Recommended Alternative for buying bitcoin in Australia is: Swyftx
If you’ve ever taken a look online for cryptocurrency investment with PayPal, you’ll know that there aren’t too many trading platforms that accept PayPal. Either this is down to fees being too high for the exchanges, or the method incurs too many fees to be profitable for investors and as a result, it’s simply ignored.
There aren’t a whole load of popular trading platforms in Australia supporting PayPal as of late 2020, however, a few smaller exchanges do offer the payment method, and as you’d expect there is a whole range of Bitcoin exchanges that offer PayPal support for XRP and other altcoins too.
However, if you’re an investor or casual trader interested in XRP or Ripple and want to use PayPal as a primary and secure payment method for buying Ripple, we have a short article for you below.
TL;DR
For those who are just after the top exchanges that take PayPal either directly or indirectly as a means to buy Bitcoin, XRP or LTC and other coins like Ethereum take a look below.
- eToro – $50 Deposit
- LocalBitcoins
- LonghornFX – No Min
- Binance – $150 Deposit
- Pepperstone – $20 Deposit
- Plus500 – $100 Deposit
- CEX.IO – $20 Deposit
- VantageFX – $200 Deposit
- Bitpanda – $1 Deposit
- Coinbase – $1 Deposit
- KuCoin – No Min
- Kraken – No Min
With those platforms out of the way, it is easy to see that there are some digital currency exchanges in Australia that do take more payment methods than just the simple bank transfer for purchasing Ripple. However, for credit card and debit card investors, the process remains near-impossible for Aussie platforms thanks for the financial institutions standing in with some rather high fees.
It’s also important to note that most of the crypto exchanges that do directly support PayPal only accept USD, GBP or EUR as a default fiat currency for investment. You are able to use Bitcoin Cash or other blockchain-based coins like Litecoin in place of USD, though this can become a tedious conversion process.
Disclaimer: Keep in mind that some of the above platforms don’t directly accept PayPal but rather allow bank accounts with PayPal directly linked to them. This should (and typically will) allow you to use your PayPal account for purchasing XRP tokens.
What is Ripple
If you’re entirely new to Ripple, we’ll go over what the cryptocurrency is and a little bit about what its major perks are. As a general rule of thumb, when it comes to cryptocurrency investing it’s always good to know as much about the currency you’re investing in as possible.
Some crypto assets have trajectories that are far more promising than others, and this is down to the way they’ve been developed. In some cases, coins have been so poorly designed that they’ve become defunct not too long after their initial IPOs or launch dates. On the other hand, some coins can even be scams.
That out of the way; Ripple is a streamlined and highly-efficient decentralised cryptocurrency that’s been designed to offset the slow and time-consuming transaction process for other coins. Users can use the Ripple platform to either invest in XRP as an asset or make use of the Ripple technology to transfer large sums of money across the globe in a more streamlined, affordable and efficient way.
Most analysts are touting that Ripple is looking like a winner in that it can be used by large corporations to near-instantly transfer enormous amounts of money without as many security concerns or slowdowns as traditional methods.
Here’s How to Buy Ripple
If you like the look of Ripple and are interested in the coin, there are a few ways to invest that include PayPal.
You’ll want to be on the lookout for XRP tokens, as these are the ‘coins’ that Ripple is based upon. These are what you will trade your fiat currency or AUD for. If you are already a seasoned crypto investor or have been gifted some cryptocurrency you can also swap these as a trade for XRP.
On an Exchange
To buy Ripple on a cryptocurrency exchange all you’ll need to do is set up an account, approve it through the verification process and deposit your AUD funds.
It might be worth noting that a lot of trading platforms don’t offer direct AUD to XRP trades, so you may need to buy Ripple with another cryptocurrency. As an example, a lot of XRP investors buy ETH or BTC and LTC with AUD and then use their cryptocurrency to purchase XRP later.
Of course, this is rather complex, though it’s one of the only methods currently out there for anyone using AUD exchanges.
Using PayPal as a Payment Method
To buy XRP with PayPal the easiest method is to set up your exchange account with a bank account that is linked to your PayPal account.
With a bank account connected with PayPal, you will be able to withdraw from your bank through your PayPal account. This means you’ll be relying on your PayPal balance rather than your direct bank balance.
The above two methods are the most straightforward ways to buy Ripple and should suffice for both seasoned and new investors to XRP. The platforms we’ve outlined either accept PayPal directly, such as LocalBitcoins, Paxful and eToro or they turn a blind eye to PayPal-linked bank accounts.
A Bit About Fees
With payment methods out of the way, it’s good to know just how much you’ll be paying in fees when using these platforms. Take a look at the fees for the exchanges we’ve outlined above.
Kraken
The Kraken platform is a relatively popular cryptocurrency exchange and features some rather low fees averaging around 0.36 per cent.
Keep in mind that Kraken’s fee structure rests on the currency pairs you choose, so you’ll need to double-check the trading fees for the currency pair you’re looking at using. As we said above, XRP generally needs a secondary cryptocurrency to swap with it, and these will affect the total fees you’re paying.
Binance
The fee structure on Binance works quite similar to Kraken in that it is variable – though the means of variation is different.
The Binance platform has its own cryptocurrency called BNB, and the more of these BNB tokens you invest in, the lower fee you’ll be charged for each trade. This is essentially Binanace’s way of enticing their customers with BNB over PayPal or a bank account for example.
There is an ultra-low 0.1 per cent flat fee for all trades here, however, if you buy XRP directly with BNB there’s a 50 per cent fee reduction. This is fantastic for those looking to maximise their return on investment.
Credit and Debit Cards
One final thing to note when it comes to fees is that there are payment methods that incur a far high fee than PayPal or bank transfers and those are credit and debit card fees.
If you’re using PayPal, or a credit or debit card you could be stung by cryptocurrency trading fees of over 6 per cent per trade. In the long term, and for those who trade a lot during the day, this could be a deal-breaker. Some high volume traders could see hundreds or even thousands of dollars shaved off their final earnings because of exuberant fees.
You can take a look at Bittrex, however, for a seamless credit and debit card experience. It just costs a little more to use these methods with the platform.
Investing in Crypto with PayPal
As you might have already expected, for most exchanges the PayPal support is rather rare or unheard of. Either due to PayPal’s dislike for decentralised currencies or for another reason, the platform doesn’t support almost any digital asset exchange.
The good news is that for XRP with PayPal there are some workarounds that mean you can use your linked bank accounts, though there isn’t too much else you can do — at least easily.
Our recommendations include:
— Choose a cryptocurrency exchange with direct PayPal support.
— Link a PayPal-linked bank account to your cryptocurrency exchange.
These are the ideal two means of investing in XRP or Ripple with PayPal in Australia.
