One thing that puts people off cryptocurrency is confusion around obtaining it. Admittedly, it can be mind-boggling if you’re new to cryptocurrency, but breaking it down into manageable steps makes it far easier to understand — sort of like baking a cake…

Recipe: Purchasing OPQ

Let me guide you on the steps required to bake your own OPQ cryptocurrency cake — and once you take that initial bite, you’ll want more!

Note: Please ensure you are considering your own personal data, security, and finances carefully at each step — precautions are there so you, the buyer, don’t get burned! There is a valuable lesson learned from all the stories about exchange accounts being hacked — do not leave your assets on an exchange. If you do, you’re leaving yourself to potentially being hacked and your assets stolen. Keep your assets safe in a hardware storage solution, such as the Ledger Nano.

In this guide, I’ve utilized Coinbase, KuCoin exchange, and MetaMask. There are other sites you could use, but I’ve found the ones listed to be far easier and more reliable than their competitors. Although these are what I use, you are, as always, free to choose other sites for purchasing once you get used to maneuvering cryptocurrency purchases. Let’s get started!

Here is what you will need:

Ingredients:

§ KuCoin account

§ MetaMask in-browser Ethereum wallet download

§ Coinbase account

§ A mobile smartphone

§ Two forms of ID*

§ Payment method — ideally a credit card for added security

*ID is required by external exchanges to ensure money laundering regulations are being met. The ID requirement is not a stipulation from Opacity Storage directly.

Method: Let’s Bake!

1. Create your accounts

First, if you do not hold active accounts with Coinbase and KuCoin, you will need to set these up.

Coinbase

Head to Coinbase here and click the ‘Get Started’ button in the top right-hand corner. This will open the account creation form which requires a name, email and password to be entered. It’s all very standard stuff at this point.

KuCoin

Head to KuCoin here and click the ‘’Sign Up’’ button in the top right-hand corner. This opens the account creation form which requires only an email. You will next hit the ‘’send verification code’’. You will be emailed a code to your personal email which you enter into the KuCoin sign up to complete email address verification. Once verified, you can set up a password.

The next step is to head to the ‘’Assets’’ tab on the top-right section of the account and click the ‘’ deposit’’ button. This will require you to set-up two methods of security. The first is a trading password — this consists of six-digits. The second is via the Google Authenticator app via smartphone or browser. Connect your account to your smartphone by scanning the QR code on the KuCoin website.

MetaMask

Head to MetaMask here. MetaMask is a browser-based wallet and by far one of the easiest methods for storing your Cryptocurrency. Download their browser extension which is available on Chrome, Firefox, Opera and Brave. Once the extension is set-up, it will show as a fox icon, usually on the top right (especially if you’re using Chrome).

When you’ve set-up your account, you will be given a generated backup phrase consisting of twelve randomly generated words which are specific to your account. Keep these safe to recover your account in case you need to!

Finito! That’s the security methods and accounts set-up. Let’s keep going!

2. Buy Ethereum (or bits of ETH) on Coinbase

First, make sure you have a payment method on Coinbase. I would advise using a credit card over a debit card as your transactions are covered, but you can choose the method you prefer. To reach the end-goal of buying OPQ, you need to purchase Ethereum (ETH). The quickest and smartest way to do this is via Coinbase.

On Coinbase, you can purchase a minimum of £1.99/$2.53 worth of ETH and a maximum of £6000/$7,628.68 (later, you will require 2 OPQ for an Opacity account, currently around £0.06/$0.08 each, plus a small amount of ETH for the transaction fees).

Once you’re ready, hit the ‘’Buy Ethereum instantly’’ button and enter the amount (recommended is £10/$12.61 minimum to cover fees and the purchase of ETH bits) and confirm once it pops up on your screen.

Congratulations! You are now a cryptocurrency adopter.

It won’t take long for the ETH to reach your wallet. You can check that your ETH purchase has cleared by checking on the accounts tab of your Coinbase account.

3. Deposit on KuCoin

On the KuCoin assets tab, click the deposit button. The next page is bare except for a search box — type ETH into the search to populate the drop-down box. Once you’ve clicked on ETH, you will note that it lists your personal wallet address. This is an important code-address that you will use to receive your funds from other places.

KuCoin has a nice little feature: with the click-of-a-button you can copy the wallet address to your computer clipboard. This ensures the wallet address is correct in its entirety as there have been horror stories where people have sent funds to wrong wallet addresses and ultimately lost that money. There is no way to return the money if this happens so use the clipboard facility where possible.

We will now use this address to transfer the ETH you purchased from step-two on Coinbase.

4. Buying OPQ — Nearly There!

With your KuCoin ETH wallet address copied to the clipboard, open the Coinbase tab in your browser. We will now be sending the ETH that’s currently sitting in your Coinbase account over to KuCoin account so we can purchase OPQ on Kucoin.

On Coinbase, you can transfer your ETH by pressing the ‘’send’’ button. A pop-up window will overlay so you can fill out some details such as the recipient. This is where you will paste your KuCoin wallet address from the clipboard.

Once you’ve confirmed that the recipient section (your wallet address) is correct, you can click on the ETH input box in the amount section. Click on ‘’send max’’. You will note the full amount you purchased isn’t listed, this is because a small amount is deducted to go towards transfer and miner fees. The fees are so small, it’s not worth worrying about.

Next, you can choose to add a note — maybe a date, a reason for sending or something else. You can opt to leave this blank if you wish. Once completed, hit continue and confirm your transaction. The transfer may take a little bit of time depending on the gas prices and strain on the Ethereum blockchain; typically it’s quick.

You can check receipt over on your KuCoin assets page.

5. Transfer into Your Trading Account on KuCoin

Now that your ETH is stored on KuCoin you will need to transfer the ETH into your trading account in order to buy OPQ. Simply hit the ‘’transfer in’’ button. It really is that simple.

Type ETH into the coin field, click the number in the available amount section to send the full amount to your trading account, then confirm.

6. Let’s buy some OPQ

Now the fun begins! Your trading account has funds so you can now buy your OPQ.

On KuCoin, head to the exchange which is located next to the KuCoin logo and the market button. Once you have done this a few times, it will become far less daunting so bear with it.

Currently, you are the proud owner of Ethereum (ETH), if you’ve followed all the steps. You will use ETH to buy OPQ, so you want to select ETH as a pair to OPQ in the Exchange section. Click on the small ‘’select pair’’ search box and type in ‘’OPQ’’.

This will drop down a box populated with OPQ/ETH and OPQ/BTC. Click the OPQ/ETH option as this is the only applicable one to this guide (unless you own Bitcoin). The next page shown is where you will purchase OPQ for use on the Opacity platform.

You will need to enter your trading password before you proceed. This is the password you set up in step one along with the Google Verification Authenticator. Once you’ve entered your trading password, you will see the main order book with several options.

Ideally, you want to try to purchase the cheapest sell-order in the order book. There is a withdraw fee of 34.7 OPQ (subject to change) and a minimum withdrawal amount of 69.4 OPQ. I’d advise you to hit the 100% button to spend all of your ETH on OPQ, but you can choose a lesser amount. When you’re ready, press the green ‘’Buy OPQ’’ button.

Congratulations! You are now the proud owner of OPQ.

7. Metamask Transfer

This is where MetaMask comes in. You want to move your cryptocurrencies into a wallet for safekeeping rather than keep them on exchanges. To do this, you will need to move your OPQ from your trading account into your main account on KuCoin. You will need to withdraw it by pressing the ‘’Transfer Out’’ button in the trading account card.

Once the funds have been released to your main account, hit the ‘’withdrawal’’ button and then select OPQ. You’ll note that the fee has already been deducted from your OPQ amount. This is normal for most exchanges.

To move your OPQ into MetaMask, you will need to click the fox icon on your browser (this is the extension we discussed in step one) and sign in, if required.

Hover over the account section on MetaMask and select ‘’copy to clipboard’’ — once again your wallet address will be copied to your clipboard, so paste this into the wallet address form on KuCoin. In effect, this is similar to what we did when moving from Coinbase to KuCoin. You’re simply moving your currency in and out.

On KuCoin, once you’ve pasted your MetaMask wallet address on the form, hit confirm and then follow the steps as before to authenticate your trading password.

Decoration: Optional

For convenience, you can add the OPQ token information into MetaMask to save time from having to go through the Blockchain record.

1. Open MetaMask via the fox icon on the browser bar and click the three lines in the top left to open the menu.

2. Click the ‘’add token’’ button which will take you to a new page.

3. OPQ needs to be added manually to display the tokens in the wallet. Add the following information into the form and click next. Once it’s complete, you will now see your OPQ balance listed on MetaMask.

Contract Address: 0x77599d2c6db170224243e255e6669280f11f1473

Symbol: OPQ

Decimals: 18

Serve, and enjoy once cooled alongside a cold Scotch-Whisky with a dash of water.