Transferring Bitcoin To Trezor Wallet From Kraken

Owning Bitcoin has become part of my identity, partly due to its appreciating value. The trauma of losing my Bitcoin to hackers would be overwhelming, and  I would die of humiliation if my exchange account was hacked before I loaded my cryptocurrency into one of the wallets I ALREADY PURCHASED. I already set up my Trezor wallet, so that’s where I decided to transfer my beloved Bitcoin for safe keeping.

The Trezor hardware wallet works best on a Chrome browser, so I launched Chrome and plugged the Trezor wallet into my laptop’s USB drive and typed in the Trezor Wallet address https://wallet.trezor.io and also logged into Kraken.

Now you have to do something in Kraken and something in the Trezor wallet interface. It doesn’t matter which order, but I did Kraken first.

On Kraken, click on the FUNDING tab, then click on WITHDRAW. Then from the long list of cryptocurrencies running along the left side of the Kraken screen, click on Bitcoin.

Click over to the Trezor wallet tab. You MUST make sure the currency you’re sending from Kraken matches the currency you’re receiving into your Trezor wallet.  This menu to select Bitcoin in Trezor is kind of hidden. At the top left corner of the wallet interface screen is the Trezor name and logo. Under the Trezor name and logo is a > symbol.  Clicking the > shows a menu of cryptocurrencies compatible with Trezor. Select Bitcoin.

You’ll see at the top of the Trezor wallet interface screen are 4 links: “Transactions”, “Receive”, “Send”, “Sign & Verify”. Click on “Receive”.

The top of the “Receive” page will say RECEIVE BITCOIN. Below you will see a 35-character code of upper and lower case letters and numbers. This is your Bitcoin wallet address for your Trezor Hardware Wallet. Highlight and copy this address onto your clipboard.

Click back over to Kraken. On the WITHDRAW BITCOIN screen you will see a button that says “Add Wallet”. Click on this button. Now you’ll see and empty field that says “Description” and an empty field that says “Address”.

The “Description” field is where you type in a reminder of where you’re sending your Bitcoin. I recommend your name or initials, the type of wallet (i.e. Trezor) maybe the color of the wallet (it’s conceivable in the future you may end up with more than one) and the currency (i.e. BTC).

In the “Address” field, paste the wallet address code you copied from Trezor. Then click the green SAVE ADDRESS button.

Kraken will send you an email about your Withdrawal Request. You must open that email and click on the “Confirmation” link within an hour of them sending it, or it will expire. If you don’t confirm this address through the email link, your transfer will not go through. The email should show up immediately. Open it and click on the APPROVE link, then go back into Kraken (you may need to log back in and navigate back to FUNDING > WITHDRAW > BITCOIN).

Now the “Address” field won’t be blank, it will have a pull-down menu. Click the Pull-down menu and you should see the wallet you just saved. Select that wallet so it populates the “Address” field.

Under the “Address” field  is an empty “Amount” field. This is where you fill in how many Bitcoin you want to send to your wallet. Since I only have 1 Bitcoin to transfer, I typed in 1. At the bottom of the Kraken page you will see a big green “REVIEW WITHDRAWAL” button. Clicking on it brings up a new screen where you can double-check the Wallet address and the amount to transfer.

I was nervous to make sure the information matches, so I clicked the big red “CANCEL” button which returns to the screen where you can edit the wallet address or the amount.   After double and triple checking for accuracy, I clicked the big green “REVIEW WITHDRAWAL” button, then the other big green “CONFIRM WITHDRAWAL” button.

Kraken sent an email informing me it received a Withdrawal Request and the name of my Trezor hardware wallet. Since I made this Withdrawal Request, I didn’t have to do anything. If I didn’t make this Withdrawal Request, there is a process to stop it.

Bloggers say a message confirming the withdrawal was submitted successfully will appear in Kraken in less than a minute, and will show a 20-ish character confirmation code. This was not my experience at all.

I saw NO indication in Kraken that the withdrawal was submitted successfully. I saw no indication in my Trezor wallet interface that the withdrawal was submitted successfully. I clicked through Kraken looking for a place that would show me the progress of this transfer. I clicked around inside Kraken and discovered going to FUNDING then WITHDRAWAL shows  a table of recent withdrawals, but this page showed no activity for me.

Of course I flipped out, presuming I did something wrong. Did I copy the address right? Is the wallet plugged in right? Is the internet connection strong enough? I swear I would prefer losing my Bitcoin to hackers than to my own human error.

After about 10 minutes of psychological trauma, Kraken logged me out. When I logged back in, I went back to FUNDING > WITHDRAWAL and saw an entry for my Bitcoin transfer had a “Pending” status. This was somewhat comforting.

I clicked over to Trezor to see if it showed a “Pending” transaction. I clicked on the “Receive” link and saw nothing. I clicked on the “Transactions” link and saw nothing. Bloggers claim it should take about 5 minutes from initiating the transfer from Kraken, to seeing the transfer in Trezor as “unconfirmed”. As you may suspect, this was not my experience. Trezor showed no evidence of an incoming transfer.

Two hours later, still no evidence of Bitcoin coming to my wallet.

I logged back into Kraken and noticed the Balances screen showed I had 0 Bitcoin. This must mean my transfer successfully completed! Wrong. I went back to FUNDING > WITHDRAWAL and saw the status was still PENDING. I noticed if you click on the transfer’s ID Number, a new page appears with details of the transfer. It showed that the transfer initiated 4 hours ago. It also showed it was pending and did not yet have a Transaction ID. I abhor that my Bitcoin is neither in my Kraken portfolio, nor in my hardware wallet, and doesn’t even have a transaction ID.  Can Bitcoin just disappear? It got late and I went to bed miserable.

Upon waking I apprehensively checked my Trezor wallet and saw at 3 a.m. the transfer confirmed. IT TOOK OVER 10 HOURS. The relief of having my Bitcoin in hardware wallet sanctuary turned to horror when I noticed my Bitcoin balance of 0.999 BTC. Apparently transferring a Bitcoin costs 0.001 Bitcoin. I wish there was a way to pay this fee in USD to preserve the wholeness of the Bitcoin, but apparently that’s not how it works. I hate that I own less than a whole Bitcoin. I’m glad that it’s safe in my hardware wallet but depressed it’s no longer whole.