If you want to know why I believe in Monero, feel free to read Why Monero is the Best Crypto CURRENCY.

Optimal Methods

Using the Kraken CAD → USD → XMR method, you will pay at most 1% in fees. The more volume you do with Kraken, the lower the fees. Only if your wire transfer fees are very high and you want to buy $10k - 16k worth of Monero should you use the Coinbase USDC to Trocador method.

Amount	Wire Transfer Fee	Method	Fee Estimate
$0 - $10,000	N/A	Kraken e-Transfer	0.8% / 1%
$10,000+	<= $50	Kraken wire transfer	~0.82% / ~1.23%
$10,000 - 16,000	$80	Coinbase USDC (0.5%) + Trocador (FixedFloat)	0.9704%
$16,000+	$80	Kraken wire transfer	~0.82% / ~1.23%

Referral Links

• Kraken ($100 when you trade $200) [Code: 3zh45fpb]
• Trocador: CGBHeJwqRb
  • All amounts are in CAD. Maker / Taker convention. When sending USDC, choose Arbitrum network.
• Coinbase ($10 in BTC after first trade)

Canadian Bank Outgoing Wire Transfer Fees

Bank	Wire Transfer Fee	Source
RBC	$45	Additional Account Services - Outgoing Wire Payments
BMO	$40	Fees for Everyday Banking - Page 11
TD	$30	Personal Fee Schedule
CIBC	$30 (<10k), $50 (<50k), $80 (> 50k)	Wire transfer fees
Scotiabank	$1.99	Can’t find one
WealthSimple	Not Supported	Google it

Exchanges and Fees (USDC)

• Coinbase: 0.5% for USDC spread
• Newton: 1%
• Wealthsimple: 2% for Core, 1% for Premium, 0.5% for Generation

If you know an exchange other than Kraken that has less than a 0.5% spread, let me know

Crypto ATMs

• fastbtcatm

Kraken

CAD → USD → XMR

As of 2025, this is the best method and will cost you at most 1% in total fees.

1. Open Kraken ($100 when you trade $200) [Code: 3zh45fpb] account
2. Verify your account (24 hours?)
3. Go to Kraken Pro from the 9 dots menu in the top right
4. Deposit USD if you already have a USD bank account (Wise will not work) and go to step 9
5. Otherwise, deposit CAD via eTransfer (if depositing 10k CAD or less)
6. DO NOT USE THE CONVERT FEATURE TO ACQUIRE USD, THE FX RATE SHOWN IS A RIP OFF
7. Go to USD/CAD trading pair
8. Market buy order
9. Go to XMR/USD
10. Place a limit buy order either at a price level that would fulfill your volume (0.4% fees as a taker) or place a limit buy order below market prices (0.2% fees as a maker).

In June 2025, I bought 198 CAD worth of Monero on a 200 CAD deposit where I was a taker in both the USD/CAD and XMR/USD pairs!

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My 2021 experience is here for historic purpose

Total fee percentage: 1.3574%

This method is possibly the cheapest if you are a liquidity taker, however there is deposit limit of $3,000 per day compared to Coinbase which allows for $10,000 at once.

A deposit fee of 0.1% for etransfers (3k limit), a USD conversion fee of 0.2%, and a 0.16% post limit order fee to buy XMR, and a flat network fee to withdraw (not counted). In total, that’s 0.46% as a maker and a 0.56% fee as a taker. You can use Etana to forgo the deposit fee, but I’m unsure if Etana has its own fees and it does require KYC. A wire transfer requires being in-persona which might have its own fees; it does for my business account!

My own results for the etransfer deposit method are:

• CAD/USD = 1.25625
• XMR/USD = 285.48
• an etransfer of 3,000 CAD becomes 2,970 CAD converted to 2,359.45 USD bought 8.2648521800 XMR withdrew and received 8.25152 XMR
• Fee = 3,000 - 8.2648521800 * 285.48 * 1.25625 = 35.94… = 1.198%

Make sure to set the limit order one cent less than market with post selected unless you are treating it as a security.

The etransfer deposit fee took the largest chunk! I’ll have to test the other methods to compare.

Kraken USDC → XMR

This was an experiment in 2021.

Buy USDC on Coinbase and send it to Kraken via the Arbitrum network. Knowing that it’s 0.5% cheaper than the Newton XLM method, we get 0.82% for makers and 1.53% for takers. If you don’t have patience to place a limit order at the market price, I recommend using FixedFloat which takes a 0.65% fees for swaps.

XLM → USD → XMR

This was an experiment in 2021.

Total fee percentage: 1.32% - 2.03%, 1% just from Newton

Bought for C$0.119274 (1% margin), sold for US$0.089 (lucky), monero for $137.95.

Buying XLM on Newton costed me a margin of 1%. I’m thoroughly disappointed with Newton.

Transferring XLM to Kraken was free. Selling to USD has a 0.16% fee for a post limit order, and a post limit order on XMR is another 0.16%. So this method would result in fees of 1.32% for makers to 2.03% for takers.

USD → XMR

This is a hypothetical experiment.

You’ll need a USD bank account for this and you’ll need Etana which is another KYC hurdle. Theoretically this method results in a 0.16% fee as a maker and a 0.26% fee as a taker. I say theoretically though since I don’t know if there’s any fee from Etana’s side and it’s not practical as like I said before, you need to have USD beforehand without a conversion fee.

Swap Services

Coinbase USDC → Trocador USDC → XMR

First buy USDC from Coinbase which is 0.5% in fees. Next go to Trocador and swap from USDC over Arbitrum One to Monero. Trocador is a swap aggregate service, meaning that it will always use the service with the lowest swap fees. Sometimes, the swap itself has less than 0.5% in fees, meaning your total fees can be less than 1%, which is competitive with simply buying with a high reward / cashback credit card.

Assuming a 0.5% to buy USDC on Coinbase, here are the fees for two USDC amounts. The lower the amount to trade, the lower the slippage.

USDC	Swap Fee	Total Fees
10,000	0.4704%	0.9704%
7,200	0.2075%	0.7075%

• Send: USD Coin (Arbitrum One) (not the e one)
• Trade for: Monero

TradeOgre (USDT:XMR)

Not worth trying to do because USDT (Tether USD) cannot be purchased in Canada.

Local Monero

Got shut down and the fees were significant.

Newton Spread Table

Currency	Spread
USDC	1.058%
SOL	1.432%
XLM	1.473%
ADA	0.962% - 1.92%
BTC	1.161%

Spread: Buy price divided by Live price minus 1

Conclusion: if you can’t use Coinbase to buy USDC, use ADA if you can buy at one cent less than buy price.