When I went to redeem my Bitcoin Gold yesterday I noticed that there is a complete lack of information on how to do this safely - even the Bitcoin Gold website doesn't have clear instructions. Below I am going to detail a safe process to redeem your free coins.
Bitcoin Gold was a fork of the Bitcoin Blockchain that occurred on Oct 24th at Block 491407. Anyone who held Bitcoin in a wallet at that time received a corresponding amount of Bitcoin Gold. Please note that you need access to the private keys of the wallet to access your Bitcoin Gold. If you held your bitcoin on an exchange or web wallet that doesn't give you access to your private keys you must wait for the exchange/site to give you the Bitcoin Gold (If they choose to do so. They have no obligation to if they don't want to - another reason that you should always store your Bitcoin in a wallet that you control). To check if you have Bitcoin Gold you can enter the address of your wallet here:
https://bitcoingold.orgIf you wish to sell your Bitcoin Gold you first have to split it from your regular Bitcoin wallet. This is the safest way to do so:
Send all of the Bitcoin in your wallet to a new address/wallet. Since you will be exporting the private keys to your Bitcoin wallet it is safest to move your real Bitcoin out of the wallet first so there is no risk to that.
Once the Bitcoin is moved export the private key of your old wallet (now empty of Bitcoin but still has access to the Bitcoin gold based on the Bitcoin balance that was in the wallet at the time of the October fork). For details on how do this all you have to do is Google for the name of your wallet and "export private keys".
The easiest method to import the private key into a Bitcoin Gold comparable wallet is with an Android wallet called Coinomi:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.coinomi.walletDownload the wallet (If you don't have an Android phone or tablet you can run Android on your computer using Andy which can be downloaded at:
https://www.andyroid.netOnce the wallet is downloaded open it up and create a new Bitcoin Gold wallet. Once in your new wallet click on the three vertical dots menu in the top right and choose sweep wallet.
Put your private key in the field provided and it will let you know how much Bitcoin Gold is contained in that address. Confirm you want to import that value.
Your Bitcoin Gold is now in your wallet. You can hold it there, send it to someone else or send it to an exchange to sell it. I choose to sell mine at HitBTC. You can sign up for HitBTC here:
https://hitbtc.com/?ref_id=5a0dab3a06dd8 (Please note this is an affiliate link that will give me a small bonus if you use it to signup. If you enjoyed this guide and it helped you out please consider using my link to reward me for my efforts).
Once you have an account go to Deposit and generate an address for Bitcoin Gold and paste that address in the Coinomi Android wallet to send your Bitcoin Gold to the exchange. Sell it for Bitcoin or try to day trade with it. It is essentially "free money" if you already held Bitcoin on the day of the fork!
Hope this info will help someone who is confused on how to claim their BTG! If this saved you any time please upvote my post! If you want to donate BTG to me: GUTf3omss65B5CdxyDqm1ZjrczPoS3YveH
Feel free to ask questions if any part of this process is confusing!