Cryptocurrency is a new and exciting technology that many are showing more interest in. How can you make money with cryptocurrency? Well, there are many different ways, some more easily accessible than others. Let’s scratch the surface of the most popular ways to earn with cryptocurrency.
Staking
Staking is an incredibly easy way to earn cryptocurrency. Basically, people stake cryptocurrency to contribute to a network and get rewarded for their contribution. The act of staking is what powers the proof-of-stake blockchains and keeps them acting in a decentralized nature. Similar to trading, anyone can participate with minimal upkeep and minimal costs to enter. With trading you can compound your profits into your balance to make larger returns; you can compound your stake returns by including them in the stake pool with your other coins which you earned from.
The only thing you need physically to participate in staking is a device with access to the internet. Additionally, there is no extensive knowledge or deep understanding of markets necessary to profit from staking. Your stake will be subject to market volatility, but the number of coins you earn from staking will only increase. You can choose when to take profits on these coins or continue to redelegate them to your stake pool.
Simple steps to get started staking are as follows:
– Download a wallet such as the Crypto.com DeFi wallet or another trusted wallet
– Buy or import the tokens you wish to stake
– Choose a stake pool or node to delegate to (review fees and projected returns to choose an optimal pool)
Depending upon which pool you delegate to, you will receive your rewards either on a daily, weekly, or sometimes monthly basis. Your stake may be subject to a lock up period which means you can’t remove them for a predetermined and agreed upon time. Usually, but not always, the longer you choose to stake the better your percentage returns will be. When choosing where to stake your crypto, make sure it is trusted and the best bang for your buck so you can make the most of your balance.
Trading
Trading is an excellent way to make money with cryptocurrency, however it is certainly not easy. Cryptocurrency trading allows anyone to make money comfortably from anywhere in the world at virtually any time.
You can start trading with as little as $20 on most exchanges, although you will need to acquire a larger amount of capital before you can rely on profits as a full-time source of income. Realistically you will need a trading balance upwards of $15k-$20k to sustain minimal living expenses. This is an extremely cheap startup cost compared to many other business avenues.
Trading also has the minimal upkeep fees associated as physically you only need a device with internet access, and you only pay trading fees. There is very minimal equipment upkeep costs and no raw product, property, or employee upkeep.
Trading allows you to make anywhere from .25% all the way up to 5% or greater depending on your skill level and your ability to manage risk and emotions. At first you will encounter many difficulties and obstacles as you navigate the markets, but do not be discouraged as this is natural. There is a wide range of things to know about trading before one can start to consistently profit, however it is certainly worth the time to learn.
Simple steps to get started trading are as follows:
– Register with an exchange that isn’t restricted in your country with competitive trading fees
– Deposit a small amount you are willing to lose as you are learning
– Study resources in your free time and execute your learnings in your account.
That’s really it. Trading is an awesome source of income for many people and there is no reason it can’t be for you. You don’t need to be a pro broker or even a college graduate to become a profitable trader. Remember to start small and slow, do not get ahead of yourself else you may lose all of your hard-earned money. Nobody is 100% accurate with trading so don’t beat yourself up over a few trades. Learn from your winners and your losers and keep on keeping on. You will end up where you want to be, and even beyond where you may have imagined.
Mining
Many people have seen or heard about Bitcoin mining farms and think they need millions to get started. While it is certainly better in this field to show up with a large amount of capital, you can still get started with a reasonable amount of money. There are a lot of different blockchains to participate in. You must understand however that this avenue is much different than trading or staking in a few aspects.
Unlike staking or trading, mining does require more physical items like GPU and/or ASIC miners as well as other things like constant stable power and connection to the internet. If you grow your operation large enough, you may even need additional or separate physical properties to house your equipment. Mining is a semi-passive method of earning cryptocurrency.
Mining is profitable for miners as they solve a complicated algorithm used by proof-of-work blockchains. Some use their power to compete in some blockchains to retain all of the rewards, others pool their power together and divide the rewards accordingly. If you don’t have access to a large sum of entry capital, you may be better off buying a small rig and starting in a mining pool such as unMineable.
You can find an excellently crafted, pre-built PC capable of sufficient mining power for worthwhile returns from many trusted vendors. Specifics to look out for include motherboard, power supply, and most importantly a graphics card. The better your graphics card, the more power you will have to mine. Upgrading your motherboard generally requires an upgrade in other areas to maintain proper cooling and sufficient power. Building a proper PC can be tough, which is why it is recommended to find a pre-built rig as an entry-level participant.
Simple steps to get started mining with GPU:
– Obtain a PC with sufficient GPU power from a trusted source. (Be cautious of resellers. Many times someone has already overheated or burned up a GPU and tries to resell it on a secondary market.)
– Find a mining pool like unMineable or other trusted mining pools (be careful, some sites use your power but never pay out!)
– Choose a coin you want to get paid in and a wallet to receive the deposit
– Download a miner like Phoenix Miner or another trusted miner. Be sure to choose the proper version to download for your system. (Be careful, downloading malicious links could allow thieves and scammers into your sensitive files!)
– Extract the files to your desktop and open
– Right click on the “start_miner” file and choose “edit”
– Copy/paste this next message exactly as is and stop at “pause” (you need to include the word pause in your copy/paste):
REM
REM Example bat file for starting PhoenixMiner.exe to mine ETH
REM
setx GPU_FORCE_64BIT_PTR 0
setx GPU_MAX_HEAP_SIZE 100
setx GPU_USE_SYNC_OBJECTS 1
setx GPU_MAX_ALLOC_PERCENT 100
setx GPU_SINGLE_ALLOC_PERCENT 100
PhoenixMiner.exe -pool ethash.unmineable.com:3333 -wal YourCoinSymbol:YourCoinAddress.WhatYouWantToNameYourMiner#dyk7-1y5i -pass x
pause
– Change YourCoinSymbol to whatever ERC20 token symbol you wish to get paid in (that you chose from the list on unMineable)
– Change YourCoinAddress to the receiving address of the same coin from the wallet you chose
– Change WhatYouWantToNameYourMiner to whatever it is your heart desires.
– After you have everything typed into the “start_miner” file then you actually need to run the file. Just double click it to open it and it should start working. You’ll see a bunch of code being produced. If you see “Connected to SSL ethash pool” at some point, then your miner is connected properly!
– If you don’t see this after a few minutes you will need to review the message from the edited file and ensure every last space, colon : and period . is in place.
After you complete this process, you are an ETH miner! You will need to ensure the GPU doesn’t overheat which isn’t hard to do with just one rig. Based on your set up you will ROI in 1-3 years and be on your way to profits so long as you can maintain all your equipment and energy costs.
Alternatively, you can obtain an ASIC, or Application Specific Integrated Circuit miner, and have far greater power to contribute to a network. With this alternative however of course comes added expenses and upkeep. You will probably need to upgrade the power supply in your home wall outlet and export/vent all the exhaust from the fans out of the area to maintain a proper temperature. ASIC miners are beastly machines that require much more maintenance and upkeep. If you want to get started with an ASIC you certainly can, but you will need to understand it is much more than just plug and play.
Airdrops
Airdrops are a magnificent way to earn crypto. An Airdrop is when a project or entity distributes crypto tokens or NFT’s for executing a predetermined task or for the purpose of advertisement. It is possible to receive airdropped tokens for free and then sell them later at a much higher price. Some airdrops will never amount to anything or die off before they gain any value. Some airdrops are malicious or scam attempts, so be cautious of any airdrop links being passed around.
You can check sites like airdrops.io to see some of the latest and active airdrops. You can also use that site or similar sites to verify if an airdrop you heard about, or someone shared with you on that site. If there is a legitimate airdrop going on or that has occurred, you can find out about it. If there are no legitimate search results, then you might want to exercise caution with the project or limit interaction altogether.
Simple ways to earn with airdrops include:
– Checking popular airdrop index sites
– Following popular NFT Twitter profiles
– Joining crypto/NFT project servers and being active/helpful
– Joining crypto/NFT project sub reddits and being active/helpful
Earning from airdrops usually doesn’t require much work although it could take time in some cases. Some airdrops only require a few simple actions, others could require a time for staking delegation or trading volume in order to qualify for an airdrop. After you receive the airdrop, it may not rise in value for a long time (if it ever does). Make sure you know what you are getting into before you run blindly into an airdrop.
Blockchain Gaming
Blockchain gaming became much more popular in 2021 and will likely continue to gain popularity in 2022. There are hundreds of games that feature NFT’s as a means of transferring items, characters, and even the ownership of the games themselves in some cases.
Getting started with gaming is not as straightforward as trading, staking or mining. The returns in this realm are also a bit harder to come by compared to the other avenues discussed above. In some cases, you can earn big by breeding creatures in Axie Infinity for example. In other games you may have to play a lot longer or overcome different obstacles and even other players to go about making money.
To earn a sustainable living from playing games is not far-fetched. We see streamers making plenty of money streaming popular games. It is only a matter of time before there becomes increased interest in the play-to-earn model. Even without becoming the next big streamer, the game could reward you with rare and expensive gear or creatures. A single plot of land in Axie Infinity has sold for 888.25 ETH! This was the most expensive plot ever sold to date, but there are many more examples of high dollar transactions that have occurred from the same and other games.
There are all these ways and more to earn with cryptocurrency, but perhaps we missed the most obvious one? If you don’t have the time or willpower to get started in one of these avenues, then just HODL! Accumulate when you are able to and just sit on your holdings. Ten years from now you will be very pleased with yourself. If you are a go getter and want to learn more about these avenues of income, follow up with a designated course from Crypto University. It’s time to earn some cryptocurrency!
By viewing any material or using the information within this publication you understand that this is general education material and you can not hold any person or entity responsible for loss or damages resulting from the content or general advice provided here. Trading cryptocurrency has potential rewards, but also potential risks. You must be aware of the risks and be willing to accept them in order to invest in the markets. Only trade with funds you can afford to lose. This publication is neither a solicitation nor an offer to buy/sell cryptocurrency or other financial assets. No representation is being made that any account will or is likely to achieve profits or losses similar to those discussed in any material on this website. The past performance of any trading system or methodology is not necessarily indicative of future results.
Written by Edward Gonzales © Crypto University 2022