Quote from: StaffsLebowski on January 14, 2018, 06:44:31 PM

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That's my concern. I'm a professional programmer/data specialist and I've been doing it successfully for around 25 years (never been out of work so must be doing something right!?). My first approach whenever I come across a new system/technology is to 'take it apart' to see if it 'holds water'.

A few days ago, Kraken scared the living daylights out of the crypto community when it went 'dark'. Crypto is in it's infancy, it's just like the klondyke era and lot's of companies are trying to get a foothold on the action and learning as they go along, mistakes and all. Sure, the banks I work for are exploring crypto but, there is no way on Gods earth they'd be working with a company like Kracken until it's well established, proven itself and is reliable. That'll take many years. If you don't think it's possible to go tits up, look at Lehamn Brother in 2008 the world-wide crash they caused.

Thanks for your input, much appreciated..

You can buy bitcoin from exchanges (there are much more exchanges, not only Kraken, and Kraken has already started the business again after the update, so it seems they will survive...) or you can buy it from the people at localbitcoins.
When you buy bitcoin, you have to have a bitcoin wallet to hold the bitcoins, if the bitcoins show up in the wallet, you can be sure that they're real and if you do the necessary safety precautions, they will be yours until the end of time or until you s(p)end them. (you should choose a wallet type that fits your needs, online, offline, paper, hardware, mobile, etc., check google for the differences and details).
You should not keep your bitcoins on exchanges (your opinion is right about exhanges, but they are improving), so as soon as you exhanged your money to bitcoin, you should send it to your own wallet asap.
Banks won't bother with bitcoin now neither in the future, so they are only interested in the blockchain itself, as a kind of system to cut down the running costs of the international wire transactions... but you should know this better if you're working for banks.