Making Profit with Decred - Noob Friendly

In this guide I will show you how to make money with Decred. I will explain how to use the official Proof of Stake (PoS) pool. If you are a total newcomer you will have to learn a lot of new things. No worries, most of your questions will be answered in the Links and Forum Discussions that I will refer to. In case you have any specific questions, feel free to reach out to me via Twitter. Let's get started!

Background

Decred uses a hybrid PoW/PoS system. The process of creating blockchain consensus is thus balanced between miners and stakeholders. Miners 'mine' to validate blocks, and stakeholders 'vote' to decide if the block is indeed valid. Both miners and stakeholders can count on a reward. Even users with small amounts of coins will be able to participate in creating consensus by joining PoS pools. For a detailed explanation of how the hybrid PoW/PoS system of Decred works, check out: http://cryptotales.blogspot.in/2016/02/pow-pos-whats-going-on.html


Rationale

How do we make profit? We will invest our DCR funds in the PoS process by joining a PoS pool. The PoS process is designed as a lottery with a guaranteed reward. How do we invest? By buying lottery tickets. The tickets will grant us voting rights via the PoS pool. Each time one of our tickets is called to vote on a block, we will obtain a reward after the vote is confirmed. The pool is always online, so we will never miss a vote. It is designed in a way that both you and the pool have voting rights, so you can leave your wallet online as a backup to the pool if you want.

The best pool to start stake mining Decred for now is: https://dcrstakes.com


Getting Started

The first step is to get yourself some DCR funds. If you don't have any coins (or stake) yet, please follow this blog post on how to obtain DCR. If you have a wallet with funds available, write down your seed and let's get started with setting up a desktop wallet. The command line interface is very easy once you've used it. These guides explains everything in great detail:
http://cryptotales.blogspot.in/2016/02/how-to-start-mining-decred.html
http://cryptotales.blogspot.in/2016/04/decred-basic-commands-with-explaination.html

IMPORTANT! Download the latest software: https://github.com/decred/decred-release/releases


Follow steps of the how-to-start-mining guide to set up your wallet by importing your seed. After unpacking the software in a map dedicated to Decred, hold Shift and Rightclick in that map to open a new command line window. The commands that you will need are listed below (my comments between brackets). Hit enter after each line.


In command window #1:
dcrd -u [...] -P [...]
(choose username and password for the dcrdaemon)
Example: dcrd -u noahdcrd -P mynewpass1@

Your deamon should now start downloading the Decred blockchain.

IMPORTANT! Let the blockchain sync completely before moving to the next step. For the most recent block height you can check: https://mainnet.decred.org/


In command window #2:
dcrwallet --create

- The wallet will ask you to input a private passphrase for your wallet. While entering, the passphrase will look blank, but actually you are typing (remember this). Confirm by typing it again.
- Now, it will ask you if you want to add an additional encryption layer for public data. Say 'yes', type the public passphrase and confirm by typing again (it will look blank as well).
- Next, when it asks if you have an existing wallet seed, enter 'yes' and type the 33-word text carefully (without any mistakes or CasE eRrOrs).
It should now say: The wallet is successfully created.


In command window #2:
dcrwallet -u [...] -P [...] --walletpass [publicpassphrase] --dcrdusername=[user] --dcrdpassword=[pass]
(choose a user and pass for the wallet, and fill out the other data)
Example: dcrwallet -u noahwallet -P mynewpass2# --walletpass mypubpassphra --dcrdusername=noahdcrd --dcrdpassword=mynewpass1@

Your wallet should now start processing the Decred blockchain.


In command window #3:
dcrctl -u [user] -P [pass] --wallet getbalance
(to check if your wallet funds are correct)
Example: dcrctl -u noahwallet -P mynewpass2# --wallet getbalance

Congratulations, you are ready to start! Keep your command windows running as we proceed.


The PoS pool

Now, we need to sign up for the PoS pool. Go to the website and create an account. If you have registered at the stake pool, it will tell you to generate a public key address. Follow the steps as displayed. The commands that you'll need are listed below. From now on you should stop using your web wallet, to prevent syncing problems between web and desktop wallets.


In command window #3:


dcrctl -u [user] -P [pass] --wallet getnewaddress
dcrctl -u [u] -P [p] --wallet validateaddress [yournewdaddress]

If you copy and paste the 'pubkeyaddr' into the form on the website, it will generate a P2SH address that you can use to purchase tickets via the PoS pool. Go to the Tickets tab and follow the instructions. The pool has generated a script that you will need to import.


In command window #3:
dcrctl -u [u] -P [p] --wallet walletpassphrase [privatepassphrase] 1800
(this unlocks your wallet for 1800 seconds, or 0.5 hour ; set it to 0 to keep it unlocked indefinately).
dcrctl -u [u] -P [p] --wallet importscript [yourRedeemScript]

Once your script has been successfully imported, you are ready to go!


Buying tickets

Personally, I always buy my tickets manually. This allows me to have full control over my spending. This command allows you to buy tickets and transfer it to your account in the PoS pool.


In command window #3:
dcrctl -u [u] -P [p] --wallet purchaseticket "default" [maxTicketPrice] [minConfirmation] [P2SHAddress]
Example: dcrctl -u noahwallet -P mynewpass2# --wallet purchaseticket "default" 20 1 Dcsgdz1randomexampleaddressVrzf

In the example we are buying a ticket for maximum 20 DCR. The transaction has to be confirmed by exactly one block before we can make a new transaction or buy a new ticket. During this time your funds will be send to a change address that you control. The ticket price will then be send to the pool address, and the remainder of your funds will be transferred back. During this time, you won't be able to buy new tickets, as you have no spendable balance. After the block is confirmed and your balance is back, you can use it again to purchase new tickets. Determine the best price to buy by checking the current, average, and estimated price here: https://dcrstakes.com/price


Final remarks

It is good to know that this pool absolutely cannot control your funds. It does not have your private keys, so there is no possibility. By using the PoS pool, you don't need to keep you wallet up and running after you've bought the tickets: the pool will vote on your behalf and your reward will be transferred automatically. In the future there will be more PoS pools, operated by community members. This way Decred will remain a truly Decentralised cryptocurrency.

Some useful forum threads that will help to answer many of your further questions:
http://cryptotales.blogspot.in/2016/04/1.html

http://cryptotales.blogspot.in/2016/04/decred-basic-commands-with-explaination.html

http://cryptotales.blogspot.in/2016/03/decred-solo-stake-mining-guide-useful.html

http://cryptotales.blogspot.in/2016/02/auto-login-script-to-connect-to.html

How to buy decred with USD or EUR ?

Many people ask how they can buy Decred (DCR) with fiat money, either USD or Euro.

TL;DR

You cannot safely buy dcr with USD or EUR, but it is very easy to do through bitcoin: USD, EUR -> bitcoin -> decred.

In this guide I describe fast and safe way to do this.
Why exchanges don't deal with USD-DCR pair

It's quite expensive and problematic process to open and run an exchange for trading crypto coins for USD, EUR or any fiat money. First, because you will be a target for fraud, since you provide crypto cash in exchange for dubious funds that can be easily charged back, like credit cards, Paypal and often even wire transfers.

Second, whenever you handle government/fiat money you need licenses and you must comply to hundreds of regulations like Anti Money Laundering (AML) and Know Your Customer (KYC). Before you will earn a single dollar you have to spend millions on a legal team and licenses and you will have a hard time finding a bank that will do business with you. Nobody will go into that PITA except for a crypto coin with a huge market cap like Bitcoin.
So, how can you buy it

Don't worry, there is a quite simple and secure enough way to buy decred with bitcoins. You can find plenty of exchanges where you can buy Bitcoin with USD and EUR and a few exchanges where you can buy Decred with Bitcoin. In this guide we will use two biggest and trustable:
Coinbase to buy Bitcoins: https://www.coinbase.com/
Bittrex to buy Decred: https://bittrex.com/Market/Index?MarketName=BTC-DCR
First step: buy Bitcoins on Coinbase

First of all check on this page that Coinbase is availiable in your country: https://www.coinbase.com/global
If it's not, you will not be able to buy or sell bitcoins, so you should try some other big exchange as:
www.kraken.com
www.bitstamp.net
www.btc-e.com
www.cryptsy.com

There is two possible ways to make a deposit to Coinbase:
credit cart: max 100$ / 24 hours, fee is 3%
wire transfer: max 3000$ / 24 hours, fee is 1%

In this guide I will describe "wire transfer" because it has lower fees and allow you to buy more bitcoins in one day. Deposit with credit card is easy as just a few clicks.

So, register at Coinbase, confirm your email and phone number (you will use it also for 2-steps authentication). Before you can make deposit, you need to verify your identity. For this you need either Passport, driver license or other ID card with photo and web camerawhich you can use to take pictures of your document. Usually verification takes only 2-5 minutes, but maybe you'll need few attempts if text on photo will be not readable.

Now you can make a deposit using both credit card and wire transfers. Do not forget to add your reference code (you will see it in red color in payment credentials) to comment of your transfer. Coinbase will use this code to identify you and process your deposit. Now you have just to wait 1-2 business days, you will receive email notification.

When your money will be enrolled just go herehttps://www.coinbase.com/buys and buy your bitcoins, that's easy as 1 click.
Second step: buy Decred on Bittrex

Register at Bittrex and go to your wallet https://bittrex.com/Balance. Press + button in the Bitcoin row and generate new Bitcoin address for a deposit. It is unique address generated only for your account, so all payments to this address will be enrolled to your Bittrex account.

Now go to your account at Coinbase and just send your bitcoins to the address generated at Bittrex account. Now you just need to wait for 3 confirmations (it can take up to few hours, but usually faster), you can track how is it going in your Bittrex account "Pending Deposits" section.

Congratulation, now you can buy Decred on Bittrex exchange:https://bittrex.com/Market/Index?MarketName=BTC-DCR

When you'll buy decred, I suggest you to withdraw it to your local wallet. Make sure that only you have access to your wallet Seed.

If you have any problems or questions, feel free to leave comment bellow.