WhatFi?
I’m trying my hand at something else in the crypto world today and that is the world of “CeFi” or “Centralised Finance”, where a company holds custody of your crypto but you can earn interest on your holdings (almost exactly like a traditional bank, ewww). If you’re like me and prefer having full control over your money like with our own private keys, then CeFi is probably not the most attractive option to try and wangle in some extra cash. However, @che-256 has posted about a platform called “Celsius” many times and I thought I’d check it out with a bit of spare change. After all, we both like stacking sats and have visions of travelling like our friend in the featured picture!
Celsius
This is a fully mobile app which I have struggled a bit with today to actually buy BTC through with a debit/credit card so I just ended up buying the BTC from another exchange I’m already set up with then sending it over to the BTC deposit address in app. Once that was all sent through, that’s pretty much it from what I can tell! You just keep your coins there and collect the interest.
A little bit more about Celsius is covered brilliantly by a well balanced YouTube video from Coin Bureau on the Celsius website itself in the “Why Trust Celsius” section – it’s 20 minutes long but worth watching just to get an idea about the project, who co-founded it (seems to be a serial entrepreneur who’s had some great success with previous well known projects called Alex Mashinsky), how it all works with its token set up and if you have no intention other than to just hodl (hold) your crypto long term then, judging by some of the comments in the YouTube video, Celsius is a popular option.
Seeing as interest rates in the UK banks are 0.1% and rapidly approaching 0% with negative rates on the horizon (what!), savings, which were already being eroded with inflation, will be even more so and for me, the current offering of 4.5% interest just for holding BTC on Celsius is worth it given that it’s 45x more than what I get currently!
Of course, I’m not putting all my eggs in one basket, that’s never a good option, particularly with rule #1 of “not your keys, not your crypto”. So I’m keeping things spread out across a few projects that I’ve heard about from my own trusted sources. If you’re interested in signing up, click this link on your phone and download the app (if you transfer $200 or more in your first one, we’ll both get $20 worth of BTC).
DeFi
If not having control of your keys isn’t for you then Decentralised Finance, or DeFi is another option. The advantage of this is that you are in full control of your account still as long you have your keys, there’s no custodial service that can take your crypto away from you so funds should be pretty safe!
WhyFi
WhynotFi?
I’ll keep you updated on how this goes as time goes on!
Take care
Nicky
