How to Move Your Savings Into Digital Dollars, Step by Step (Mexico and Colombia)
A practical guide to moving savings into digital dollars from Mexico and Colombia: what you need, what the full round trip actually costs, the risks involved, and what happens if you live somewhere else.
What this is, and what it is not
A digital dollar is a stablecoin: an asset that holds a 1:1 peg to the US dollar. The one we use is USDC. When you send pesos and the balance is credited as USDC, what happened is that you changed currency — much like buying dollar bills and putting them away.
It is worth being equally clear about what it is not, because that is where most disappointment comes from:
- It is not an investment. No yield, no interest, no "remunerated account". The balance sits still.
- It is not a bank account. There is no deposit insurance from any country behind it.
- It does not protect you from everything. It protects you from your local currency losing value against the dollar. It does not protect you from dollar inflation, nor from needing the money in pesos exactly when the rate is against you.
- It is not financial advice. This guide explains a mechanism. Whether it suits your situation is your decision, and for amounts that matter, an adviser's.
If you want the full risk picture before going further, we wrote it without decoration in is it safe to keep money in stablecoins?.
Step 0: check that we can open a wallet for you
This step comes first, and it is not a formality.
What decides is where you live, not your nationality or the country your card was issued in. There are countries where we cannot open a wallet today, and without a wallet there are no deposits and no withdrawals — the account is useless. Since the subscription is charged before the account becomes operational, checking afterwards is expensive.
Two cases that surprise people:
- In the United States we do serve customers, except if you live in New York or Texas.
- In the European Economic Area we cannot open wallets today.
The full, dated list is on country availability. And there is a second check most people skip: being able to open a wallet is not the same as being able to withdraw to a bank. Today withdrawals go to banks in the US, Europe, Mexico, Colombia and Brazil. Anywhere else you can hold a balance, but not send it to your local bank.
Step 1: verify your identity
Without approved identity verification (KYC) you cannot top up, receive or withdraw. It is a regulatory requirement, not an optional step, and it is worth doing before you are in a hurry to move money. What documents are needed and what usually goes wrong is covered in the verification guide.
Step 2: put the money in
The app generates bank details for receiving deposits in your local currency. You copy those details, make a normal transfer from your usual bank, and the deposit is credited to your balance as USDC.
Inbound fees, as published on our fees page:
| Inbound | Rail | Fee |
|---|---|---|
| Mexican pesos (MXN) | SPEI | 1.50% |
| Colombian pesos (COP) | Bre-B / PSE | 1.75% |
| Dollars (USD) | ACH / Wire | 1.00% |
| Euros or pounds (EUR, GBP) | SEPA / Faster Payments | 1.50% |
| Brazilian reais (BRL) | Pix | 1.55% |
These fees cover what it costs us to receive your money, plus a small margin. Our main margin is on bank withdrawals.
The account details are reusable. Save them and use the same ones every time you add more, without repeating the setup.
Step 3: hold the balance
There is nothing to do here, which is precisely the point.
Holding digital dollars costs nothing: no custody fee, no inactivity fee. There is also no yield. A balance of 1,000 USDC will still be 1,000 USDC a year from now.
What does change in the meantime is how many pesos those dollars represent, and that is the entire reason for doing this.
Step 4: take the money out when you decide
The exits, with published fees:
| Exit | Fee | Time |
|---|---|---|
| Withdraw to a bank in Mexico (SPEI) | 1.90%, FX included | 1–2 business days |
| Withdraw to a bank in Colombia (Bre-B) | 2.10%, FX included | 1–2 business days |
| Withdraw to a bank in Brazil (Pix) | 1.95%, FX included | 1–2 business days |
| Withdraw to a bank in the US (ACH) | 1.50%, in dollars | 1–2 business days |
| Send to another person or a wallet | 0.40% | Under 2 minutes |
Three conditions worth knowing beforehand, not after:
- 20 USD minimum to withdraw to a bank. It is a floor on the amount, not on the fee: below that, a bank withdrawal cannot be made. Sending to a wallet has no minimum.
- Currency conversion is already inside. When you withdraw outside the US, the FX is included in the withdrawal fee: one operation, one fee.
- The exchange rate is applied when the order is processed, not when you create it. If the market moves between confirming and processing, the processing-time rate applies.
Withdrawals to the United Kingdom are not available yet. In that case the balance can be held in dollars or sent to a wallet, but it does not land in a local bank account.
What the full round trip costs
This is the number that almost never appears in these guides, and it is the one that decides whether this makes sense for you. The inbound fee is not enough: if you will ever want to go back to your currency, the real cost is there and back.
From Mexico, using 100 units so the percentage is visible:
- In 100 → 1.50% fee → 98.50 left
- Out 98.50 → 1.90% fee → 96.63 arrives
- Full round trip: 3.37%
From Colombia:
- In 100 → 1.75% fee → 98.25 left
- Out 98.25 → 2.10% fee → 96.19 arrives
- Full round trip: 3.81%
These figures are published fees only: they do not include the exchange-rate spread applied on each conversion, which depends on the market at processing time.
The honest reading of those numbers cuts both ways. Around 3.5% is reasonable for moving savings and leaving them there for months or years, where what decides the outcome is how the exchange rate moves, not the fee. And it is clearly bad for hopping in and out: if you convert back and forth every month, the fees eat any advantage before devaluation has time to hand you one.
If the plan is not to go back to pesos — because you spend in dollars, save long term, or get paid in dollars — then the only cost you pay is inbound, and the journey stops at 1.00% to 1.75% depending on how you come in.
The risks, undecorated
None of this is free in risk terms, and we would rather you read it here than discover it later:
- There is no deposit insurance. Stablecoin balances are not bank deposits and are not covered by the FDIC, SIPC, Fogafín or any deposit or investor insurance. If something goes wrong, there is no public fund that makes you whole.
- The 1:1 peg is a design, not a law of physics. A stablecoin can temporarily break from its peg. It has happened in the market with various issuers.
- The issuer can freeze funds. Issuers of regulated stablecoins have the technical and contractual ability to immobilise balances at specific addresses, and they use it when an authority requires them to.
- Sending on the wrong network can mean losing the funds. If you move a balance to an external wallet, verify the network before confirming. When in doubt, Base.
- Exchange-rate risk at the worst moment. If you need the money in pesos exactly when the rate is against you, moving into dollars will have cost you. It protects against a trend, not against a specific moment.
If you live outside Mexico, Colombia or Brazil
It is worth being precise here, because this is where most people end up disappointed.
If you live in a country where we can open a wallet but there is no local rail in or out — the case for much of Latin America today — what you can do is narrower:
- You can receive dollars from abroad by USD transfer, receive USDC from another wallet, hold the balance, and send it to another person or wallet.
- You cannot transfer from your local bank in your own currency, or withdraw to your local bank. There is no inbound or outbound rail in Argentine pesos, Peruvian soles or the region's other currencies.
Put directly: if your plan was to move money you already hold in your local bank, and your country is not on the rail list, this does not solve your case today. If you already get paid in dollars from abroad, it does.
D-ONE CASH is a product of DIGITALROCKETS LLC. We are not a bank or a licensed financial institution, and this article is informational — not financial, investment or tax advice. Availability of each rail is enabled progressively by country, and the app shows the real status of your account.
Frequently asked questions
Does moving my savings into digital dollars earn any yield?
No. Holding a balance in digital dollars earns no interest or yield of any kind: 1,000 USDC today is still 1,000 USDC a year from now. The only thing that changes is how many pesos it represents. Any service promising you yield on a stablecoin balance is offering a different product, with different risks.
What does it cost to move savings into dollars and back to my currency?
Counting published fees only, the full round trip costs 3.37% from Mexico (1.50% inbound plus 1.90% outbound) and 3.81% from Colombia (1.75% plus 2.10%). It does not include the exchange-rate spread on each conversion. If you do not plan to go back to your currency, you pay only the inbound fee.
Are my digital dollars insured?
No. Stablecoin balances are not bank deposits and are not covered by the FDIC, SIPC, Fogafín or any deposit or investor insurance. It is a real difference from a bank account and worth keeping in mind before deciding how much money to move.
From which countries can I move money in and out of a local bank?
Today, inbound bank transfers work in dollars, euros, pounds, Mexican pesos, Brazilian reais and Colombian pesos. Bank payouts work to the United States, Europe, Mexico, Colombia and Brazil. Withdrawals to the United Kingdom are not available yet. On top of that, there are countries where we cannot open a wallet: check the availability page before subscribing.
What is the minimum amount to start?
By bank transfer there is no published inbound minimum, and card top-up is not available at the moment. To take money out to a bank there is a minimum: 20 USD per withdrawal, which is a floor on the amount and not on the fee.
Can I lose money doing this?
Yes, in three distinct ways: if the exchange rate moves against you between going in and coming out, if you go in and out frequently and the fees accumulate, or through the asset's own risk scenarios — a temporary loss of peg, a freeze by the issuer, or a transfer sent on the wrong network. None of those losses is covered by deposit insurance.