Bitcoin and Russian bank

Smoggle

Well-known member
As some of you might remember I was in Russia when Putin decided that another war was what everybody needed and that, coupled with a family emergency back home, meant my family had to leave Moscow in a hurry. (Thanks again for the kind words I received at the time).

To cut a long story short, my wife has money in a Russian bank account. We couldn’t transfer or withdraw it in the uk, and we’ve just relocated overseas again and tried to withdraw it with no luck.

It’s not an insignificant amount but nor are we depending on it, but I’m loathe to see it confiscated by Putin as had been threatened. So, the last option I see is moving to bitcoin, then to bank account with possible losses in the process but some is better than none. I’ve tried reading up but I’m largely clueless, I’ve seen the topic discussed on here so I thought I’d check to see if anyone has any starter tips for moving in and out of bitcoin… I wouldn’t be looking for a long term investment, unless I had no other choice or it was wise, it’s mainly just to get the money back into our control, thanks in advance! 😊
 
Persoanally I see Bitcoin as a terrific investment and at its current price cannot see you losing money in the relative short term.

I would open an account with Coinbase Pro and go from there. It's more user friendly for new folk into the world of cryptocurrency, and low fees. It is also authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority which should give you confidence in its authenticity. Transactions are fast and reliable too.

As a newcomer I would stay away from Binance. I, and others I know have lost money during transfers when using it.
 
Persoanally I see Bitcoin as a terrific investment and at its current price cannot see you losing money in the relative short term.

I would open an account with Coinbase Pro and go from there. It's more user friendly for new folk into the world of cryptocurrency, and low fees. It is also authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority which should give you confidence in its authenticity. Transactions are fast and reliable too.

As a newcomer I would stay away from Binance. I, and others I know have lost money during transfers when using it.

Thanks for the reply, I’ll look into it - one thing I read is that I might have to go down a p2p route as trading from a Russian account may be restricted - do you know if coinbase pro would allow this? Some of the money is in rubles and some is in pounds (the bank allows a linked £ account).
 
Nice comments lads, I’d rather not have to go anyway near bitcoin and I’m not a financial risk taker at all but I’ve exhausted all other options. I realise I might lose at least some of the money but that’s preferable to having it all confiscated.

Unless of course you know how to get money out of a sanctioned country short of actually going there (not an option)?

And yes JVM, if a fellow poster needed advice on an issue relating to where I was I’d happily help. I tend not to post on topics where my advice wouldn’t be beneficial though.
 
I've been in Bitcoin for about 7 years.

You can forget about 99% of things said about it.

Treat it as a speculative investment.

I never have more than 8% of my overall wealth in it.

I watch the fear and greed index and I sell most (not all) when people are greedy and it's gone parabolic.

Then I start adding more when the hype cycle is over and people are fearful.

But if you don't want to trade it, it's been proved that adding 2% of Bitcoin to a portfolio gives you a lot of upside with very little downside.

The key with investing is to have enough in to make the volatility worthwhile, but not an amount that you will lose sleep over.

You have to stay in the game and don't wreck yourself by greed or doing what most do by FOMOing in too high, then panic selling out.

You have to do the opposite of the herd.

And remember: Buying an average stock/fund/crypto at a great price, is better than buying a great one at too high a price.

Most people should just put whatever they can afford in a Vanguard total world index, don't look at it, and let it compound over decades.



 
I've been in Bitcoin for about 7 years.

You can forget about 99% of things said about it.

Treat it as a speculative investment.

I never have more than 8% of my overall wealth in it.

I watch the fear and greed index and I sell most (not all) when people are greedy and it's gone parabolic.

Then I start adding more when the hype cycle is over and people are fearful.

But if you don't want to trade it, it's been proved that adding 2% of Bitcoin to a portfolio gives you a lot of upside with very little downside.

The key with investing is to have enough in to make the volatility worthwhile, but not an amount that you will lose sleep over.

You have to stay in the game and don't wreck yourself by greed or doing what most do by FOMOing in too high, then panic selling out.

You have to do the opposite of the herd.

And remember: Buying an average stock/fund/crypto at a great price, is better than buying a great one at too high a price.

Most people should just put whatever they can afford in a Vanguard total world index, don't look at it, and let it compound over decades.




Thanks very much, I appreciate the advice and I’ll sit down and discuss with my wife later.

I know bitcoin is emotive with some people championing it and others pointing out the risks, and I’ve read persuasive arguments on both sides when scanning the topic. My circumstances and lack of overall knowledge of the subject mean I’m pretty stuck… I either leave the money and potentially lose the lot, or move to bitcoin and potentially lose some. My wife’s former employer were supposed to help staff but there are people still working there who can’t transfer money to their home countries to pay mortgage/bills etc.

I’m not looking at a long term investment really. More at the feasibility of moving from a Russian bank account (in rubles and £) to bitcoin - do these platforms allow Russian banks? - and then out of bitcoin to my wife’s UK account - basically a convoluted bank transfer to get around the sanctions as I don’t think my wife was the intended victim 😂
 
I was in crypto from 2016 to 2019 but I'm all out now.

I don't think coinbase allows Russian bank accounts, a lot of other exchanges won't now either...

I think an exchange called "Kraken" still does - I've never used it personally but it is one of the biggest exchanges so you should be pretty save.

It's all just opinion, but I'd just get your money across and back into £ as soon as you can.

Open a Kraken account in Russia, open a Coinbase account in the UK - Put rubles in, convert to BTC, transfer BTC to coinbase, convert to GBP, withdraw.

You'll probably be hit with some fees doing it in BTC, you could use a different currency (Tether/ADA) to avoid the fees, but depending on how much the fees are and if you're worried about it, just pay them.
 
I was in crypto from 2016 to 2019 but I'm all out now.

I don't think coinbase allows Russian bank accounts, a lot of other exchanges won't now either...

I think an exchange called "Kraken" still does - I've never used it personally but it is one of the biggest exchanges so you should be pretty save.

It's all just opinion, but I'd just get your money across and back into £ as soon as you can.

Open a Kraken account in Russia, open a Coinbase account in the UK - Put rubles in, convert to BTC, transfer BTC to coinbase, convert to GBP, withdraw.

You'll probably be hit with some fees doing it in BTC, you could use a different currency (Tether/ADA) to avoid the fees, but depending on how much the fees are and if you're worried about it, just pay them.

Thanks, that’s great, I’ll check kraken out and if it works with Russian accounts I’ll get it out and across asap. Cheers 👍🏻
 
Good luck. been a rough year so hope you get yourself sorted.

Thank you, one of the reasons I posted for advice on here is due to receiving a good number of kind messages from strangers who only knew me as a fellow Boro fan off a message board - there are some very decent and helpful people on here, I hope I can be the same in return with areas I have a bit of experience in 😊
 
Personally I think it's the perfect time to be getting into bitcoin and crypto in general, it's probably at about its lowest right now with massive gains to be made in bitcoin over the next couple of years. Not financial advice just personal opinion.
 
I'm not sure I understand how you can't access or control the money in the Russian account but can somehow access it to buy bitcoin, how does that work ?
 
Personally I think it's the perfect time to be getting into bitcoin and crypto in general, it's probably at about its lowest right now with massive gains to be made in bitcoin over the next couple of years. Not financial advice just personal opinion.
Can you explain your rationale? I have no horse in the race but I often hear this kind of statement from advocates.
 
I'm not sure I understand how you can't access or control the money in the Russian account but can somehow access it to buy bitcoin, how does that work ?

Through a VPN my wife can get into her internet banking. We could spend the money within Russia no problem, the issue is moving it or spending it outside of Russia. Buying online, in this case crypto, should be ok - we could buy stuff online in Russia but we no longer have an address there to receive physical items, but that’s not an issue here. That said, it may not work, the bank may stop a transaction but I’m struggling to see any other options at the moment.

I’m pretty sure the bank itself isn’t fully sanctioned, at least it wasn’t, although I read that the head of the bank is. But the combination of sanctions and the bank’s own policy means that in the current circumstances money can’t be moved abroad via internet banking or withdrawn at foreign ATMs - the UK was an obvious no no, but where I’ve moved to is not an “unfriendly” nation towards Russia so we tried our bank card here with no luck.

There’s a Moscow expats group on FB I’m a member of and the prevailing advice was to move money from Russia via crypto- however, it was full of conflicting info so I thought I’d check on here to see if others thought it may be feasible.
 
Personally I think it's the perfect time to be getting into bitcoin and crypto in general, it's probably at about its lowest right now with massive gains to be made in bitcoin over the next couple of years. Not financial advice just personal opinion.

I genuinely have no idea of the longer term prospects. I can see areas where it could be very useful, but there’s enough opposing views to make it seem very risky to someone like me with very little crypto knowledge and a natural wariness when it comes to financial issues.

I think basically my post is about moving (and probably losing some) money, as opposed to making or investing money. Although I have no issue with that side being discussed too 👍🏻
 
I've been in Bitcoin for about 7 years.

You can forget about 99% of things said about it.

Treat it as a speculative investment.

I never have more than 8% of my overall wealth in it.

I watch the fear and greed index and I sell most (not all) when people are greedy and it's gone parabolic.

Then I start adding more when the hype cycle is over and people are fearful.

But if you don't want to trade it, it's been proved that adding 2% of Bitcoin to a portfolio gives you a lot of upside with very little downside.

The key with investing is to have enough in to make the volatility worthwhile, but not an amount that you will lose sleep over.

You have to stay in the game and don't wreck yourself by greed or doing what most do by FOMOing in too high, then panic selling out.

You have to do the opposite of the herd.

And remember: Buying an average stock/fund/crypto at a great price, is better than buying a great one at too high a price.

Most people should just put whatever they can afford in a Vanguard total world index, don't look at it, and let it compound over decades.



What a load of old tosh and dangerous tosh at that apart from

"
Most people should just put whatever they can afford in a Vanguard total world index, don't look at it, and let it compound over decades.

"
 
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