Two years ago, I really messed things up with LUNA. I had zero knowledge of how the project functioned and why it was failing, but it seemed like trading blood on the streets was the "trade of the day" to save my portfolio. Little did I know, we were already in a bear market, and LUNA was about to worsen the market's bleeding.
I risked everything and ended up losing $3,500 with LUNA. It was hard-earned money. I barely slept that night, but there was no turning back. This tragic event taught me, once again, that bull markets are for taking profits, not reinvesting, and that catching falling knives hurts. A lot...
Fast forward to 2024, and things are slightly different. Despite almost depleting my cash reserves, I now have a few coins in my wallet and am eagerly waiting to dump them all as we enter the euphoria phase, with no interest in buying back for years to come. Except for HBD, which will be my hedge during the bear market.
Today, I experienced firsthand the risks of holding crypto on exchanges. I had some VELO on gate.io because it is one of the exchanges that support the coin, and there's no way to HODL offline. When I wanted to move that VELO to crypto.com, it prompted me to "update my KYC"...
I couldn't do anything until I actually re-uploaded my ID card image, even though I had already done that many months ago. It all worked fine afterward, but something told me I should quit that exchange, and that's what I did. Hence, I swapped the VELO I had on the gate to other coins and moved these to Exodus and left the other chunk on crypto.com. Crypto.com seems to be more trustworthy...
The world has changed a lot in the past two years since the LUNA event. The crypto landscape has matured, but at the same time, we can see that it has also become more controlled than it used to be. We see that with ETFs.
Recently, it was revealed that many traditional finance companies, such as Morgan Stanley, have dipped their toes into crypto assets such as Bitcoin. Crypto has gradually become a more mature asset class, to some extent... But on the other hand, it is also more regulated than before.
I wish there would be more DeFi going on and more liquidity for all sorts of coins on all sorts of swapping options on certain non-custodial wallets, such as Exodus, which I have been using for a few years now. The world is not perfect, though, and it seems to be changing rapidly.
What a difference two years makes nowadays, and we haven't seen AI in full swing yet.
Anyway, as stated in a few previous posts, I am planning to make a significant difference in my life in this bull market. I am more and more cautious as time goes by instead of being exuberant and looking to take profits in the months to come and end the misery in which I have been living for the past couple of years.
I wish all of us will make it. Not because we are way smarter than some others, but because we deserve it. We've been in this thing for so many years, and we deserve to reap the rewards for all the pain and skin in the game. I really believe that...
Thanks for your attention,
Adrian
Yahoo! What a wild ride, cowboy! Keep those hard-earned lessons close like your trusty lasso and ride the crypto trail with caution and confidence. Remember, it's not about how hard you fall, but how you get back up and ride into the sunset of profit! Yeehaw!
😉
Nice writeup and warning for newbies in the crypto space like me. The bull run this year has been relatively fair, but how does one anticipate the bear?
Cos that's my greatest fear, losing my hard earned money
Watch for euphoria in the market and all over media. I would also become cautious once BTC goes above $100,000. Gradually exiting the market once that happens is my plan.