third party verification to track and prove their legitimacy across the supply chain. Vechain is partnered with and backed by some of the most respected and dominant players in their fields, such as DNV GL, PWC, Deloitte, Walmart China, and many, many more.

For the majority of these partnerships, Vechain is focused on optimizing product transparency, authenticity, and user trust by offering provably decentralized third party verification. Decentralized verification is a necessary tool to build trust in this process, as the producing party is incentivised to report in their favor, so a third party system mitigates this potential risk.

Vechain actually has 2 cryptocurrencies in its decentralized ecosystem; the first is VET, which gives users proportional control over a part of the entire network, allowing users to participate in staking. The next coin is VTHO, or the ‘gas’ of the network that is earned by staking VET and used to pay for network transaction fees.

 As a business tool, the creators of Vechain understood the tradeoffs necessary when running a decentralized versus centralized organization, so they combined aspects of both when creating the VeThor Platform, their blockchain network.

Vechain is a proof of stake platform, meaning users can “stake” their VET in order to act as a node and take part in the verification process for a reward. There are different levels of nodes where the higher you stake the larger percentage of the payout reward you receive. At the highest level, there are 101 nodes, all pre-selected and run by partner organizations such as DNV GL and others. This is where the semi-centralized aspects come in, as the highest decision making power isn’t delegated to one specific entity,  but all of the major stakeholders at the highest node level. Since many of the organizations building on the Vechain platform are massive companies, they feel more comfortable with reputable decision makers having the final say compared to a random community of enthusiasts.

VeChain App Interface
The Vechain mobile application preparing to scan and verify a products authenticity.(reddit.com)

How to Buy Vechain

If this is your first time purchaing Vechain, the first thing you have to do is register and log into a cryptocurrency exchange that offers Vechain to its users. There are many reputable exchanges that offer Vechain, so choose the one that fits your needs best and get started!

Buy Vechain with Credit or Debit Card

Vechain has really solidified itself as the preeminent decentralized supply chain solution, and because of that has a current market cap hovering right around $1 billion dollars. This large market cap makes it quite accessible to traders who want to buy, sell, and hold Vechain using a variety of methods. For all of these examples, we will be talking about buying VET, not VTHO, so make sure you are purchasing the right Vechain based cryptocurrency during your transaction.

If you would like to use a debit or credit card to make your purchase, first make sure you are registered to a cryptocurrency exchange with a fiat currency so you are allowed to make the purchase. At this point, once you verified you can complete the transaction, all you need to do is go to the credit and debit card section, find the right cryptocurrency you want to purchase, and execute the trade. 

Buy Vechain Using Paypal

Paypal, co-founded by SpaceX and Tesla billionaire Elon Musk, is one of the most widely used financial transaction services on the globe, and a service that many people prefer to use when interacting and making payments online. This has led to many wanting to use their Paypal account to initiate cryptocurrency purchase. Like with making any cryptocurrency purchase, the first thing you need to do is find an exchange that accepts Paypal as a means of payment. Since you will be paying with fiat currency, there will most likely be a lot more regulatory scrutiny around the exchange, offering you additional layers of protection.

Unfortunately, the exchanges that offer users the ability to use Paypal to conduct their purchase, such as eToro, do not offer VET as a tradable asset.  This means that if you need to use PayPal to conduct your Vechain purchase, you will have to use another payment method to obtain VeChain

Buy Vechain Using Bank Transfer

Even though bank transfers tend to take longer and charge higher transaction fees than a lot of alternative payment methods, bank transfers are still an extremely popular way to conduct online transactions. Luckily for Vechain, it is a large enough coin and has enough attention surrounding it for cryptocurrency exchanges to justify allowing bank transfers as a payment option. Using a variety of exchanges, you can use a bank transfer to transfer fiat currency to your exchange of choice and use that money to trade with Vechain.

Buy Vechain Anonymously

For many users, privacy is of the upmost importance when it comes to their cryptocurrency transactions. That being said, transparency is woven into the nature of many blockchain platforms, so it isn’t always so easy to make private exchanges. Currently, there are no exchanges that allow you to anonymously purchase Vechain, but there are still methods which would allow you to acquire it without being traced.

The first thing you would want to do is create a single use Vechain wallet address that won’t be tied to any of your other wallets or transactions. At this point you have two options, you can use a privacy based cryptocurrency such as Monero and use a decentralized exchange to execute the trade and transfer the Vechain to your new wallet, or you can organize a cash deal with a Vechain seller who will conduct a peer-to-peer transaction with you. Your best bet is to conduct the trade using a privacy coin, decentralized exchange, and one time wallet address, as it may be hard to locate a peer-to-peer Vechain transaction that you are comfortable with making.

Where to Buy Vechain

From a Cryptocurrency Exchange Platform or Broker

If you want to purchase Vechain, the easiest, safest, and fastest way is to purchase it through a cryptocurrency exchange or online broker. These tend to be regulated and managed platforms that offer their users security and transparency when it comes to cryptocurrency trading. Since Vechain is such a dominating and important project in the cryptocurrency space, you have a plethora of different exchange and brokerage options for your purchase. Using a cryptocurrency exchange or broker, you will be able to purchase Vechain using almost any medium you want, such as fiat currency, cryptocurrency, debit or credit card, bank transfer and more. Some exchanges that offer users Vechain are:

As a smart contract platform, Vechain even has its own native decentralized exchange that was built ontop of its protocol, OceanEx.

With Cash

Buying Vechain with cash will be a challenging endeavor, but is not impossible. There are two options when buying cyptocurrencies with cash, peer-to-peer transactions and cryptocurrency exchanges; I will explain the logistics of both.

First off, unfortunately, there are currently no Vechain ATMs. It is possible that there is a cryptocurrency ATM that can offer it in the future since it has such a large market cap, but generally, these ATMs are connected to exchanges and the possibility to purchase Vechain has not been integrated.  On top of that, it may also be challenging to reliably purchase Vechain using cash in a peer-to-peer transaction.

Peer-to-peer transactions are very popular with cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, but there is no infrastructure built around the person to person Vechain trading like there are for other cryptocurrencies. This means that if you want to purchase Vechain using cash you will have to organize the entire deal by yourself. Since it is such a new and potentially lucrative space, there are many scammers that may try to take advantage of a situation like this. This is why it is extremely important to do your own research and be diligent before finalizing any trades. If you are purchasing VET using cash, try to meet the seller face to face in a safe setting and never send or give any money until the VET has shown up in your appropriate Vechain wallet.

Trading

Geographic Restrictions

Trading Vechain is very easy and accessible regardless of where you live around the world. Although Vechain is a cryptocurrency, VET and VTHO are more similar to financial tools than an actual currency, so there are no restricting regulations. Vechain is available for trading, buying, and selling all over the world. The one aspect of regulations you need to consider is the tax implications that your trading will be subject to, as tax regulations on cryptocurrency vary depending on which country you live in. As far as trading goes, you can trade for and with Vechain without worrying about underlying geographic restrictions.

Vechain CFDs

Contracts for Difference, commonly referred to as CFDs, are financial tools, specifically derivative products, that allow users to gain exposure to a market without having to physically own or trade for the underlying asset. CFDs are very common, and can be found for different cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin, but are not available for Vechain. If you would like to have your portfolio gain exposure over the Vechain market, you are going to have to physically purchase VET.

Where to Store Vechain

Like all cryptocurrencies, it is important to store them safely as possible in their available wallet. The least secure level of storage would be to keep your Vechain on the cryptocurrency exchange wallet that you used to trade for the asset. If the cryptocurrency is available to trade then the platform will have a built-in wallet for it. These exchanges are subject to hacks and exploitation, and since they control the wallet private keys it is possible (although unlikely) that your VET could be stolen. The safest way to store your Vechain would be to use a cold storage option. 

Storing VeChain on the VeChain Wallet
Vechain’s easy to use mobile wallet (vechaininsider.com)

One great thing about Vechain is they have an intuitive and easy to use mobile wallet application that gives you full control over your VET and Vechain based coins. You generate private keys and then can create a 6-digit numeric password to protect and lock the app. You can also store your VET using a hardware wallet, such as the Nano Ledger X, which uses cold storage methodologies to create the safest wallet experience.

Why does Vechain have 2 cryptocurrencies (VET and VTHO)?

Vechain utilizes this model to fairly distribute verification rewards. By buying VET, you now have proportional governance abilities in the network, and can stake your VET in order to earn VTHO, or the “gas” of the network that pays for transactions.