Discuss Latest WCI Blog Post: Should I Invest in Cryptocurrency?

[Tangler]

frequency of anti crypto posts?

This might be me! Ha! Actually, I hope you guys win. I have plenty. I will be ok. I know I am not going to make 30M but I am trying to just be happy knowing I won't be able to spend what I got.

[jacoavlu]

This might be me! Ha! Actually, I hope you guys win. I have plenty. I will be ok. I know I am not going to make 30M but I am trying to just be happy knowing I won't be able to spend what I got.

if I had to be declared pro crypto or anti crypto then I’m anti crypto

[docnews]

Too bad you didn't index tech stocks in 1999 or held real estate since 2008. My point is you are right to worry about rampant speculation but that doesn't rule out real value underneath it all.

Apologies if this triggers anyone, but I was becoming a young adult during the dot com boom and bust and then just starting real investing as the housing market tanked. This crypto stuff reminds me of the crazy speculation in websites and housing, respectively, and the former even moreso, and at 40 years old, I feel more confident than not that this is going to go up in flames during my lifetime, but not before it becomes even bigger than it already is now, and therefore triggering a massive recession and decimating people's retirement savings who got on the bandwagon and invested way too much in crypto. I admit to not understanding it. I have tried. People pushing it sent me articles and I tried to read them without bias and trying to learn something new. I'm not the smartest person out there but I'm closer to being the smartest person out there than the dumbest. And it all went over my head. Thousands if not millions of people are investing in this and they either truly do not understand it or they drank so much of the koolaid that they are 100% convinced they understand it but they don't and we can't get them to be humble and/or back to reality.

[docnews]

No EARNINGS, NO INTEREST, NO RENTS, NADA NADA NADA
put 1% of assets in it if you like SPECULATION
The most basic concept is never to invest in something you do not completely understand

Believe it or not I do make interest off some of my crypto. Have the 1099-MISC to prove it.

[xraygoggles]

Believe it or not I do make interest off some of my crypto. Have the 1099-MISC to prove it.

Stablecoins have been quite lucrative indeed - muni bond income seems paltry in comparison.

[JBME]

Too bad you didn't index tech stocks in 1999 or held real estate since 2008. My point is you are right to worry about rampant speculation but that doesn't rule out real value underneath it all.

Well I didn’t have any money at either time. Was in HS during the former and just finished grad school at the latter. Nothing yet has proven any real value underneath. And the dot com bust wasn’t about tech stocks. It was about investing in website names (thus the dot com bust, not the tech bust) that had no value underneath them. That’s why I said originally that the crypto frenzy going on now is more like the dot com recession than the housing recession. Even during the housing recession actual real estate values didn’t go to $0

[The White Coat Investor]

if I had to be declared pro crypto or anti crypto then I’m anti crypto

Are we politicizing crypto or something? Why does one have to declare themselves on this issue? Am I not allowed to be pro crypto unless I own some?

[The White Coat Investor]

Stablecoins have been quite lucrative indeed - muni bond income seems paltry in comparison.

I did a post on those too: https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/cr...vings-account/

Like most of these crypto posts you guys are seeing, these were all written and published months ago, just not run on the blog.

Bottom line: Those yields aren't risk free (nor tax free). Apples to oranges.

But I think the article does conclude that stablecoin savings accounts might be the least insane thing in crypto investing.

[The White Coat Investor]

this is all fine, but a different argument
the key phrase that doesn’t make sense to say is “there is a price at which bitcoin is a good deal”

at that point you’re applying different principles than the rest of your portfolio

Nonsense. The portfolio is built on the fact that I don't know what that price is for any asset class. If I did, I'd have a very different looking portfolio than the one I have that has spread my bets very, very widely. That doesn't change the fact that there is a price where each of those investments is a good deal and a price where they are not a good deal. Just because I don't know the price doesn't mean there isn't one.

Maybe Bitcoin is a good deal at $50,000. Maybe it's a good deal at $500. Unless it goes to zero, which seems unlikely given the fanaticism surrounding it, there is some price at which it should be bought and at which it should be sold. I just have no idea what those prices are. It doesn't appear to me that anyone else knows either or it would be much less volatile.

[jacoavlu]

Are we politicizing crypto or something? Why does one have to declare themselves on this issue? Am I not allowed to be pro crypto unless I own some?

uh not that I’m aware, I was responding to tangler

[jacoavlu]

Nonsense. The portfolio is built on the fact that I don't know what that price is for any asset class. If I did, I'd have a very different looking portfolio than the one I have that has spread my bets very, very widely. That doesn't change the fact that there is a price where each of those investments is a good deal and a price where they are not a good deal. Just because I don't know the price doesn't mean there isn't one.

Maybe Bitcoin is a good deal at $50,000. Maybe it's a good deal at $500. Unless it goes to zero, which seems unlikely given the fanaticism surrounding it, there is some price at which it should be bought and at which it should be sold. I just have no idea what those prices are. It doesn't appear to me that anyone else knows either or it would be much less volatile.

is there a price at which VTI should be bought and should be sold? How about BND? Of course not, if we are long term buy and hold investors. We will sell in retirement only when we need the funds

But you’re approaching “crypto” with a different lens

[xraygoggles]

I did a post on those too: https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/cr...vings-account/

Like most of these crypto posts you guys are seeing, these were all written and published months ago, just not run on the blog.

Bottom line: Those yields aren't risk free (nor tax free). Apples to oranges.

But I think the article does conclude that stablecoin savings accounts might be the least insane thing in crypto investing.

Yep I agree - no free lunch.

I strictly use Gemini, since it's the most regulated and endorsed by the NY state financial apparatus. It's definitely much "safer" than trying to get insane yields on some of these opaque DeFi platforms, that's for sure.

[Random1]

I really don't get crypto as an asset. Its not like gold with an intrinsic value. It is not like a bond with a predetermined coupon payment. It is not like a stock with earnings and potential growth. It is not like commodities with an underlying value. The only value I can see is in it is having someone pay you more for it than you bought it for. But that does not intrinsically create value, it only makes the person who bought it from you less smart

[jacoavlu]

I really don't get crypto as an asset. Its not like gold with an intrinsic value. It is not like a bond with a predetermined coupon payment. It is not like a stock with earnings and potential growth. It is not like commodities with an underlying value. The only value I can see is in it is having someone pay you more for it than you bought it for. But that does not intrinsically create value, it only makes the person who bought it from you less smart

might help if you approach it from utility perspective rather trying to equate it to something else

[Random1]

I honestly don't any utility value unless it is a cycle when it is monetized and more stable, until then, a "value" of something that can change by 20% really has no utility value, it is more a purchase on some thing you hope goes up. And when it gets monetized it will be regulated by the government.