When the crypto markets took a nose-dive, I felt it was a good time to put some cash in. As I learnt, traditional banks are still slow as molasses…I started my money transfer on a Friday; it was the following THURSDAY before my funds actually reached the Coin Exchange. How, you ask? Why didn’t I wire the funds online?

In fact, I DID wire the funds – and it still took that long. Here is what happened (and why I believe Crypto will eventually kill traditional banks)

Day 1 (Friday, the 12th) – Initiate Wire Transfer

Day 2 and 3 (Saturday, Sunday, 13th and 14th) – Wires are not processed. Wait till Monday

Day 4 (Monday, MLK Day) – Bank Holiday, no wire processing

Day 5 (Tuesday) – It SNOWED in my hometown – with ice on the roads; All banks were closed (I could not go in to figure out why my wire was stuck)

Day 6 (Wednesday) – I finally get to a branch only to find out that my wire was stuck because I was trying to wire to a crypto exchange (and some banks treated that with ‘suspicion’). Never mind that I had been a customer of the bank for over 15 years –and never mind that crypto exchanges based in the U.S. are fully legit, SEC backed and approved!!

Day 6 (Wednesday) – Withdraw the money from the bank where the wire was stuck – transfer to another bank, where I had no trouble wiring in the past. Took ANOTHER day for my bank-to-bank transfer!

Day 7 (Thursday) – With funds in my alternate bank account, I was finally able to send out a wire, which reached the same night.

All this while, I am closely watching the markets for signs of recovery (and some of the coins I was after, did recover somewhat).

My point is, it shouldn’t take a week to transfer funds from a U.S account to a U.S exchange, when a Bitcoin would have gone through in minutes (30 minutes on average).

  • It has nothing to do with your customer history at the bank or your account history – but everything to do with slow processes.
  • It would be understandable if these funds were being transferred internationally – there are regulations etc. around that. Even then, a week would have been considered long.

The Crypto Advantage

Banks, in my humble opinion, are doomed, as are loans and mortgages and other ‘unsmart contracts’ that take days and weeks to go through.

Anuj holds professional certifications in Google Cloud, AWS as well as certifications in Docker and App Performance Tools such as New Relic. He specializes in Cloud Security, Data Encryption and Container Technologies.

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Anuj Varma – who has written posts on Anuj Varma, Hands-On Technology Architect, Clean Air Activist.

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