Chris from Tokyo. I don’t usually join chatrooms/forums etc but Cardano has me excited enough to do so.
Only problem is…Where can I safely buy Cardano??
Why is it so hard to buy ADA? I’ve been trying to buy ADA for over a week, (before the price explosion).
The only option before the Binance announcement was Bittrex. Problem is Bittrex turns out to be a bit of a sham. I can transfer bitcoin in & buy ADA but I cant transfer the money out without account verification.
This is where the fun starts…cause when you try to ‘Enhance Verify’ & despite doing everything correctly, it declines you & asks you to open a ticket with support. But, no-one responds to your ticket or emails. Over a week & no response. Upon researching, it seems this is happening to thousands of account holders, some of whom have been waiting more than a month.
So Bittrex takes your money, but doesn’t verify your account, ignores all contact/communications, doesn’t allow you to join slack chat, & we can’t withdraw our ADA.
Why is Cardano associating with such a dishonest operator? I joined Bittrex only to buy ADA & now I’m left thousands out of pocket.
Any advice, help or suggestions would be most appreciated & welcomed.
I still strongly ‘believe’ in Cardano. I just want to be able to buy it safely.
Thanks for hearing me out & welcome to all the other newbies.
chris-san
Sorry to hear about your experience. I created an account a few days ago on Bittrex and jumped in on the ADA hype. Earlier today I found out we had to verify the account before withdrawing which was a little frustrating but for me I was able to walk through the enhanced verification in about 10 minutes and cleared.
Since their verification is provided through a well-known and trusted outside vendor ( https://www.jumio.com/trusted-identity/netverify/ ), I don’t think this is intentional or mischievous. They are more likely unable to keep up with the spike of accounts from Cardano. Maybe give if a few days and reach out to them again? Hope you’re able to get it working!
The problem is not Cardano and its placement on Bittrex. The problem is that Bittrex, Coinbase, Bitstamp and other exchanges are absolutely overwhelmed with the surge of new customer account creations. I had to go through the exact same verification process. I am in the US and Bittrex processed me in 3 days. Same for Bitstamp. Bittrex is not a sham. They are understaffed (which is unfortunate), but they have served me and countless others adequately enough over the past few months. Best of luck.
Bittrex is not a sham, but (as a US customer) I find the registration process for Most exchanges to be really invasive. This is especially true for exchanges that accept transfers of Fiat currency (coinbase, kraken, etc), where US banking law dictates a “know your customer” policy.
I recommend coinswitch! https://www.coinswitch.co/, there is no registration or verification and they only get 0.25% fees. You can also choose bitween 5000 different exchanges (like Bittrex) for the 100 most important coins. The only restriction you have is, that you only can change coins, no fiat money like USD.
Sounds like Spam? No I think not, because the regulations are only for transfers between fiat money and cryptocoins not between crypotcoins itself, so you doesn’t have to verify yourself.
I would first buy an amount of bitcoin on a trustfull market and then change them over coinswitch into ADA’s, Easy and fast. If you think its to risky, try a small amount first and choose then it its something for you.
@chris-san My understanding is that Bittrex, a US based exchange, compares your submitted data to local public records. As you are based in Japan, you’re not found in that public database, and as a result it takes longer for them to handle the verification process. It happened to me (I’m in Europe) and several other non-US-based users according to forums noise. They verified me in 3 weeks, but that was a few months ago. In addition, as @andone explained, most exchanges have been recently overwhelmed by the large amount of new customers registrations to deal with.
But once you get that Bittrex enhanced account, it is totally worth it due to the large choice of alts.
If you’re in a rush, a faster alternative might be Coinspot who trades ADA for AUS dollars. Or Binance and Coinswitch.
Sorry to hear you’re having issues. We know Bittrex is extremely busy at the moment and dealing with inquiries as quickly as they can.
We are working on partnerships with other exchanges and you can keep up to date on this through our site:
I know this doesn’t help your current situation but we hope this will help with such issues and that you will be able to buy ADA. We really appreciate your support and patience!
I got through the enhaced verification on Bittrex quite quickly.
However, I’ve now tried to withdraw a small number of the ADA I hold (5) to my Daedalus wallet using the wallet id generated by Daedalus. Four hours later it’s still showing as pending on Bittrex, but I note the current high usage reports for Bittrex elsewhere in this forum and will be patient.