Putting $500 in, three ways
Say you have $500 and want crypto. A debit card is quick, a bank transfer is slower, and the price gap between them is large. The fee pages of three exchanges, read on November 8, 2026, show what each charges for the money going in.
| Exchange | Debit card, $500 | Bank transfer (ACH), $500 |
|---|---|---|
| Kraken | $0.25 + 3.75%, so $19.00 | Free |
| Gemini | 3.49%, so $17.45 | Free |
| Bitstamp | 4% for Instant Purchase, so $20.00 | Free |
The Kraken figures come from its cash deposit page, updated November 4, 2026. Gemini’s transfer fee schedule prices debit cards at “3.49% of total purchase amount,” and Bitstamp’s fee schedule adds that the card issuer “may charge additional fees” on top of its 4%.
Getting money in is only the first charge. Kraken’s Instant Buy FAQ lists a fixed 1% trading fee, waived for Kraken+ members on up to $10,000 a month, plus any spread built into the price. Bitstamp’s Basic Trading carries a fixed spread of 1.8% on most crypto and 0.5% on stablecoins. A spread doesn’t appear as a separate line, so compare the quoted price with the market price before you pay.
How regulators classify it
Who runs an on-ramp matters, because the business is regulated as money handling. In the US, FinCEN’s 2019 guidance describes an exchanger as a business that swaps virtual currency for real currency, funds or other virtual currency, and says exchangers generally qualify as money transmitters. It treats the owner-operator of a crypto kiosk the same way, both when it takes cash in and when it pays cash out.
Europe names the service directly. MiCA lists “exchange of crypto-assets for funds” as a crypto-asset service in its own right. Article 3 of the regulation defines it as concluding purchase or sale contracts with clients for funds using the firm’s own capital.
The trade-off people miss
Free deposits come with the longest wait. On Kraken, ACH deposits through Plaid cost nothing and can be traded at once, yet they stay locked from withdrawal for seven days, according to the same cash deposit page. A card purchase costs more and triggers a temporary 72-hour hold, which USD card purchases may face every time, not just the first. Kraken applies these holds to crypto withdrawals as well as cash.
If you plan to move the coins to your own wallet soon after buying, the cheap route is the slow one. Card payments can also simply fail. Kraken’s FAQ names a card issuer that “does not allow payments to crypto platforms” as a common reason, and it lists an account not yet verified through KYC among the reasons a card can’t be added.