Buying BTC in Canada - User Stories
I have been working with a small group to find the best options for buying and holding BTC if you are a Canadian resident.
We spent a week trying various options before finding a smooth way to buy BTC and download the BTC to a wallet. This is a recount of experiences. Your needs and situation may lead to better alternate choices -- you need to decide on a strategy that is good for your needs.
Buy BTC Online - Best case
Best choice we found, hands down (see below for issues we had with other sites), was Newton.co
With Newton you get good buy/sell spreads. A big plus is Newton allows you to use the Canadian Banking system Interac service to fund your account. Works great, once you learn the secret tricks the banks use (see below) and you, with Interac, you never need to reveal your account number or password to some third party agent. I can't believe that someone would give their bank account number and password to any third party but my bank tells me that people do and that people can lose large amounts of money without recourse.
Newton works great on any purchases and BTC withdrawls. On fiat deposits, the transaction times are a few minutes and on BTC withdrawals, timinig is consistent with BTC blockchain block timing cycles. Of course, your bank and Interac can add huge delays which I discuss below.
Moving BTC is Infinitely Easier Than Moving Fiat Into BTC
Once we got some BTC, moving BTC was infinitely easier and quicker than moving fiat into trading sites to purchase BTC. BTC is a forever store of value.
Holding Your BTC Keys and Storing Off-Line
The Trezor hardware wallet is a clear winner in our option:
The Trezor desktop app has a very clean user interaces. The Model T hardware wallet makes account seed entry as easy as possible with key word completion. Important steps in the setup and wiping of a Trezor always required confirm on the hardware. It would be hard to make a mistake (but no doubt not impossible so please do watch the Trezor how to videos).
The Trezor can be wiped so that the only way to get at your BTC is by restoring the Trezor (or an alternate wallet) from your seed.
We tried restoral to a somewhat popular software wallet but found the experience to be very unsatisfying - it can be done but the user interace on the software wallets we tried was NOT good. The Trezor App UI is hands down the best so we stopped looking for a software wallet.
We have NO reservations regarding Trezor hardware wallets. They just work (we tried several). Nothing more to follow-up on Trezor.
Buy BTC Horror Stories in the Making
Canadian banks can be tricky when funding your Newton account via Interac. You can complete the transaction using the Newton email and the bank app will show you the amount has been debted. But the Newton account shows the transaction as pending, even after 24 hours. The bank stays silent and there is nothing Newton can do about it. Well, the issue has been the bank can silently flags transaction as fraudiant. When I see funding delays, I call the bank, get through to the fraud department and convince them to unblock the transacion and explain, I trust Newton and I accept the risks. Ok, this may be reasonable bank behavior but be warned, if your transaction isn't completing always check with your bank first. In my experience, 100% of the Newton account funding were the result of bank silently blocking transactions.
We tried Binance but rejected it since funding via the SWIFT system required sending $ to an Island off the coast of India. In fact the country did not even appear in the Binance list of countries. Very messed up and I have NO TRUST.
We tried several other exchanges I won't name. Although you could fund via your credit card (probably at some high credit card fee) the only bank transfer to fund the account involved providing your Bank Account number and access password!!!!! Hello, I don't think so. No way I'd trust a 3rd party with bank account number and password. While it is the case that some of the You Tube bloggers offer huge sign-up bonus on some of these other site, the account funding issue for a Canadian are non trivial. Also I believe the act of buying and withdrawing BTC is significantly cheaper on Newton.co (but I am still researching this point).
We tried CoinBase and did get one account verified and completed funding with a Canadian bank debt card. User interface was good enough and fast BUT they have ridiculously low funding limits -- much less than $500 in the first week and unclear how much you could actually fund in the first month. Compare this in Canadian Bank Interac limits of $10k to $50k, there is no question in my mind that Newton.co is the best choice for me (resident of Canada buying BTC) we found so far.
A second CoinBase account we tried to create got into a verification nightmare - support acknowledged they had software issues and were working on them, nothing cleared in over a week and then the CoinBase software cleared the trouble ticket (but the issue wasn't fixed). Redit and other online sites have lots of details on this CoinBase issue. So, CoinBase, is IMO not a good choice for a Canadian resident (but it may work fine if you need to buy small amounts occasionally - say hundreds of $ per week. CoinBase BTC withdrawal did work fast and was easy to use and very professional IMO.
Square has BTC purchase options but isn't obvious about how you can withdraw your BTC from Square -- looks like Jack want to lock your BTC into a layer he controls. Did not persue as it just doesn't feel right.
The give you bank account number and password issue noted above can also be found at Newton. However, Newton has the much safer option of an Interac transfer (but Newton.co delays on larger amounts are unclear - early trials). Just use Interac in Canada and avoid the password risk problem.
Gold / Metal Streamers and Cryptocurrencies / Blockchain Updates
GoldMinerPulse is tracking cryptocurrency/blockchain companies and streaming / royalty companies accessing or likely to access Canadian capital markets.
GOAU: A New Way to Invest in Gold and Precious Metals
Watch this exciting interview at Kitco news for a first-hand introduction to GOAU, a gold and precious metals ETF launching soon. Learn more about this game-changing product here and view the SEC filing details here.
Unlike other gold ETFs, GOAU implements a "quant" strategy to guide its stock selection. Drawing from an array of factors that have proven successful, the new ETF seeks, for instance, to discriminate between companies with good and bad management and to identify companies with superior metrics. This active, discriminating approach not only is attractive for its own sake, but is buttressed by back testing results going back 10 years.
I fully expect the GOAU to become a major ETF player as the next gold bull run evolves.
Anyone looking for exposure to the gold sector need look no further than GOAU on the NYSE.
Data Exploration Tools
nged and ngp are available on a custom crafted subscription basis. Updates on the free versions are no longer being provided.
See my contact information at the bottom of the page to make inquiries.
TSX/TSXv Gold Reserves and Resources
Gold reserves and resources for TSX/TSXv listed companies with at least 12.5% of their in situ metal values from gold:
Metric |
Gold Reserves
|
Gold Resources
|
|---|---|---|
Gold Producers |
13655 | 37414 |
Gold Developers |
3435 | 11972 |
Gold Explorers |
2198 | 9094 |
Gold Explorers |
138 | 4405 |
All Gold Equities |
19427 | 62885 |
Based on gold production rates reports over the last 4Q, TSX/TSXv gold producers have 21.5 years of gold reserves.
TSX/TSXv Gold and Silver Equities Statistics
The following table includes TSX/TSXv listed companies with at least 12.5 of their in situ metal values from gold or silver (in US$).
Type of Equity |
Producers
|
Developers
|
Explorers
|
Explorers
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
Enterprise Value |
$72 | $12 | $5 | $22 |
Estimated Discovery Cost |
$13 | $3 | $25 | |
Net Working Capital |
$18,581M | $1,351M | $477M | $819M |
Crypto Fear and Greed Index
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Gold and Silver Miner Market Capitalization Estimates
| TSX/TSXv Grouping | TSX/TSXv Total Market Capitalization (Millions of US$) |
|---|---|
| Gold & Silver Producers | $117,741 |
| Gold & Silver Streamers | $13,420 |
| Gold & Silver Developers | $10,703 |
| Gold & Silver Explorers | $7,812 |
| Total TSX/TSXv Gold & Silver Miners | $149,676 |
| Market Cap Estimate For the World's Gold & Silver miners (Millions of US$) |
$542,645 |
Note: All TSX/TSXv companies with at least 12.5% of their total in situ metal value coming from either gold or silver and which match the category definitions, are included in the above table.
Gold & Silver Producers category includes those companies that report quarterly production counts and revenues for gold and/or silver production.
Gold & Silver Streamers category includes companies focused on creating gold/silver streams or royalty income flows.
Gold & Silver Developers category includes companies with an explicit plan to start production in the near term or which have a spending profile and work plans to imply potential future production.
Gold & Silver Explorers category includes companies that are primarily focused on expanding resource counts at one or more existing gold and silver projects without indicating plans for future production.
Generator and grass roots companies are not covered.
Market capitalization is always computed using closing market price (expressed in US$ using exchange rates in effact at market closing time) and the issued share of each company. Updates are made daily after the TSX market close.
TSX/TSXv Market Share Assumptions: the TSX/TSXv gold producers are estimated
to represent approximately 25% of the world's gold producers since the TSX/TSXv gold producers
report approximately 25% of the world's yearly gold production.
The streamers, explorers and developers are estimated to represent very roughly 50% of the world total for companies in those groupings.
NOTE October 24, 2016: Lowered the TSX/TSXv producer gold production estimate to 25% down from 33% - thus the spike in Market Cap Estimate
for the World's Gold & Silver miners.
The Market Cap Estimate For the World's Gold & Silver miners is computed based on the actual TSX/TSXv market capitalizations, computed on a daily basis here using closing market prices and Sedar.com material filings as available at the TSX market closing time, and applying the market share assumptions detailed above.
Gold and Silver Miner Daily Update Counts
The following plot shows showing a per day count of gold/silver producers/developers/explorers with one or more "metric impacting" Sedar updates (e.g. resource disclosures, financial statements, shares for debt, private placements, options grants, project ownership changes, mergers/acquisitions, etc.).
Note: Snapshots are always taken at 4PM of the current day. Any filings after 4PM will only be counted at the next close.
Contact Information
twitter: @GoldMinerPulse
e-mail: dennis@goldminerpulse.com
phone: 778-230-3439, Pacific Standard Time (GMT-8)