Are you "Crypto spoilt" too?
The Set-up
I was speaking to my colleague today. The 'micro-analyst' who invested £250 in STEEM back in November, cashed out 'early' at £300 and missed out on a 10x return.
What I hadn't previously mentioned is that he has also invested £250 in AMP back in November.
At the time I was pretty bullish on AMP. AMP had tanked from 40k sat (just after the second "ICO") down to under 14k sat. I'd thought it had reached it's bottom and would climb to at least previous highs. He bought £250 worth of AMP at 14.5k sat and got around 3050 AMP tokens.
The Unravelling
Then, of course, the Synereo AMP Team began to unravel as I'd previously documented here and here and here. The price tanked and dropped below 5k sat. He speaks in fiat, so I'd told him his AMP had halved in value. He marked it in his spreadsheet. I was even more despondent. It was only the steadily rising Bitcoin price that stopped his losses being a lot more.
The Recovery
Fast forward to today and my colleague asked me how much his AMP was worth. I'd noticed that AMP had recovered to just under 12k sat. To me this was down on the 14.5k sat price he'd bought in at. He was also a long way off the gains (in BTC terms) I'd thought he make when he bought AMP. However AMP had made a some good gains on BTC this year.
The Math
So we did the math. His 3050 or so AMP was now worth around 0.35 BTC. To my mind this was a loss. It was less than the 0.44 BTC he'd spent in November. I told him his investment was worth 0.35 BTC. He asked how much was that in pound sterling, so I told him,
£650.
The Elation!
He was delighted!
The £250 speculation on AMP, that he'd thought was worth only £100 was now worth a whooping £650!! He wanted to cash out there and then and wasn't listening to anything I was about to tell him! He was beaming and boosted to anyone that would listen how much I'd made him in just over 6 month. He was happy to lock in his crypto profit and was going to put the money into Russian stocks and some other country.
The Disconnect
I didn't register other country he was going to invest in because I was incredulous. Seriously? He was going to bail on crypto and put your money in some random Index Fund?...
He hadn't even made a 3x return on his AMP. Worse still because he bailed early on STEEM he hadn't even made a 2x return overall. He'd put £500 and 'only' managed £950 in return.
In his mind however, 'HE'D ALMOST MADE A 2X RETURN!' That was fricking awesome!
The Spilt Milk
It was then I realised,
I'm "Crypto Spoilt".
I've normalised the idea of getting a 10x return on a crypto investment to such an extent that I couldn't be happy for my colleagues almost 3x return on AMP. He was happy to be almost tripling his money. However I think I'd let him down. I can't help knowing he'd have made more if he'd have kept his cash in bitcoin, then backing my hunch on AMP.
Frankly he'd would have likely earned more if he put the top 100 crypto in a hat and let a monkey pick out the one to invest in at random.
The Take Home
I think I brush off 90% gains because I feel we're 'in the bottom of the first innings' in terms of the disruption crypto can cause. It is literally life changing tech and the right investment can come with life changing returns. What is happening now is nothing compared to what potentially lies ahead. It's self-evident to me, why cannot others see it?
This is how crypto has spoiled me. A 90% return on an investment in 6 months or so, is by any measure, fantastic. I should be happy for my colleague. There was and is no guarantee of AMPs success. He got in and came out with a healthy profit.
More importantly, he learned a bit about crypto. He learned about wallets. He learned a bit about exchanges. He dipped his toe into cryptocurrency and came out with a positive experience. He will share that experience. Should he have an occasion to actually use crypto as a means of exchange, he'll be confident in it's legitimacy.
That's the take home for me.
For all the thrills, the wild rides, the pumps, the dumps, the gains and the losses, all that really matters is adoption.
If people 'come for the profit, stay for the utility', then those invested in crypto for the long haul can only benefit.
With that said I'd going to try and recognise I am 'crypto spoilt', so I must try to keep a bit of perspective when analysing how others navigate their way through this crazy world of cryptocurrencies.
Very good post. The truth is that out there people are putting $18000 on stock hoping for a $350 return (intra-day trading). Those numbers looks ridiculous to me but it's how it is. The reason for this differences is that we are in a middle of an exponentially growing unregulated market and we are using the benefit of growth. In order to win someone else shouldn't lose necessarily. In a bullish market all the investors are making money.
"This is how crypto has spoiled me. A 90% return on an investment in 6 months or so, is by any measure, fantastic. I should be happy for my colleague. "
I can identify with your post. It IS about adoption, but at the same time, it is about those huge returns too. I think we can have a little bit of both. Don't you? I'm up a massive amount in coins like Stratis and Xtrabytes, but the coins that have a solid team, real world use case, and great tech, will be around a while. So why not invest and receive some healthy returns in the process?
Great story, very entertaining and true for many people. Not everyone can understand the opportunities that exist here.
I've noticed a lot of "re-wiring", as far as how I read moves, since cryptos hit the world.
I used to look at %10 gains over the course of a week as "huge moves" back in the early 2000's, now I see a %100 gain over the course of three days and it's almost like I'm unimpressed. I've been desensitized to two and three baggers!
Obviously, these are small market caps compared to DOW stocks. Most of the big gainers are actually closer to penny-stock market caps than they are big cap stocks, but, IMO, the general direction of the crypto market sets it apart from pinksheet stocks in terms of probability of x_ (multiplier) profits, or, said another way, less risk of dropping to zero.
In other words, it's a trader's heaven!
I can definitely relate to being crypto-spoiled. Investing in regular stocks and bonds is much too boring now that I've benefited from 10x-100x gains from bitcoin and other cryptos! I think it's OK to be a little spoiled though... Crypto has not reached its peak yet!
I could not agree with you more here @nanzo-scoop. It's hard to not desire large returns when the marker and possiblity for this market it huge. I remember talking wtih my father (who is a stock broker) about my returns in ETH, when I made the majority of my purchase in Nov, December of 2016 having now gone 25X is one in a million in his eyes. While even in the crypto world, these are great returns, they are not uncommon at all. We just have to remember to stay humble, and while always looking to invest in good projects, like we invest in good content on steemit. Thank you for the post. Cheers!
Great article, @nanzo-scoop!
And something most of us in the game can relate to. The great thing is this isn't like traditional investment in the most common sense of the word. We are all witnessing a possible revolutionary technology about the lift off into the depths of space. But it hasn't taken off yet.
So even some years down the line, we are still accustomed to expecting crazy returns until the crypto space fully establishes itself in the mainstream. The days of being satisfied with doubling, tripling or even quadrupling your investment are over. Crypto is a game-changer and I hope your friend buys a strategically sound digital coin at a great price and simply holds. The rewards are there for the taking. A modicum of patience is all that's required.
Take care and steem on, man! :)
This is a really great post. Being new to crypto but a long time investor in the stock market, my beliefs are rooted in finding value. Price meant nothing, value was everything. I've struggled for years coming to grips with finding value in the crypto market. My lack of financial education and lack of understanding in this market left me without the necessary tools in my toolbox to properly put 'value' on crypto as a whole and individual currencies. Your friends' belief in what investing is "supposed" to be is a flawed way of thinking that I and many others have shared and share. If we can grind out our small % gain, we think that's a win. I've cost myself a lot of money refusing to give this sector the necessary time and effort it deserves. I understand now crypto is here to stay, it's usefulness quite simply cannot be ignored. With it's emergence, there also comes the hope of a true 'free market' coming into existence without the disease of HFT and paper derivative corruption.
I had a letter from my bank saying I have 0.05% interest on my savings account, I should have saved it and posted it here, but it went straight into the shredder as soon as I opened and saw the number.
I think about this all the time. People are holding stocks to hopefully 9% a year. When I tell my friends I got 30% in 1 day with dgb coin they look at me like.. there is something wrong with me. I'm not sure if we're spoiled or just blessed with an opportunity others will never have in a lifetime. Thank you very much for posting :)).