Key facts:
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It offers the simplicity of P2P exchange through the implementation of smart contracts.
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With complete asset independence, since the private key belongs to the user.
Currently, thanks to the rise of LocalBitcoin as the largest P2P bitcoin exchange platform in the world, other cryptocurrencies have been somewhat suppressed. However, Localethereum has come to change that a bit. As its name suggests, there we can directly exchange ethers to fiat currency with other people.
Localethereum offers the simplicity of P2P exchange through the implementation of smart contracts, where said contract will only be executed, when both parties reach a mutual agreement. In addition, it offers complete asset independence, since the private key will be stored only by the user, thus the platform will not be able to touch the ethers. All this guarantees that funds are protected, as well as offering the transparency and decentralization typical of the cryptocurrency universe.
With this tutorial we will learn how to make the most of buying and selling Ether on this platform. Let’s get started.
Log in to Localethereum
As with any good portal tutorial, the first step is registration. To begin, let’s go to the main portal Localethereum and we will choose Check it out in the top menu. If the portal opens in English or another language, you can change the language next to the Localethereum logo in the upper left corner.
Localethereum registration form.
Here is the “basic” registration form. The only thing we have to be careful about is using an email that we use regularly, because that’s where the message will be sent to us. key for two-factor authentication.
Once the form is complete, we’ll confirm our email and that’s it. We will already be registered on the platform.
Now we will need to add a little more security to our account. The next step is confirm our phone number. For this we will click on the 3 bars located in the upper right menu: this will open a drop-down menu in which we will select edit account.
Here we can modify our profile information.
We will click on the box in the section Telephone number (phone number) que dice «no estabulato» (not set).
Here we will enter our phone number.
In this field we must put the phone number, respecting the order of the country code, operator code and finally the specific number as such. In the end we choose send a validation codewe wait for the message to arrive, confirm it and that’s it.
Shopping on Localethereum
We’ve already registered and are ready to go. The first transaction we will make will be the purchase of Ether.
There are two ways to purchase on the portal: one is by publishing an ad, where we can save 0.25% commission, or direct purchase from the seller, which is what we will do in this section. We’ll see how to post an ad later.
To begin with, let’s organize the Ether sale announcements. For this we will look at our own menu.
Main screen after login.
In the first option, Buy or sell, let’s choose Comprar. In the next selection we choose method of payment, including bank transfer, cash, PayPal, AliPay, WeChat Pay and others. In the third part we have to write the country where we want to filter transactions. Finally, we will choose the way we want to filter the offers: by popularity (users with the highest number of transactions) or by price, which will vary depending on the provider and whether ethers are offered in different currencies in the selected country.
Leaked shopping ads.
In the previous image you will find all ads already filtered by sales and country. From there we will have to choose one of our preferences, but first we need to be very aware of this data.
Important information about the offer.
1.
In this column we will see username. We can click on him to see his profile and the reputation he has. The lightning symbol, located on the side, This means that it reacts very quickly, or a crescent moon symbol may appear, implying that the ad is outside of the user’s pre-defined business hours. At the bottom of the name will be the approximate number of transactions that this user has successfully completed: the higher the number of transactions, the higher the trust.
2.
Here you will see the payment method, and at the bottom the seller’s comment about the offered payment method, which is usually the name of the bank from which the payment is received – in case of transfer. It is important to pay attention to this detail, because only through this method will either the seller or the buyer accept the conditions.
3.
In this column, the state/province/city where the offer is located will be at the top and the state at the bottom.
4.
Here are the lower and upper limits for making a transaction. The first is the minimum offered and the second the maximum. Sometimes only the maximum offered appears as “up to X amount”.
5.
Finally, there is a button to open a transaction. It will show the bid price per unit that the seller charges for each Ether sold, usually in the fiat currency equivalent of the selected country. But the full amount may not be listed: in this case, for example, the price per unit of ETH is 253.2 million strong bolivars.
Here you can compare the official rates of each fiat currency against the dollar, so you can generally calculate what rate they are offering you: whether it is above or below the average price of ETH.
Once we understand this, we will select the ad and click the buy button.
Purchase form on Localethereum.
This is the screen where we will make the change. On the left side we will see what is related to the transaction: in the first field we go enter the amount we want to buy in fiat currency, and in the second the quantity in the ether will appear; Or this process can be done in reverse, by entering the amount of Ether you want to buy and automatically displaying the amount in fiat currency.
Minimum transactions that can be made on the platform Must be at least $10 in exchange what the seller offers.
On the right side, we will see, first of all, the price of ether that this user offers. At the bottom will be information about the user, including their name, the number of transactions, the total volume of transactions they have processed and the percentage good comments left by people who have exchanged with him before.
After clarifying this and entering the desired amount, click on Start a transaction.
Open purchase transaction. The first step is to contact the customer via chat.
We have already opened a transaction here. On the left is an encrypted chat. This chat will only be visible to the localethereum team in case a dispute is opened, and the private key for this chat is shared. It’s on the right transaction status: It will reflect what is the next step we need to take. For the case shown in the picture, the status is waiting for funds in ether to make a payment.
Below the above we will see how long the transaction has been since it was opened and a history showing us the steps taken and the time since they were taken. In this case it would be so Waiting for the seller to deposit the funds as escrow.
At the end of the window we will find a smart contract. This will reflect the status of the contract, and whether it has already received funding, as well as whether the parties have already reached an agreement.
After the seller has transferred the escrow funds to the contract, we will have 2 hours to make the payment. Please note that you should not make a deposit if you have not confirmed that the ethers are already in escrow.
As can be seen at the bottom, the seller’s funds are already escrow in the smart contract.
As you can see, here the seller has already sent ethers to the smart contract and confirmed them. Only after we check this will we make the payment and after completion (in the manner agreed in the chat) we will click on Mark as paid. This will show the user that the payment has already been made. Then we have to wait for the user to confirm the specified payment and proceed with the release of ether. This last step can take time because, by the time the seller releases the funds, the digital contract has been fulfilled and must be confirmed online for the funds to be transacted.
In case it is marked as paid, and the user does not want to release the funds, we can open a dispute by clicking «Open a dispute«. This button will appear when we mark our transaction as paid where previously there was an option to confirm our payment.
Menu for opening a dispute.
From the drop-down list, we have to select the reason why we are starting a dispute and select the appropriate button to open it.
Once the process is complete, we will be able to see the funds reflected in our portfolio. They will be displayed in the top menu; what remains now is leave the classification up to the user showing whether we did “good”, “neutral” or “bad”.
Withdraw funds from Localethereum
We already bought, now it’s time to withdraw them. To begin we will click on our portfolio located in the top menu and this will open the following.
From here we can manage our portfolios within the platform.
In the send ether section, we will fill out the form by entering the destination address in the first box, then the amount to send in ETH, and then the source address. When we’re done, click on transfer and that’s it, we just have to wait for it to be confirmed and we will already withdraw our funds to our personal wallet installed on our device.
It is important to remember that it is not recommended to leave funds in exchange offices, because everything on the Internet can be hacked.
Receiving and selling Ether on Localethereum
Now it’s time to learn how we can sell our ethers. To begin with, as with buying, there are two ways to sell, either by placing your own ad or by approaching customers. On this occasion we will learn how to sell directly to the customer.
First of all, we need receive funds to our account. To do this, we will select the ETH balance found in the top menu and it will show us our wallets.
Portfolio on Localethereum.
In this section, on the left, we will find the addresses of our account. Below each you will find the current balance that each address has.. New wallet addresses will be automatically generated when you use or transfer balance to any already generated wallets. Then we choose one of these addresses to send funds from our personal wallet.
Once we have established the balance, the first thing we must do is filter our ads. In the menu, we will choose to filter ads according to users who buy ether (Sell). As with shopping, we must take into account that the user is online; we should see the number of transactions this user has made as well as the percentage of successful transactions. We can see this when entering the profile, by clicking on their name.
When we find an ad that matches our interests, we click on it Sell.
Sales opening form. We must have funds in the wallet and the transaction must be a minimum of 10 USD.
As with the purchase process, we will add the amount in either fiat currency or ethersince filling in one of the two fields will immediately fill in the other.
When we have already added the amount to sell, we must take into account that the sale cannot be made with an amount greater than what we have in our portfolio, a commission of 0.25% is charged and, in addition, Minimum transactions to be made must be greater than $10. After we are convinced of this, we will click on the start of the transaction.
Open exchange of sales.
Here we have already taken the first step to sell. For now, we will have to contact the customer, via chat, asking for some reference information in order to reach a mutual agreement. Once the contract is finalized, you must post your funds as collateral. This does not mean that your funds will be transferred to the buyer, but will only be held by the smart contract until payment. After you transfer them, the buyer has 2 hours to make the payment, otherwise the contract will be automatically cancelled.
To deposit funds, you must select a button Guarantee deposit (escrow).
Funds must be transferred for the buyer to make payment. You have only 2 hours before the contract expires to complete the payment.
There we will select the source portfolio at the bottom of the box. We will then press the button below to send the funds. After this operation is done, we have to wait for said contract to be confirmed (the smart contract must confirm the operation on the Ethereum blockchain) and we proceed to tell the user that they can now proceed with the payment.
When the user has marked that the payment has already been made, we check on our account that it really was; we have to release ethers by clicking on Free up funds.
Release of funds. This can only be done after the payment has been confirmed.
In this field we will see the total deposited funds, commission costs and the total amount that the customer will receive. Once we agree on this, we’ll click Yes, release funds. We must always remember that we must release the funds only when the customer confirms the payment.
After publishing and confirming online, all we have to do is leave an opinion on how the exchange with that user went.
Post an ad on Localethereum
As we mentioned earlier, there is another way to buy/sell Ether on the platform, and that is by posting ads. This allows us to get better prices when buying or selling, but it will always depend on the reputation we have gained: the higher the number of successful transactions, the better feedback we will get and this will improve the trust that new users can have in us.. In however, this option may take much longer than using other ads.
To start, let’s go to the ads or offers section. To do this, we will click on the 3 horizontal bars in the top menu and click on My offers.
Menu to manage our ads.
Here we can create a new offer or see the list of active offers we have. Let’s click Create a new offer to start generating our ad.
Creating a new offer.
This section has not yet been translated at the time of writing this guide, but it is not too complicated to understand, since it is basic English. The first thing we have to choose is the type of advertisement we want to place. U The guy We will select whether it is a sale or purchase ad. In case it is a sales ad, it doesn’t matter if we have the funds to sell, because when someone gives us an offer, we have to pay to complete said transaction. Then we will choose the payment method, in this case it is a bank transfer, and then we will enter in which currency the offer will be made: in our case it will be in strong bolivars.
In the section Course or exchange rate, we will choose the percentage above or below which we want to sell or buy, depending on the exchange which we choose as a reference and the exchange rate from the dollar to the local currency at that time. This means that the price will be variable.
Menu for selecting the percentage of profit or loss in relation to the price of a specific exchange. ‘Down’ is below, ‘Above’ is up.
In the first box we have to enter the percentage we want to get, and then we have to choose whether that percentage will be above or below the price of the exchange we choose. After that we will choose the house of our choice, but we can also choose the average price managed by CoinMarketCap: this option is at the end of the list.
Other information in the ad.
After we’ve done that, we’re asked for more information. The borders They are the minimum and maximum amount we are willing to buy or sell. The value we will display here will be in the fiat currency we choose, but not in Ether.
He Title refers to the header that will follow the payment method. For example: if it is a bank transfer, we will put in the title to which bank we will make – or want – the transfer.
Moose Terms of trade or terms of exchange, are descriptions that we will set as our policies for performing any type of transaction, such as: I only accept transfers from certain banks, I do not accept transfers from third banks, etc.
Finally we meet Standard Hours. Here we will enter the time we will be available to make the change, keeping in mind that the platform will penalize us if we take too long to respond to the offer.
To finish we will click on Publish my offer and this will mean that, if the ad is at the moment we post it, it will immediately become visible to all users of the portal. Already published ads can be viewed and edited My offers.
Final remarks
Without a doubt, Localethereum is a platform that creates trust, all thanks to the use of smart contracts. New users can quickly build a good reputation just by offering good prices or responding to other ads, because the platform guarantees and keeps the funds, so that in case of disagreement it can be quickly resolved by dispute.
Simplicity is also part of the site, but perhaps this simplicity is also one of its main flaws: It does not ask us for more personal information, for verification, than our phone number. It does not ask us for a photo of a passport or an identity document, as happens on other portals; which could give users greater confidence when using the platform.
If you have followed the entire step-by-step tutorial, you will understand that each task is not at all complicated, and moreover, they are performed safely for both the buyer and the seller. After the drastic increase in bitcoin fees, it is undoubtedly a good option to exchange fiat and buy ETH.
If you want to see a video tutorial, you can visit our channel. YouTube.
