Purchase your 1st crypto in Binance – Step By Step Guide

• Binance [referral link] as in Binance International, apparently there is a different “Binance SG” as well. So if you are living in Singapore and would like to get into Crypt trading with Binance, you can follow this simple step by step guide. This is for informational purposes only. The author is not a financial advisor!

[Update: 11-Sep-2021]At the moment it seems that Binance has suspended P2P trading for SGD. I am not sure when this will resume but we are all hoping that it will be soon.

First of all you will need to create an account with Binance [referral link]. You can of course use my referral link or go direct to Binance [no referral] if you don’t want to use my link. Once you have created an account you will need to verify your identity. This is a requirement for most of the major crypto exchanges. Might as well do it once and for all.

So go to your account and choose Identification. There are several levels of verification but I would suggest you to complete advanced verification. The process is pretty straight forward and you should be able to complete them without much issues. For the advance verification, you will need proof of address – I used my Internet access bill as proof. There are several other types of documents you can use as well.

Once you have done the verification (which might take a few days – mine took all but one day), you are ready to start purchasing your first Crypto. This is where the fun begins. But how do you proceed?

First of all you will need to get convert some Fiat currency (eg Singapore dollar SGD) into a stablecoin. And with this stablecoin, you can use to trade for other Cryptocurrencies. The reason why we want to convert our Fiat currency into a stablecoin first is because usually the exchange rates for Fiat to other Cryptocurrencies are pretty bad. So it is a good idea to get stablecoins first and then use the market to trade for the cryptocurrency we want. Here I will show you how to get stablecoin via the Peer To Peer (P2P) platform. You can transfer via bank transfer or even PayNow depending on the other party. P2P basically means that you are trading directly with other traders in the platform.

Goto Trade and choose P2P.

Choose Buy, USDT (a very popular stablecoin pegged to the USD) and under Fiat type in “SGD” and then choose SGD.

You will then be presented with a whole list of traders/sellers. So choose the “advertiser” with the best rate (and good completion rate), the limit you can handle and the type of payment transfer you are able to do (like PayNow or Bank Transfer) and then click on Buy USDT. However make sure you check the exchange rates first. If it is not good, you should wait for a few hours or days to get a better rate. At the time of writing, there is 0 fee for P2P transfers in Binance. However it is important to check on Binance on the fees again.

Key in the amount you want to buy and make sure that the USDT is what you need and then choose Buy USDT.

You will come to this BUY page. But before you begin, you can chat with the seller. What I normally do is to check that he/she is actually online and awaiting my transfer of funds. Note that this is P2P and the seller might not even be aware that an order has been initiated if he/she is not paying attention. I will ask whether I should proceed and if I get a reply, then I will go ahead.

First choose the transfer method. I prefer PayNow but you can choose which payment method you want. Check everything is correct before you make the transfer. It is very tedious if you make any mistake here and to get a “refund”. So check and double check to see the amount and the transferee information is correct. And once you have sent the payment, click on Transferred, Next. You should also type that you have paid in the message box to alert the seller as well.

And if everything goes smoothly, you should be presented with this screen saying that the order has been completed and it is now in your P2P account. So click on Transfer to Spot.

You will then be transferred to the P2P page but will then need to transfer the stablecoin to the Spot section before you can do any trading. That is how this works. So go ahead and click on Transfer for your particular stablecoin.

So now you choose Fiat and Spot in the To section and click on MAX (if you so wish) and click on Confirm. If you don’t transfer to Fiat and Spot, you cannot do trading in the Binance Exchange.

Now we will go to the “Fiat and Spot” wallet to check whether it has been transferred successfully. So goto Wallet and choose Fiat and Spot.

Here we are. The most important page for us. As you can see our stablecoin (USDT) has been transferred to Spot and is now ready for trading. You can see the total amount, total available and the amount that has been set into orders. At the moment, the total amount should be the same as the total available for use. So well done! Now lets get into the actual trading!

So go to Markets, choose Zones and choose the Coin you want to trade and then click on Trade on the right. You can search for the coin name as well. These will be trading via the crypto-USDT pair.

So you will come into the trading page. In this example, I choose BTC. As this will usually be way more complicated than what I can list down here, so I will only go through the basics of trading. You should be very careful in this page and choose the correct Price that you want to buy the Crypto. Anyway click on BUY under place order, key in the price that you want to buy the coin and then drag the amount that you want eg. 25%, 50%, 75% or 100% or anything in between. Then after confirmation of the information, click on Buy BTC (or whatever Crypto you are trading).

You can see your trades in the Open Orders section. If you are lucky, the order will be fulfilled in no time and you just got your first Crypto! Of course it all depends on the price you have placed it on. Overall it really isn’t that difficult once you get the hang of it.

I hope you all the best in your crypto trading adventures. I would suggest first timers to start small. Never play with your entire life savings in the Crypto Market. May you always be able to buy the dip and make tons of money on your investments. If one day you make it big, don’t forget your buddy here. Buy me a beer or something. Please take care! You can also take a look at my Crypto Portfolio to see what I am holding. Or check out my guide on using Nexo to earn interest on your cryptocurrencies.