Cryptocurrency Investment and You: An Informative Introduction

This is an introduction. That's all it is. It's not financial advice and it doesn't cover how to delve into cutting-edge financial instruments. It is an abridged form of the presentation I gave to the attendees at the President's Week conference held in Belize on the topic of cryptocurrency investment.

It's simply an introduction for investors looking to learn more about bitcoin and cryptocurrency. It will cover a few basic strategies to profit from bitcoin and give a brief overview of the top 10 coins by market cap and finally show a few ways to get some free crypto without needing to invest.

You can watch the video here
or if you're a reader, the slides and my explanation are laid out below:

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Here are some of my cryptocurrency credentials. I moved from Arizona to China in 2014. While there I became a speaker and presenter on cryptocurrency having made sense of it myself and having published a book on the topic. Below are a few pictures of my work:

This is the cover of my book The Bitcoin and Ethereum Startup Guide, written in 2017 and available on Amazon. The screenshots may be a bit outdated but the information is still extremely helpful.

One of the times helping people in China learn how to use bitcoin and cryptocurrencies.

Presenting at the 2018 Global from Asia Cross Border Summit

Presenting at the 2018 Crypto Games conference in Kyiv.

In the 2019 Escape Artist conference in my hometown Phoenix, AZ.

Here are the aims for the rest of this presentation. Sorry, the special gift was only for conference attendees.

Since this presentation is for beginners, let's make sure we're on the same page and define our terms:

That last sentence sounds pretty good, right?

Before diving into the investment strategies, here are 3 reasons why I love cryptocurrency:

The part about opening up the imagination is an important one.

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Let's get into the strategies :

First, keep this graph in mind. This is a monthly chart showing the price of bitcoin from early 2012 to 2019. Yes, bitcoin can have 50% retracements and 50% gains in a week's time. In the short term, it and the cryptos can be very volatile (which can also work to your advantage). However, over a longer time frame it is clear that bitcoin has been a pretty good investment (for reasons we'll get into shortly).

Buying and holding (or hodl-ing) is the simplest way to invest, especially in the years ahead. The fiat currencies we are forced to use (USD, CAD, EUR, RMB, et c) are all worthless pieces of paper that are constantly losing value. So far, very few people understand this. When they do (and I think that day is coming soon), they will look to ditch their worthless paper money for something that holds its value, or is deflationary.

Bitcoin and the good cryptocurrencies fit that bill.

If you have bought bitcoin and are underwater, just be patient.

And finally, if you hold cryptocurrencies, open your own wallet and hold them there. Do not keep them on an exchange. Those coins do not belong to you any longer! Keep them in your own wallet and take the necessary simple precautions. I can help with that, feel free to book me for a 1 on 1 consultation

It's interesting that bitcoin's genesis block included the sentence "The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks."

It seems to me that is referencing the latest financial crisis in 2008/9 and bitcoin being a response to it:

Those new to bitcoin wonder whether or not it is money. To me, it fulfills the 5 properties of a sound money listed by Aristotle. And in some ways is superior to gold and silver. Try taking $1,000,000 in gold across any border. Good luck!

With bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, you can take your money anywhere in the world very conveniently.

Does bitcoin have value apart from its use as money? Well, I think the blockchain technology underneath bitcoin and the other good cryptocurrencies definitely does. What do you think?

Finally, some people wonder what would happen if a government banned bitcoin. I was asked this question often while living in China. Due to its decentralized nature, this is what it would be like if they tried to:

Let's move on to the other investment strategies:

Cryptocurrencies can be extremely volatile in the short term. If you're a good trader, this can work out very well for you.

The markets trade 24/7/365 and you can sign up for just about all of them. Many of them are centralized exchanges and not private. Privacy is very important to me, so if that doesn't please you, feel free to pass on this option. If you don't mind, then Coinbase Pro and Binance are two I like to trade on.

Coinbase Pro is good for fiat to crypto trading, and Binance is good for crypto to crypto trading.

Mining can be lucrative, but there is more to it than just plugging in a computer. Take care to have the right electrical setup, low-cost power, et c. Someone I know put solar panels on his home to get cheap electricity. If you have some means and would like to buy cryptocurrencies for the price of electricity, then mining is another option you have.

A helpful website is Crypto Compare which can help you see what your potential mining profits would be.

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Let's get into a brief overview of the top 10 cryptos:

Bitcoin is the granddaddy of them all. Everyone knows it, just like everyone knows Coke, but may not know 7Up, Dr. Pepper, R-C Cola.

A note on grades. I have not given any A ratings to these cryptocurrencies, because I am picky and because none of them so far have demonstrated an A rating. They are great but they are still very early in their development and need a lot of improvement.

Cryptocurrencies now are like the internet in 1993. Companies then showed a lot of potential, but I wouldn't have felt comfortable saying any of those companies were "sure things." Netscape? AOL? Maybe for a time, but things can change.

So for my grades here, a B is a very good grade and something I feel comfortable with. But of course, this is not financial advice. Do your own research. You're responsible for your own decisions. Yada yada yada.

Finally, EVERY fiat currency and government denominated bond or treasury note would get a big fat F grade from me.

Ether is a neat one. It's more than just trading value. It's a smart contract platform. These contracts can execute without the need of an expensive third party arbiter.

For example, a band can list their album online. They can write a smart contract so that when their fans send over $10 worth in Ether, the smart contract will automatically send them the latest album. The band keeps all the profits and doesn't need to mess around with iTunes and its 30% take. The trick is though that the fans need to buy Ether in order to make the smart contract work.

The ethereum platform provided the means for many of those ICOs in 2017, giving it its large value at that time. Everyone needed Ether to launch or buy into an ICO!

This sums up by thoughts on XRP quite nicely.

Stellar needs to step it up to get a better grade. I like what they stand for but they need to do more because most people know more about its half-brother XRP.

Monero is the most private and fungible coin out there. It also garners a lot of respect from those in the crypto sphere, which can be a very catty environment. I really like Monero.

Dogecoin gets an honorable mention for having a jolly good time in the crypto space and bringing some great awareness to the space.

In 2014, Dogecoin users raised over 6 figures to sponsor the Jamaican bobsled team and send them to the 2014 Sochi olympics. No joke.

And they also sponsored Josh Wise's #98 NASCAR car in 2014.

Such clever. Many laugh.

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Joking aside, let's see a few ways that you can get free cryptocurrency:

1. Lolli

Lolli is an e-bates program. You download the extension onto your Chrome or Brave browser and sign up. Once you do, you get discounts paid out to you in bitcoin when shopping online at partnered stores. They have quite a few partners and it's great that the extension alerts you when you are visiting one of them.

They don't have Amazon yet, but if you do online travel or buy other things online, it could be a great way to get some free bitcoin.

2. Coinbase Earn

Coinbase offers a program where they reward you with a bit of crypto tokens when you watch a couple minute videos about the cryptocurrencies available on their platform.

This works and I have done it. These coins are yours to keep or you can easily trade them for bitcoin (though I would recommend using Coinbase Pro for that).

After finishing the videos they provide you with a referral link which you can share and earn a bit more.

If you're interested, please use the link at the top or the link right here to sign up.

3. The Brave Browser

This one is a no-brainer and something you should get regardless of your affinity for crypto. The Brave browser blocks ads and trackers. Seriously. I haven't watched a Youtube ad in a year and a half.

If you choose to see ads (which are really just tabs that open up after you okay them), you are rewarded with their cryptocurrency token the Basic Attention Token (BAT). If you're online often you can accumulate a fair bit of tokens this way and easily cash them out for bitcoin and then dollars if you're so inclined.

If you have a business with a lot of computers, I'd definitely consider switching over to Brave. I'd recommend it even without this Brave rewards program.

You can also use the tokens to tip your favorite content creators for their work.

If you download the Browser, please do it with this link. This will reward me directly and send good karma your way!

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That's all I have for you today. I hope you enjoyed this presentation and learned something from it. Feel free to ask if you have questions on this topic and you are always welcome to book me for a private consultation here.