In the US, the biggest gambling news in recent weeks has nothing to do with gambling itself.
At least, not entirely.
After all, if you live in the United States, you’re already probably aware that you have tons of legal online betting options.
However, the hardest part – even more difficult than knowing where to bet – is knowing how to fund those bets.
Because of the UIGEA law, online bet funding has always been the biggest issue for those looking to gamble real money over the Internet, and that remains true today.
For many players, Visa and Mastercard deposits are just fine. Most of the time, anyway. The aforementioned UIGEA causes those to be declined about 10% of the time.
But if you bet frequently – and especially if you keep a smaller balance in your betting bank roll and then top it off with reasonable regularity (which is exactly how we prefer to manage our funds) – even a 10% rejection rate can cause you to miss out on a time-sensitive slots tournament or poker event. For sports bettors in particular, any delays can cause valuable pre-game line or futures to go from sure thing to missed opportunity before the game even gets underway.
Of course, there are plenty of solutions.
Cryptocurrency is the best one by far, but crypto is intimidating for many gamblers. The monetary and “value” concepts behind crypto are complex and non-traditional, giving many potential users a sort of “information paralysis” that keeps them from jumping in. And when they finally decide to go for it and get started with Bitcoin gambling or altcoin betting, they run into another issue: crypto exchange wait times.
See, once you’ve decided you’re going to bet in crypto the next time you make a deposit – unless you set things up well ahead of time – you’re not going to bet in crypto the next time you make a deposit.
This is because all – all – of the major US commercial exchanges have a built-in waiting period for new users.
In other words, if it’s your first time using Coinbase or Bittrex or Kraken, when you buy a coin or coins by linking your bank account or debit card to the platform, those crypto buys will be limited to the exchanges themselves for up to 10 days. If you want to send that crypto to your online betting account the same day you buy it, you can’t. You have to wait until the exchange unlocks off-platform trading for your account.
Why the exchanges do this appears to have something to do with a combination of regulatory safety and liquidity concerns, but it seems less and less relevant as the market grows. Maybe one day they’ll put a stop to this foolishness.
But right now, luckily, there are two ways you can skip past this new user wait time and have your crypto bought – and sent to your gambling site – within just a few minutes: Cash App and Atomic Wallet.
Cash App Bitcoin Deposits
If you want to make a Bitcoin (BTC) deposit, Cash App is the only P2P app that allows you to buy BTC and send it to any external wallet address immediately.
Now, Cash App crypto betting isn’t all that flexible, as the platform only supports Bitcoin currently, and there don’t seem to be any plans on expanding the Cash App crypto selection anytime soon. Cash App also charges a 2% fee on top of BTC’s regular blockchain transaction fees, so you’ll be paying a small premium for the convenience of immediate unfettered sending.
However, if you’re already a Cash App user and want to make crypto betting deposits, this is the way to go.
Similarly, if you’ve been thinking about signing up for one of the big P2P money transfer platforms out there in general and also gamble online, this specific feature alone makes Cash App more attractive than PayPal, Venmo, or even Zelle. Yes, you can also buy Bitcoin with Zelle, but that process involves more steps and more accounts, as you must buy through the LocalBitcoins.com exchange and interface with private BTC sellers.
Cash App’s solution is faster, cheaper, and better.
Atomic Wallet Deposits
The other – and frankly, much better – way to buy crypto for first-time use at legal online gambling sites (or anywhere else) – is to download Atomic Wallet for your iPhone or Android device.
Atomic Wallet is a crypto wallet app that supports hundreds of different coins and allows you buy a few dozen assets directly through their trading storefront. No other crypto wallet functions as a dedicated exchange, and since you’ll need to have a crypto wallet once you start investing with crypto anyway, you can effectively kill two birds with one stone.
Atomic supports buying and selling all of the major crypto coins used by every site we recommend:
- Bitcoin (BTC)
- Bitcoin Cash (BCH)
- Cardano (ADA)
- Chainlink (LINK)
- Dogecoin (DOGE)
- Ethereum (ETH)
- Litecoin (LTC)
- Ripple (XRP)
- Stellar (XLM)
- Tether (USDT)
- USD Coin (USDC)
In the case of Ripple especially, Atomic Wallet isn’t just the best place to buy XRP, it’s the only place to buy XRP for those living in the US. All the major commercial exchanges have delisted Ripple because of ongoing SEC litigation, but it still remains a top-rated crypto asset and one of the fastest, cheapest crypto platforms to use for legal online gambling activities.
Of course, as with other rapid crypto buy-in options, Atomic does charge a bit of a premium to buy cryptocurrency through its exchange. Most purchases come with fees of 5%, though if you’re not buying huge sums of coin, the convenience is worth the added cost.
Hopefully, if you’ve been wanting to get started in Bitcoin betting or crypto gambling in general and haven’t pulled the trigger because of time considerations, the above options will allow you to finally get started buying in and cashing out.