4 Things You Should Avoid When Betting with BTC

If you know nothing about cryptocurrencies, it's time to brush up on your Bitcoin knowledge. There are guides that can assist you in selecting the very best cryptocurrency online casinos.  Below we offer the common pitfalls when selecting a casino that primarily incorporates Bitcoin and similar digital currencies.  Let's take a look.

4 Things You Should Avoid When Betting with BTC 

1. Thinking dollars instead of mBTC 

mBTC is the unit you use to place wagers on bitcoin casinos and sportsbooks. When Bitcoin goes down in value, your mBTC will go down in value. When Bitcoin goes up in value, so does the mBTC in your wagering account.  

Don’t forget that you are betting with mBTC. If you start thinking dollars, you may forget that the price of BTC will affect your mBTC. You could wonder why you have more, or less, in your account than you thought you had.

2. Withdrawing after a bad beat 

All sports handicappers, all gamblers, suffer a bad beat once in a while. When we suffer a bad beat, we should go with it. Take a few horse races or games off. Or look for the next winning bet. 

The last thing we should do is withdrawal our BTC. Doing so not only wastes time, but it could cost money. It depends on where you send your BTC and if you end up converting to dollars.   

3. Forgetting that BTC doubles as an investment 

Bitcoin is not only a utility, but it’s also an investment. You can use BTC, in the form of mBTC, to bet on sports games, in the casino, and in the racebook.  

But while you are betting at the online casino or sportsbook, your mBTC, because it converts automatically to BTC once you withdrawal, is also an investment. Bitcoin can have wild swings. 

When it swings to the upside, you make money without placing a bet, which gives BTC a major advantage to betting on sports than fiat currency.  

We here at Gambling911.com had this experience recently where our Bitcoin payment lost a bit of value while waiting for confirmations on a particularly "high demand" day.  It took around four hours to confirm as opposed to the typical 45 minutes to one hour, which allows for little change in the price.

What we have found is, while it's important to move your crypto quickly from the wallet to the exchange and into your bank account, the best times to do this appear to be during "off" hours (i.e. early morning, late night) and days outside of Friday.  The later is our own personal experience as Fridays seem to be one of those "high demand" days.   There were no significant fluctuations on the day we were doing our own transfer so the money lost was a minute amount.

4. Converting Bitcoin to dollars and other currencies can cause a taxable event 

U.S. citizens who became multi-millionaires in BTC know that if they transfer their BTC to dollars they must pay capital gains taxes.  

The U.S. Government sees Bitcoin as an investment like a stock. If you live in the U.S. and you forget this small but important fact, you could end up withdrawing your winnings and converting all your BTC to dollars. 

Don’t be surprised when Coinbase, Cash App, or whatever crypto exchange you use, sends you a 1099 form before tax season. Capital gains taxes on BTC is yet another reason to reconsider before converting to dollars.   

But if you think you're screwed living in the USA, consider what it is like in other countries.

Belgium is often considered among the worst nations in the world in terms of crypto taxation for residents.

And then there is Japan.  Here you will often be paying Miscellaneous Income Tax on your crypto for the vast majority of transactions.

In France, occasional traders pay the Single Fixed Levy (PFU) of 30%. While professional traders and crypto miners pay a Business Income Tax of 45%.

On the plus side, The Bahamas, Bermuda, Belarus, the United Arab Emirates, the Central African Republic, Lichtenstein are some of the better options with minimal to no tax liability when it comes to switching from crypto to fiat.

Germany has some quirky tax rules when it comes to crypto but the tax implications are mostly nominal.

- B.Delmer, Gambling911.com