Changpeng Zhao - Founder and former CEO of the largest cryptocurrency exchange Binance
Brian Armstrong - Co-Founder and CEO of Coinbase
Barry Silbert - Founder of Digital Currency Group, which invests in numerous cryptocurrency-related projects and startups
Chris Larsen - Co-Founder of Ripple
Fred Ehrsam - Co-founder of Coinbase and Paradigm, a crypto venture capital firm
The world of digital assets is enticing to many, and it is no surprise that the cryptocurrency market, despite all the volatility it witnesses, is clearly not short of money. According to CoinGecko’s annual report, the cryptocurrency trading volume in 2023 reached $40.2 trillion, with daily trading volume exceeding $113 billion (as of 10-04-24). Impressive, isn’t it?
For beginners, it is important to breathe and be motivated by the successes of others. So in this article, we will tell you the stories of people who not only reached great financial heights, but also had a significant impact on the development and evolution of the cryptocurrency space.
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What skills do you need to become a successful cryptocurrency trader?
A cryptocurrency trader who wants to succeed must be able to manage risks, understand technical and fundamental analysis, control emotions, keep up with the latest news, developments and trends in cryptocurrencies, be able to make quick and clear decisions, and continuously learn.
What strategies do successful cryptocurrency traders use?
The top five effective ways to trade cryptocurrencies include arbitrage, long-term holding, swing trading, day trading, and scalping.
How do successful crypto traders manage risk in a volatile market?
Successful traders manage risk by using reasonably sized trades, placing stop-loss orders, diversifying their portfolios, and constantly updating their strategies to meet changing market conditions.
What can you learn from famous cryptocurrency traders?
By reading stories of famous cryptocurrency traders, you can learn different trading strategies, discover risk management techniques, gain insight into how to maintain emotional control and discipline, learn how to analyze market trends, charts, etc. to make informed decisions.
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Most Successful Cryptocurrency Traders and Their Stories
Changpeng Zhao
Changping Zhao
Changpeng Zhao (@cz_binance), known as CZ, is a Chinese-Canadian cryptocurrency entrepreneur and founder of the Binance exchange. The future billionaire was born in China, but his family immigrated to Vancouver in the 1980s. Zhao Qiqi was educated at McGill University in Montreal.
Zhao began his career in finance with Bloomberg Tradebook in 2005, where he was a software developer. He later worked at Fusion Systems and Blockchain.info. In 2013, Zhao joined OKCoin after working on the team for over 8 months. In the same year, Zhao Zhao founded OKCoin, which was a software development and technical support company for software in the fintech space.
On July 14, 2017, Zhao and his descendants decided to create a Bitcoin exchange, which they named Binance. Binance is now the largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume, and Changpeng Zhao's fortune, according to 2024 data, is $33 billion, making him the 50th richest person on the planet.
The final piece of advice Binance CEO gave investors was: “If you feel stressed every time you go down, maybe you shouldn’t trade so much, or at least you should change your trading strategy. Maybe you should just hang in there.”
Brian Armstrong
Brian Armstrong
Brian Armstrong (@brian_armstrong) is an American entrepreneur best known as the co-founder and CEO of the cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase. Throughout his career, Brian has earned various nicknames. For example, he has been called the “White Knight” for his attempts to bring natural regulation to the cryptocurrency market.
Brian Armstrong was born on January 25, 1983 in San Jose and attended Rice University in Houston, Texas, where he earned a bachelor's degree in economics and computer science. While in college, Brian interned at IBM for 4 months and also worked at Deloitte and Touche as a risk management consultant. Together with his college roommate, Brian created University Tutor, an aggregator for finding tutors.
Brian became interested in digital assets in 2010 after he first read Satoshi Nakamoto’s white paper. At the time, he even tried to create a wallet project that would allow him to safely store and buy cryptocurrencies, but due to his busy schedule (he was working at Airbnb and developing his own college education project in parallel), he was unable to bring it to its logical conclusion.
But failure didn't stop Armstrong, and in 2012, he and Fred Ehrsam founded Coinbase. As of November 2023, Coinbase is valued at $80 billion. Forbes estimates Brian's personal wealth at $2.4 billion.
Barry Selbert
Barry Selbert
Barry Silbert is an American entrepreneur, investor, and founder of the cryptocurrency group.
Barry Silbert was born in 1976 in Gaithersburg, Maryland. He earned a bachelor’s degree in finance and information technology from Emory University. Barry began his career in finance working at Houlihan Lokey, a large multinational bank. In 2004, he founded his own company, Restricted Stock Partners, which specializes in developing financial platform technologies. After expanding, the project was renamed SecondMarket, and after just two years of operation, the company brought Silbert $2 million.
2013 was marked for him by the creation of the Bitcoin Investment Fund, a private trust fund, and 2015 was marked by the launch of the Digital Currency Group, a leading company in the field of digital currencies and blockchain technologies. It works on investing in many projects and startups related to digital assets. For example, DCG has invested in companies such as BitGo, BitPay, BitPagos, Circle, Coinbase, Kraken, and others.
As of April 2022, Forbes estimates Barry Silbert's personal wealth at $3.2 billion.
Chris Larsen
Chris Larsen
Chris Larsen (@chrislarsensensf) is an American entrepreneur and angel investor who is primarily known for co-founding Ripple.
Chris Larsen attended San Francisco State University, where he earned a Bachelor of Science in International Business and Accounting in 1984. Larsen's first official job was at Chevron, a major American energy company. But already in 1997, he and Janina Pavlovsky founded E-Loan, a pioneer in online lending.
The next step in Larsen’s career was to create an online peer-to-peer lending platform – Prosper Marketplace. The way the platform works is that borrowers can apply for a loan through Prosper’s website, specifying the amount they need and the purpose of the loan. Private investors can then shortlist borrowers for funding based on various criteria such as credit rating, repayment history, etc.
In 2012, Larsen left his position as CEO of Prosper Marketplace to join the team at OpenCoin, which later changed its name to Ripple Labs.
Ripple Labs has developed a blockchain technology that enables banks and financial institutions to conduct instant, low-cost international transactions using the XRP cryptocurrency.
Chris Larsen's personal net worth is $2.9 billion in 2023.
Fred Ehrsam
Fred Ehrsam
Fred Ehrsam (@FEhrsam) is a well-known and highly controversial figure in the cryptocurrency world. He, along with Brian Armstrong, was one of the founders of the largest cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase.
Fred graduated from Duke University in North Carolina in 2010, and then worked as a currency broker at Goldman Sachs in New York. During his time at Goldman Sachs, Erasam gradually became acquainted with digital assets, trading Bitcoin in his spare time. In 2012, Erasam and Armstrong met fatefully, and as a result, they decided to create the Coinbase exchange. In 2017, Fred Erasam left active management at Coinbase to engage in investment activities and support new projects in the blockchain and cryptocurrency space.
Later, Ehrsam and Matt Huang launched Paradigm, a crypto venture capital firm, which in its first year made 28 investments in digital asset businesses.
Fred Ehrsam's personal net worth is approximately $3 billion (based on 2023 data).
Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss
Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss
Cameron (@cameron) and Tyler (@tyler) Winklevoss are twin brothers, American rowers, entrepreneurs, and rivals of Mark Zuckerberg. They are best known for co-creating the social network ConnectU, which later became known as Facebook. Their story was the basis for the book and film The Social Network.
However, it was Bitcoin that provided them with their real wealth. In 2013, the twins invested about $11 million in “digital gold,” and in 2017 they became the world’s first publicly known Bitcoin billionaires. Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss are also the owners of Nifty Gateway, an online auction platform for trading NFT artwork.
Mike Novogratz
Mike Novogratz
Mike Novogratz (@novogratz) is an American investor, public figure, and former hedge fund manager. Mike was born in 1964 into a large family with several children. He began his career in finance at Goldman Sachs, where he worked for 11 years. In 2002, he joined Fortress Investments. In 2007, the company held an initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange. Fortress became the first large hedge fund in US history to issue shares to the public. That same year, Novogratz made it to the Forbes Billionaires List for the first time, ranking at number 317. However, Mike lost his spot again during the 2008 crisis.
In 2015, Mike founded Galaxy Investment Partners, which focused on cryptocurrency investments in Bitcoin and Ethereum. Between 2016 and 2017, Mike made over $250 million in crypto markets. In 2022, Galaxy Investment Partners recorded a massive $500 million loss due to the collapse of Terra and FTX, which cost Novogratz not only financial losses but also reputational damage.
Vitalik Buterin
Vitalik Buterin
Vitalik Buterin (@VitalikButerin) is a Russian-Canadian programmer, best known as the co-founder of the Ethereum project. Vitalik was born in 1994 and raised in Canada, where he immigrated with his parents at the age of six. In 2011, Buterin became interested in Bitcoin and in the same year became a co-founder of Bitcoin Magazine.
In 2014, Buterin dropped out of college to devote himself full-time to working on Ethereum. The network officially went live on July 30, 2015.
In 2017, Vitalik joined the Forbes “30 under 30” list, and in 2021 he became the world’s youngest crypto billionaire. The American Forbes magazine estimated his fortune at $ 1.3 billion. According to the latest data, due to the collapse of the cryptocurrency market, Buterin lost his billionaire status, as his personal capital decreased to about $ 850 million.
Mikri Zan
Mikri Zan
Micree Zhan, also known as Zhan Kun Ketuan, is a Chinese entrepreneur and engineer who played a key role in creating the world's largest Bitcoin mining hardware company, Bitmain.
In 2013, Micree Zhan co-founded Bitmain Technology with Jihan Wu, which quickly grew into one of the leading manufacturers of ASIC chips and cryptocurrency mining equipment. However, in 2019, a dispute broke out between Jihan Wu that resulted in Micree being removed from all of his positions and becoming persona non grata at Bitmain. Micree later regained his rights as a founder through the courts and regained control of the shares. But it cost him $600 million.
Nikhil Viswanathan
Nikhil Viswanathan
Nikhil Viswanathan (@nikil) is a prominent American entrepreneur and social activist. In 2011, while studying at Stanford University, he met Joseph Lau and since then they have launched dozens of successful ventures. Their first joint venture was Down to Lunch, a social app used by college students to connect. Following the success of the program, Nikhil and Joseph founded Alchemy, a platform for blockchain developers, which raised $200 million in February 2022 at a valuation of $10.2 billion.
In recognition of his achievements, Viswanathan was named one of the Forbes 30 Under 30 award winners in January 2017.
