I know what you're thinking, nothing in life is free. YOU are absolutely correct, but what do you consider free?

What I consider free... Anything where I do NOT have to pay for something. But if you want to argue semantics, even though you aren't spending your money to get something, you are dedicating your time. How much time you want to spend is COMPLETELY up to you. If you really want to get a strong foothold in the cryptocurrency market, GET A PEN AND PAPER READY. Because I know you've heard the phrase: "Time Is Money"

Full disclosure here: I am not a financial advisor nor am I affiliated to any certain cryptocurrency. Yes I truly believe in certain currencies, and if you want to know more about those, hit the follow me button then look for my other posts.

Now, do you have that pen and paper ready? And please don't get carpal tunnel. You can always refer back to this article at a later date.

The first thing you need to consider, and I mean REALLY consider, is how much of your time do you want to invest in your cryptocurrency future? I've thought about that very question numerous times. I have my wife, six kids, 3 cats, 3 dogs, a rabbit, my 9-5 job, I've written a novel, a kids book about cryptocurrency and researching for the next novel. I coach soccer, volleyball, and special teams football coach at the high school and a travel soccer team for the city. Plus all of the sports my kids want to participate in... MY TIME is very valuable. When I consider what I want to partake in, I keep it specific because its easy to go "Down the Rabbit Hole" when looking into ALL the different options in cryptocurrency.

Getting started in mobile mining is the quickest and fastest way to get your foot in the door. Listed below are three of the top six mobile mining apps that I personally and currently mining. Each of them have the possibility to become very lucrative [in the long run]. Pi Network, Bee Network and Spotter are all currencies you can "mine" from your phone. They do not have a valuation as of yet, its all speculative, in hopes that the communities can become a viable cryptocurrency in the future. Best part is, you will only spend roughly 5 seconds a piece on Pi Network and Bee Network as they mine for 24 hours. Spotter's mining session is at an hour at a time, but the rate of mining is higher. If you mine 12 hours a day on it, you will roughly use up a whole minute of your day to mine. (I know... So long and tedious) 

So there are three things you can start right away to mine from your phone:

• Pi Network  use referral code: HMFIC62 
• BEE Network  use referral code hmfic62
• Spotter  use referral code HMFIC62

The next thing you are going to want to do is download COINBASE. The Coinbase app is perfect for adding to your portfolio of cryptocurrency. Once you get verified, you start watching all the videos they have listed under the "REWARDS" section. For just signing up, they give you $10 in Bitcoin. You now have the availability to transfer from the coinbase app to any wallet you choose to hold it in. The videos you watch are on the average 2 minutes long, you answer a question about what you saw, and they reward you with free cryptocurrency. I continue to watch the videos as they add new ones to the platform. Its literally FREE money!! I started with $46 dollars in various currencies. I transferred $10 in Bitcoin to a different wallet (Binance- I'll tell you about that in a minute) and traded out of some of them to gain more ground in Stellar Lumens. So because of the $10 taken out of Coinbase, I had $36 left... now in a few short weeks, (albeit, I made certain choices/moves) my portfolio balance is $102.02 (at the time of writing this article). I know its not making me rich, but its over a hundred dollars that I made, FOR FREE.

Seeing that I brought up Binance already, here is what you will definitely need to know. Its a little bit cluttered and you need to study the application to be able to navigate properly through it. That was the downside. The upside is that Bitcoin Black should be on the site soon, as long as its approved through their channels. Having this account will allow you to trade in to different cryptocurrency pairs, that aren't offered on many other wallets/sites. This is the site where I transferred $10 of BTC to, so I could turn around and get $10 of VET (VeChain). Again, this was my personal choice. I looked into it and made the choice. If you decide to download Binance, click here. 

What you also need to do is download any other wallet that offers a free coin promotion. The best way I have actually seen was to go into CoinMarketCap.

From there, you can see the official wallets and others that might offer free cryptocurrency rewards for downloading the wallet.

Have you ever heard of AirDrops? I'm pretty sure you have. Maybe you didn't really look into it because there were more pressing things on your mind. I'll break it down real easy for you. Basically, an airdrop is provided as a marketing strategy for companies to get their name and coin or token out to the public. Airdrops can be useful in the long run as well. To get started, you will need to download the Blockchain Wallet for the airdrops. It has the accessibility to receive almost any cryptocurrency out there. 

Now on to some of the more fun ways to earn free cryptocurrency. What you also need to know is that like most things, there is a referral code so that you can earn more currency faster. Each one of the items listed below has the hyperlink attached to it, with the referral code embedded. 

1) Paxfull: Trade off things you don't really need for Bitcoin or Tether. One of the great things about this site is you can trade in your gift cards that you don't need anymore!

2) Prize Rebel: Prize Rebel has you earn points for completing online surveys, completing offers, or watching videos. They also have raffles, lottery and special promos. 

3) Earn Crypto: Just like Prize Rebel where you earn points for completing surveys, offers or watching videos, you can however choose which type of Cryptocurrency you would like to be paid in. However, each type of crypto has different withdrawal rate. I personally have the payout in Doge.

4) Gram Free: This site will run off of the internet from whichever browser you choose (more on that in a minute). With Gram Free, there are a few ways to get Grams. You have Free Rolls, Signing Smart Contracts, play the Lottery, watch videos, and making videos. You have to collect 500 Gram before you can cash out. A really good feature is that is shows on the "Dashboard" how much each Gram is worth. Currently a Gram is worth $3.13 each. So you do the math... Roughly $1500 that you can now use to invest in more cryptocurrency.

5) Stendex: A relatively new site where they give you $25 to sign up. The more referrals you get the faster you can earn more. You can cash out once you reach $90 you can withdraw it, as long as you still have $25 of working cash in the account. I mean, its free $25 to play around and see if you can make money with it!

6) BTC Claimer Bot: This works off of Telegram. If you don't already have it, download the app. I personally know a lot of people that use the platform, so I had it already. You can earn more "Diamonds" by referring people, and the 12 hour bonus. So two bonuses that yield anywhere between 10 and 100 diamonds per. You also have a rate in which you earn Satoshi. My current rate per hour is 16 Satoshi. And you can withdraw around $40 each. Best to watch the market and withdraw the funds on an up swing (when its at a peak).

7) Initial Coin Offerings (ICO): These vary from each platform. There is a new one called Bitcoin Black, where if you go to https://bitcoin.black or Student Coin, has pre-sale offerings for next to nothing. Of course this is totally dependent on if you want to buy in for $5 or so. But if you do go on to Bitcoin Black's website, look for the AIRDROP!!!

8) Web Browsers: there are a few web browsers like CryptoBrowser and Brave, that reward you for searching from their platform. Most of the time its paid in Bitcoin or BAT (Basic Attendance Token) respectively. 

9) Money Whale: This is actually a game that you play, where you can earn cryptocurrency from. The first cash out was $.40 (40 cents) worth of Doge. This is time consuming like everything else... but you could be playing a game where you spend money! Its rather addictive too, and keeps you engaged in the game.

The point I think I have made here is that there are numerous ways to get in to door of cryptocurrency. Definitely get Coinbase, you will learn about different cryptocurrencies as well as getting that free coin or tokens. 

BUT WITH EVERYTHING YOU DO online or apps in which you give your personal information. Do your research and figure out what best suits you. I have only mentioned a handful of the opportunities out there regarding cryptocurrencies.

However there are three other platforms where you can get something free for just signing up. Even if you know nothing about them, stocks can be a great way to trade in to cryptocurrencies.

• FirstTrade: Click on the name and you will be directed to sign up. Once you have completely sign up, they will give you a free random stock. It can be worth anywhere from $1-$500. If you want more free stock... invite your friends!
• Robinhood: Here, once you sign up and link your bank account, you will receive up to a $500 free stock in your Robinhood account. You can invite Unlimited amounts of people, and get a free stock for each one!!
• Webull: Once you sign up, you get free stock. If you deposit $100 or more in the account, you get two more free stocks valued between $8 - $1600 each! Now here's the thing. Say you deposit the $100 in the account. Wait for the free stock to get to your account, then pull out the $100 you initially deposited. (minus a small transaction fee) but its nothing compared to the worth of the two stocks. Unfortunately my two stocks when I initially signed up were only worth $3.18. My other two stocks for the deposit was worth$24 each but now (3 weeks later) $37 each. Not bad for free!

So there you have it. A basic Outline for how to get some free cryptocurrency AND some free stock! So in total, I literally had no money or time vested in anything stock or crypto-related, now I have just under $500 in free Cryptocurrency and Stock. ($478.51) 

Do me a favor and leave a comment on how this works out for you! Remember, that we are all different in our needs, time, experience, etc. And again, I'm NOT a financial planner or broker. I just know that in these hard economic times, I have learned to diversify my holdings and keep my eyes and ears open.

Hope you do well,

Thomas