How does one acquire bitcoin?

00:01 So, how does one acquire Bitcoin? Well,
00:04 the easiest way is on a cryptocurrency
00:06 exchange. The largest cryptocurrency
00:09 exchange in the United States is
00:11 Coinbase. A lot of people though prefer
00:14 River. R I Ver River.com
00:18 uh because it’s Bitcoin only, which
00:19 means you’re not bombarded with a bunch
00:21 of stuff about other mostly worthless
00:24 crypto tokens and all of that. So, uh
00:26 those are the two I use, Coinbase and
00:29 River.
00:30 uh between the two I can accomplish
00:32 everything I want to do between Coinbase
00:34 and River. And the way you acquire
00:37 Bitcoin on that uh uh exchange, let’s
00:40 use River for example because it’s
00:41 easier for people just uh getting
00:43 started. You go to river.com and you or
00:46 you download the River on the mobile app
00:49 store and you create an account. The
00:52 easiest way to do that is like with the
00:53 you know login with Apple or the the the
00:56 auto way automatic way that your phone
00:58 does it. You log in and then it will you
00:60 can hit a button that says buy Bitcoin.
01:02 And when you hit that button, uh it will
01:04 give you the option to buy it with a
01:06 debit card. Uh sometimes they’ll let you
01:08 use a credit card or the easiest way is
01:10 to link a bank account. When you link a
01:12 bank account, it will use something
01:14 called Plaid. Pli D. Plaid is an
01:18 integration that financial apps use to
01:20 link with bank accounts. Uh pretty much
01:23 every financial app I’ve ever used, they
01:26 all use Plaid. like it’s completely
01:27 universal. Uh from Fidelity to Robin
01:30 Hood, you know, Coinbase, River,
01:33 everybody. I’ve never used a financial
01:35 app that app that didn’t use Plaid. Now,
01:37 if you’re not comfortable because in the
01:39 part in the process of using Plaid to
01:41 integrate with your bank account, it
01:43 takes you to your bank account website
01:44 where you have to enter your username
01:46 and password credentials to uh in order
01:48 to link it, which is in my opinion safe
01:50 and secure and everything. But if you
01:52 prefer, River uh will allow you to link
01:54 it with your bank account routing number
01:56 and account number. Uh if you prefer not
01:60 to do any of those because you just
02:01 don’t want River or Coinbase to have any
02:04 of your account credentials, then River
02:07 specifically, it’s easier to do on
02:08 River. You can get it to work on
02:10 Coinbase, but it’s it’s harder if you
02:11 don’t have a linked bank account. On
02:13 River, it’s easy. You just uh wire the
02:15 money. It gives you wiring instructions.
02:17 You take those to your bank branch and
02:18 you say, “Hey, I want to wire so much
02:20 money to this banking information and
02:23 they will wire the funds.” Wire uses a a
02:26 process called Fed wire, which is how
02:28 banks transfer money uh to and from each
02:31 other. So, that’s the easiest way. The
02:32 easiest way for most people, I know I
02:34 made it sound complicated, but the
02:35 easiest way for most people is just go
02:38 to river.com, link it to your bank
02:40 account, pick an amount of Bitcoin you
02:43 want to buy, and just make sure your
02:44 bank account has that much US dollars in
02:46 it, and then push the buy button, and it
02:48 just buys it, and then it’s you the
02:50 Bitcoin’s on River, and anytime you
02:52 want, you can uh you can sell it on
02:54 River and move the money back to your
02:56 bank account, or anything you want to
02:58 do. You can send Bitcoin to people for
02:60 free like I do to get them started. You
03:02 can do anything you want. There are
03:04 other ways of buying Bitcoin. If you’re
03:06 comfortable with a brokerage account
03:08 like Fidelity or Schwab or something
03:10 like that, there’s something called a
03:12 Bitcoin ETF, exchangeraded fund. Uh the
03:16 two big ones are IBIT, which is run by
03:19 BlackRock. IBIT T. Uh I because it’s
03:23 part of their Eyesshares brand and Bit
03:25 because it’s the first three letters of
03:26 the word Bitcoin. I bit. And the other
03:28 one is FBTC as in Fidelity because
03:31 Fidelity runs it. And BTC as in Bitcoin,
03:35 the the threeletter symbol that
03:36 represents Bitcoin, BTC, FBTC, Fidelity
03:40 Bitcoin. Um, and you can buy a Bitcoin
03:42 ETF just like you can buy TSLA for Tesla
03:45 or AMZN for Amazon or MSFT for
03:48 Microsoft. Basically, the exact same way
03:50 that you can buy any type of stock or
03:53 bond or anything like that on a
03:54 brokerage account, which means a market
03:56 investing account. You can buy Bitcoin
03:58 way just entering the letters of a
04:00 Bitcoin ETF. And again, if you want
04:03 Black Rockck, it’s IBIT. If you want
04:05 Fidelity, it’s FBTC. I personally have
04:07 all of my retirement funds in uh
04:09 Fidelity rather than Black Rockck. So, I
04:12 usually recommend SBTC, but Black Rockck
04:14 is larger. Uh but Fidelity custodies the
04:17 Bitcoin themselves rather than having it
04:19 uh held with Coinbase and others. So, I
04:22 like Fidelity because just because it’s
04:23 got fewer risk vectors in my opinion. Uh
04:27 so anyway, that’s the lay of the land.
04:29 Um easiest way again is to just log into
04:31 somewhere like Coinbase or River, create
04:34 an account, link it to your bank
04:35 account, and buy Bitcoin. Um and again,
04:38 if you are not comfortable logging in,
04:39 you can link it with a a routing number
04:42 and a account number um on River, but it
04:45 does take a couple days because they
04:46 have they send you like two small
04:48 deposits for different amounts of money
04:50 and you have to uh enter those on the
04:52 River platform to verify you control
04:54 that bank account. Um, so there’s
04:56 there’s extra hoops to jump through. If
04:58 you link it with Plaid, it’s super easy.
05:01 You literally it’s you enter your, you
05:03 know, you log into your bank account
05:04 through the Plaid integration and then
05:06 it’s an automatic link. And again, all
05:08 the financial apps use that regardless
05:09 of, you know, what you’re trying to do.
05:11 Um, so anyway, it’s that simple.
05:13 River.com, link it to a bank account and
05:16 buy Bitcoin or use a debit card. If
05:17 you’re using, if you want to buy really
05:19 small amounts of Bitcoin, you can even
05:20 use a debit card, but the uh the fees
05:22 are always higher to use a debit card.
05:23 So that is how get and if you want to
05:25 use retirement funds call your financial
05:28 analyst or advisor and tell them you
05:30 want one of the Bitcoin ETFs and it’s
05:33 either Fidelity FBTC or it’s a a
05:36 BlackRock IBIT. And if they tell you
05:40 that you’re not allowed to buy Bitcoin,
05:42 change financial advisors. Any financial
05:44 adviser in the year 2025 that refuses to
05:47 let you buy Bitcoin with your money
05:50 should not be in the business of being a
05:51 financial adviser. Bitcoin is the fifth
05:54 largest asset in the entire world
05:57 and gold which is much much much larger
05:59 and I believe Apple, Microsoft and
06:02 Amazon I think are the only three
06:04 companies that are larger in market
06:06 capitalization than Bitcoin. So if your
06:08 financial adviser is telling you you
06:09 cannot buy the fifth most valuable asset
06:12 in the entire world then they shouldn’t
06:14 even be in the business and I would
06:15 change financial advisors or move your
06:18 IRA 401k Roth IRA move that over to
06:21 Fidelity because if you move it to
06:22 Fidelity rather than wherever it’s stuck
06:25 uh absolutely Fidelity will encourage
06:28 and enable you to buy Bitcoin with it
06:30 and um they have been a supporter of
06:32 Bitcoin back to like 2014 for more than
06:34 a decade now. So, I am a big fan of uh
06:37 of Fidelity. So, anyway, hope that
06:40 helps. That’s how you buy Bitcoin. Lots
06:41 of ways to do it. Uh the easiest way is
06:44 river.com and link it to a bank account.
06:46 It’s that simple. Have a great day,
06:47 everyone. Thanks.