Stellar Philippines | How to Buy XLM in PH
Designed to support any type of currency, Stellar is a decentralized platform, is open source, and can support thousands of transactions per second. Its currency – Lumens (XLM) cannot be bought in the Philippines with a trip to the convenience store (unlike your bitcoins). But you can still buy Stellar’s XLM in PH using the steps listed in this article.
This article had a slight update on October 2, 2018.
(Note: Various companies in the Philippines have portions (or all) of their remittance/money transfer systems built on the Stellar blockchain, like Coins.ph, Tagcash, etc). This article is all about the ways into buying XLM.
How to Buy Stellar in the Philippines
As mentioned, you cannot buy XLM directly in the Philippines. There are currently two ways to do this by means of trading your bitcoins for XLM.
By the way, I should mention that even if we cannot buy XLM with our Pesos directly, you should know that it is also impossible in most places in the world to buy XLM with their fiat currency. XLM, like other altcoins, are usually traded in exchange for bitcoins. Fiat is mostly traded only with Bitcoin (and to an extent – Ether and Lietcoin). So do not worry if it feels like you need to do this workaround.
In short, if you think the process below is inconvenient, take solace with the fact that this process is almost the same for virtually every other person in the world.
Buy in Binance Through P2P
You can purchase XLM from Binance through P2P. This is the simplest out of the options mentioned in this article. Here are the steps:
- Log in or register to Binance
- Go to its P2P page
- Find a seller of USDT for your PHP
- Transfer USDT from Binance P2P to Binance Spot
- Find XLM/USDT Pair
- Trade
Here is our step-by-step guide to buy crypto using Binance P2P: How to Use Binance P2P to Buy Bitcoin, USDT in the Philippines
Buy Stellar on Abra
Abra supports depositing fiat via local banks and through credit cards. You can exchange bitcoins for XLM within the Abra App. Should in case you want to cash out, you can do via partner merchants like Tambunting.
- Download Abra here! (It will ask for your mobile number, start with the PH area code 63.)
- Buy cryptocurrency on Abra through credit card!
Buy Stellar using Credit Card on Changelly
The Changelly platform allows anyone with a credit card or debit card to purchase XLM with USD. Changelly can also be used to trade bitcoins (and other altcoins) to XLM. Register for Changelly here.
Buy XLM using Credit Card using Cex.io
CEX.io is a reputable crypto exchange that allows users to exchange fiat (notably USD) for cryptocurrency like XLM.
Buy Stellar On Binance (Old Method)
Binance is one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange in terms of volume. You can trade your bitcoins for XLM or any other coins.
The process will involve sending your bitcoins from your bitcoin wallet such as Coins.ph into your Binance’s bitcoin wallet address. Click here for the steps.
Buy Stellar Lumens from Abra:
Users with Abra can now trade their bitcoins for XLM within its app. The instructions should be similar to how you buy ethereum through Abra. For the original announcement article, click here.
Buy XLM in Cryptocurrency Exchanges
Majority of foreign cryptocurrency exchange sites trade XLM for Bitcoins (and also for Ether). We will use Bittrex as an example. But first, check out these two articles that discuss funding your Bittrex account and buying coins from there.
- How to fund your Bittrex account with your Coins.ph / Abra Account
- How to buy altcoins from Bittrex for beginners
Note: You may choose not to use Bittrex. Majority of cryptocurrency exchanges may differ in website design, but all basic features (the trading of coins and how it is done) are basically the same.
Step by Step Guide to Buy XLM from the Philippines using Bittrex
- Send Bitcoin from your Coins.ph or Abra accounts to your BTC wallet in Bittrex.
- You can also use Buybitcoin.ph and use the Bittrex BTC wallet as your destination address.
- Go to Bittrex’ XLM page.
- Buy XLM using instructions from this article.
- Depending on how much worth of XLM do you want, proceed to transfer your XLM coins in an XLM wallet.
XLM Wallet
Here are the wallets mentioned by Stellar to keep your Lumens (XLM). Note that Stellar also stated that they do not own, maintain, or operate any of these wallets:
- Ledger
- Stronghold
- StellarTerm
- Stellar Desktop Client
- Blackwallet
- LuPoEx
- Lobstr
- Stargazer
- Saza
- Centaurus
- Papaya
Other Ways to Buy XLM
Can I keep my XLM at Coins.ph and Bitbit?
No. Bitbit only supports BTC at the moment. Coins.ph, on the other hand, now supports BTC, ETH, and BCH.
Overall
Currently as the world’s 8th best-performing cryptocurrency (as of January 9, 2018) according to Coinmarkecap, Stellar is poised to stay in the top 10 or atleast within the top 20 coins in the future.
