I’ve been in Crypto for years now. Since early 2018 to be exact. It wasn’t a good time to get in, but nevertheless, the lessons I picked up along the way are priceless. I’ve had many victories and equally many defeats on this journey, and to say that I haven’t enjoyed every minute of it, well, that’s accurate 😄. 
Like many trying to make it through Crypto trading, I made some big mistakes, but I was lucky where I didn’t get myself wiped out completely. And believe me, that is something I have seen happen to many others throughout the years, especially those who put all their eggs in a single basket. However, I believe it is through the mistakes that I have reached the point where I am today. I am still far from my end game - my dream goal, but, for the first time since my journey began, I am starting to see that goal in sight.
So what was one of the biggest mistakes I was doing? Simply, I was re-investing all my profits from successful trades. Some might say that this is the way to go, but when you’re dealing with an unpredictable monster like the crypto industry, it is always good to ensure your success. 
The problem with reinvesting everything is you begin to forget why you got into this whole crypto trading thing - To earn as much Fiat as possible. You are basically diving into an abyss, climbing your way out and diving back in, not leaving anything from those dives. This is exactly what I see many people doing, they don’t put anything away, they reinvest, then the market eventually crashes, they panic sell or they’re left off with months to years of waiting before their crypto regains any of its previous worth.

So what has worked well for me?

Common sense really. Whenever you have a successful trade - Let’s say you made a $150 profit. Divide that $150 into 3 ways, as per follows:

$50 to your FIAT stash. This is your endgame stash. Don’t ever touch this stash, only add to it. As it grows, this is everything that you have to show for years of trading.

$50 to any Crypto that you want really. Basically buy any crypto, especially if it dipped and the price is right. This crypto is complimentary to your end game stash. It is a long term hold, when you have the highest price possible, then sell it.

$50 Your trading stash. The bigger your crypto trading stash gets, the more trades you’ll be able to do vs. other crypto and bring in profits. So don’t neglect this completely.

Would love to hear your thoughts in the comments guys, whether you have any ideas you'd like to share or just wanna say hello!
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And How I Missed The Previous Bull Run.
I have a confession to make. The previous bull run was an utter shambles for me. Having started trading crypto just at the beginning of February 2018, I was in for a long wait, close to 3 years to be exact. Having the patience to hold without any idea of when we would enter a new Bull run was rough. But eventually we did get there, and it couldn’t have gone any worse for me.
I had broken the one golden rule which as a trader you should never do. I put all my eggs in one basket, and what a disastrous basket it turned out to be. For many of you, you’ll probably remember it quite bitterly, for others, thank your lucky stars you never got into it. I am speaking about Cover Protocol. An insurance based project that had a lot of hype behind it — even Binance’s seal of approval.
I got into Cover Protocol early, around when it was $600. I didn’t really go in big, but it made a jump to around $1,300 and I made a killing on that trade. The price eventually went down again, and rationalizing that it had so much hype behind it, potential to be huge as an innovative insurance provider in the crypto space and a small token supply— I along with so many others (blinded by greed) believed that the next price hike would be absolutely massive — and man, how wrong were we.
In a moment of which I still wonder what I was thinking. I ignored my own golden rule of keeping my portfolio varied and pretty much sold everything to fully go into Cover Protocol. It was the biggest mistake that I have ever made in all the time which I have been involved in Crypto.
To cut things short, the team behind Cover Protocol turned out to be some of the most arrogant and shady individuals that you could have ever met in the crypto space. Their project was hacked (I still believe to this day that they had some involvement in it) and the price was absolutely obliterated.
What made things even worse was the 2021 Bull run was now in full effect. So people who had invested in Cover Protocol, were basically waiting for weeks to receive the new version of Cover, and eventually when we did, the price never recovered.
What was particularly infuriating, was without even having fixed things yet for people that were waiting to receive their new tokens, the Cover Protocol team started a new project called Ruler (Unsurprisingly it turned out to be a failure, but never before they pumped the price and dumped on holders).
As for Cover Protocol In the end, the price never recovered and so many people had lost so much money. I along with some others had an amazing Bull run pass us by. It took me a long time to recover after that. I was so jaded mentally that I was considering leaving the Crypto trading game for good. I’m glad I didn’t though. This was a huge error on my part and I learned a huge lesson.
So my advice to you and I really hope that you follow this with every fibre of your being — Do not put all your eggs into a single basket, always keep your portfolio as varied as possible, I know for many of you, this is something that is obvious or natural, but you never know when greed will play a part on sound rational decision making. You may see a coin that is way undervalued than everything else right now, by all means buy some, but don’t put everything into it. Looking at what has happened with some very big projects such as Luna and FTX, we are skating on very thin ice as it is investing in crypto, it’s imperative to always keep your risk as minimal as possible!
Good luck!
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Image by Nattanan Kanchanaprat from Pixabay
For the uninitiated, staking is when you lock up your crypto for a specified number time usually — 30/60/90/120 days and as a reward, you get an APR (Annual Percentage Rate) reward which is distributed to your spot wallet on a daily basis. It’s a means for project teams to ensure their coin continues to grow in value and isn’t so easily dumped in the market. So the questions to consider are how much are the rewards and what are the risks involved? One thing for certain and what I will be showing you is how crypto staking rewards are essential to grow your portfolio with the right strategy.
Let’s dive in.

How Big Is Your Portfolio?
First off, you need to look at how big your portfolio is and your overall strategy as a trader. Are you an aggressive short term trader who looks to enter and exit smaller price windows? Or a medium term to long term trader who doesn’t mind holding for days, weeks, months until a trade hits the right profit target?
These type of considerations will determine how you would divide your portfolio between staking and what to leave in your spot wallet ready to be traded.
Assuming your portfolio is worth $5,000. Here are some examples of how traders with different priorities would approach staking.
Short term traders — Most short term traders are adept at TA, and with that confidence you see a tendency towards aggressive trading. They mostly have 85–90% of their crypto in their spot wallet, waiting for price opportunities to trade and maximize their daily profits. This kind of strategy is much more lucrative to them, than mostly relying on staking.
Medium term traders- These traders usually have 80–90% of their portfolio staked. Since it aligns with their medium term goals they opt for 30–60 days of locked staking, while utilizing 10–20% of their spot wallet for some quick trades.
Long term holders — These traders buy and sleep on their stash. They’re in it for the long run and so their habit involves staking their crypto for a longer amount of days. Usually 90–120 days.

When Would Be The Right Time To Stake?
You can stake whenever you want, but of course, there are times which make more sense to do so.
If you’re in a Bull market and you reached the point where you’ve sold all your crypto into fiat, then it makes sense to go ahead and stake your USD until the next time a buying opportunity arises.
On the other hand, if you’re still waiting to cash out, and your crypto is close to reaching its sell price target, it simply wouldn’t be wise to stake as your holdings would be locked and you wouldn’t be able to sell even if you wanted to. There is the option to redeem earlier, but it usually takes two days for the crypto to return to your Spot wallet and you’d be losing the APR rewards accrued so far.
In Bear markets however, it makes more sense to stake as much as possible since prices have crashed badly and recovery may take months, if not years. And since Bear market days are filled with flat charts, trading for profit can be very challenging. Staking in this case, ensures that you keep your portfolio growing during a time where accumulation is an absolute must.
Keep in mind though that there are still risks associated with staking even in a Bear market.

What Are The Risks?
As mentioned, if you’re staking during a Bull market where prices can shoot right up in an instant. You won’t be able to sell. You would have to continue to stake and just be content with whatever amount you’d be getting when the specified lock duration ends — this could be much less than what you could have got if you sold. A crash could also happen during a Bull market and you wouldn’t be able to react.
During a Bear market, just because charts on most days are flat it doesn’t mean that coins you’re staking are incapable of having wild pumps— It could happen! These kind of pumps sometimes don’t last for long and usually people are quick to sell and take profits. Having those coins locked means you will miss that opportunity to sell.
The most severe risk of staking is a rug pull or a hack could occur and while people are relentlessly selling to save whatever fiat they can, you can’t do anything about it.

Which Coins Should I Stake And Which Should I Buy To Stake?

An example of the rewards you’d receive for staking that many coins over 30 days.
Have a look at your portfolio and consider the APR reward (See above) you’d be getting if you staked all the coins you hold. Is the return attractive enough to leave it locked for a minimum of 30 days or more? Whether that’s worth it or not is down to you.
If you’re trading and making profits, consider putting a significant amount of the profits towards great projects which have high APR. For example at the time — Cake would give around 55% APR return for 30 days staking, while AXS would reward users with 70% APR for 30 days. Always look at which listed coins can grow your portfolio better than others in the same amount of time — within reason.
Don’t slouch on research due diligence. If you find a solid project with high APR, consider going for it. On the flip side, some shit coins have really attractive APR, don’t make that mistake! Let good research always determine what you buy, nothing else.

So Is Staking Worth It?
That depends. While some out there are making hundreds to thousands of dollars each month because of their massive portfolios, smaller traders would need a significant amount of crypto to make it worth their while.
If you’re staking enough crypto during the Bear market where it’s bringing in at the very least $50–$100 monthly. Why not?! It keeps your portfolio growing during a time when there isn’t much price volatility and the road to recovery can be a long one.
On the other hand, if staking isn’t bringing in a significant amount, then it’s a waste of time. You’d be better off keeping much of your crypto in a Savings account and using some of it to trade (If you know what you’re doing!). Saving account APRs are small (1–5% on average). But, on the flip side it is flexible where your crypto is not locked and you’d be able to redeem it instantly should there be any big market movements or unfortunate circumstances that require a quick reaction, so the risk is significantly lower.

My Staking Strategy
As mentioned above, most of my portfolio is being staked right now. I just don’t see a recovery anytime soon, so for me it makes sense. The left over crypto which I have in my portfolio is used for quick trades and profits from that as well as APR rewards go towards growing my portfolio.
As for managing risk, while I was choosing to stake for 90–120 days-months ago. I found that the prolonged lock up time was too risky for my taste and I’ve since opted to utilize 30 day staking as I find it more flexible.
One thing which helps me determine how long I want to stake is to consider the current price vs. my sell target. If I have a coin which is currently priced at $50 and I’m waiting to sell it at $800 (Looking at you Comp!) It’ll take a while to get there and so staking would be ideal for me.
In the end, staking can be a significant strategy to help you grow your portfolio during slower times. BUT, you need to consider how much you can allocate towards it and whether the rewards are worth the time / risk of having your crypto locked up for a specified amount of time.
In my case, staking along with trading profits have had a profound effect on growing my portfolio during the current market.
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Note: The above is not financial advice! You may utilize the above information at your own discretion, however, I am not responsible for any Financial losses you may incur.

I am a crypto related writer on Medium.com. My work is 100% free and hopefully provides value to those who are new to the crypto space. If you enjoy / like my work, please consider supporting with a tip. Thank you very much!

Buying Cryptocurrency. Photo by Kanchanara on Unsplash
Congratulations, You’ve just entered the crypto space. You’re excited, sweating all over the place (dude get a towel already!) and can’t wait to start spending that hard earned cash on some cryptocurrency that’ll hopefully earn you some anxiety inducing profits and you can finally tell your boss to shove it.
Just hold your horses there for a second. Buying crypto is easy, but there can be pitfalls involved. Do it wrong and you could end up on the losing end of trades. Learn from others and you’ll be on your way to making the right purchases that will set you up for profitable investments.
So let my experience be your shining light on that journey. Here are 7 things you need to know before you buy any cryptocurrency.

1. Who’s Behind The Project?
For some projects you’re planning to buy into, you need to have done your research first to make sure you’re buying into a project that is legit and not something that could turn out to be a scam or junk. Generally, most of the coins in the top 100 spot on Coinmarketcap.com are a safe bet as they’ve been around for some time now and have built up trust with communities. If however, you’re not looking to buy into the popular coins and opting more towards finding gems, then you need to be more careful what you invest in.
When I’m looking for a coin to invest in, one of the biggest red flags for me is an anonymous team. If at any point, you see an attractive project and everything looks good except you don’t know who the team is, I would be cautious and take it as a sign that it’s probably better to walk away.
I can hear your screams of “BITCOIN”. True, No one knows who Satoshi Nakamoto is. But chances are if Bitcoin — which has been around since 2009-is a scam, then whoever is behind it would have folded shop and disappeared ages ago. Instead year by year more institutions are becoming interested in it and throwing their money towards it.
In the crypto world, scammers / hackers don’t like to play the long game. Some will steal funds overnight, while others will build projects under the guise of legitimacy only to pull off a rug pull in a matter of months. They’ll create an authentic looking project, reel in investors and even build communities, playing the part for months before they remove liquidity and disappear to the Bahamas overnight.
So why take a chance on a project with an anonymous team? I made that mistake when I invested in Cover Protocol a while back. It was an exciting Insurance project that even had the “Godfather” of Defi Andre Cronje attached to it. Now if there was just one thing to know about Andre it’s that if his name was attached to a project, then it was gold.
But then you had a bumbling, arrogant, anonymous team behind Cover Protocol making one unbelievably bad decision after another. They shortly severed ties with Andre and only God knows why, even though he was the only reason they had any sort of legitimacy to their name in the market. But what was incredibly stupid, is that they broke off with him even before using his celebrity status to catapult their project to its full potential.
What’s worse, is the team had zero understanding of any sort of Marketing. It was now just a bunch of arrogant Devs who treated their community like shit.
Eventually, their project got exploited where a hacker gained access to the Blacksmith farming contract and was able to mint 40 Quintillion Tokens. Keep in mind, this is for a project that only had a supply of around 64,000 tokens and at one point reached the value of $1,700 per token. So, you can only imagine what happened to the price after so many new tokens were minted.
What seemed like a promising project, turned sour overnight. And while the exploit was happening, what was the team doing? They were all “asleep”. Not a single one of them on hand, and no security measures in place to stop the exploit.
The community chat mods knew there was obviously something insidious going on, and yet there were no warning messages or any announcements to deter investors from buying newly minted worthless tokens. What followed was an incapability of the team to compensate the traders who bought the bogus minted tokens. Binance did its best to help out but there was simply too much money that was lost in the process.
As for the other holders who were there from day 1? they had to wait over two months to be compensated with a new version of the token-all this while an amazing lucrative Bull market was passing them by at the time.
People were absolutely incensed. And being masters of empathy and self awareness, what did the team do? They decided to start another project of course. This was while wounds were still fresh and no one had yet received their new tokens.
To cut a long story short, their new project “Ruler” failed and Cover Protocol never recovered. The two main devs (Pumpkin and Alan) decided on the same day that they had mental problems and that they would be stepping down from the project and that their clueless minions would take over and continue their work.
It only took a few weeks later, for the project Director to announce that Cover Protocol would be shutting down. To this day non of the team members faced any judicial consequences even though they had the stink of a scam all over them. And what’s worse is most of them could already be working in new projects and under a new anonymous identity.
Moral of the story? Don’t invest in any project with an anonymous team. Especially devs that name themselves after vegetables.

2. Read Through The Whitepaper
Every project has a Whitepaper. Before considering to buy in and especially if you wanna go in big, make the time to look through it and know exactly what the project is about. The whitepaper needs to give you a clear picture and answer the following questions — What is the purpose of the project? Does it have the potential to be adopted on a large scale? What do the milestones look like? Does it over promise on goals? Is the messaging clear and well written or vague and filled with errors?
There’s a lot you can tell directly and indirectly from a whitepaper. It should give you a clear idea of whether you want to invest in a project or not and yet there’s a lot of traders out there, holding coins in their portfolio who have no idea what they’re all about. It makes me wonder what got them to invest in the first place. I’m guessing Moonboy hype on social media had a lot to do with it.
Additionally, knowing what your project is all about can assist you with addressing misinformation which you may read in public outlets. And if your conviction is strong enough, being an ambassador can help put the project in a positive light and draw others to it which is a big win for your investment. Just remember to do it to provide value to others rather than prioritizing any selfish gain.

3. Don’t Buy High And Sell Low
One of the most puzzling things I continue to see since getting into crypto is how many people out there vehemently refuse to buy coins when prices get decimated. It’s as though they convince themselves that this time, crypto must be dead and that they’d be be fools to lose money in it. Conversely, when prices rally, you’d have to wrestle some traders to stop them from making a mistake and buying coins at ridiculously high prices. So if you’ve ever heard the amusing meme- “Buy high and sell low” you now know who it refers to.
I suppose FOMO and greed is the main culprit for why so many traders irrationally jump into overpriced positions. A coin could start pumping out of control and they rationalize that they can quickly jump in and out and make a nice profit in the process. Except in these situations, someone will always get caught and end up holding the bags when others (who got in way before you) start dumping.
You’re putting yourself in a situation where the payoff isn’t worth the high risk you’re taking. There are two outcomes here, you could get away with a decent profit or get absolutely destroyed and have your money stuck in a price point you won’t be seeing again for a while.
Look at the chart below. When you buy at those peak prices, know that there are thousands of people who have bought at the bottom and just waiting for people like you to cash in and take their profit. Don’t be their bag holder!

When you should be buying
The bottom line and reality is that there will always be bag holders. You will always get people who buy at the very top and crypto needs that. That’s how anybody that trades successfully and patiently makes their money. They buy all the way at the bottom and wait for the guys who make it a habit to buy at the top until those same guys eventually learn their lesson. And the cycle just repeats itself but with newer people coming in. But luckily for you, you’re reading this guide, and now know better.

4. How Much Supply Is Too Much?
Supply is one of the main categories I consider when I’m thinking of investing in a coin. I like projects with small Market caps and low supply — the lower the better.
They’re called crypto gems. The majority of the market still hasn’t caught on to them yet. Get in at a low price and you could find yourself with a sweet lucrative return on your investment. However, a low supply doesn’t mean that a coin will be successful, so its up to you to look into the coin’s Tokenomic aspects and gauge the potential of whether your coin could be adopted on a large scale.
One thing I like to go through is the current circulating supply vs. the total supply. It’s worth knowing how many coins are currently being traded in the market and how many are locked up by the team.

Axie Infinity Supply
In the above image you can see how much AXS is currently circulating in the market, while you have a total supply of 270,000,000. This means that there are 186,943,813 locked up by the team. Which is significant enough to effect the current price negatively if the team decided to unlock a specific amount and sell it in the market at one time without the communities’ consent.
It’s not to say that everyone would do that. A lot of teams are transparent in their whitepaper about when locked coins would find their way into circulation. Some locked coins are even used as staking incentives to get people to invest in the project. The only problem is that if the demand does not grow with the newly released supply, you get a coin that decreases in value and which could remain underpriced until there is more demand to offset the new coins.
I also wouldn’t put it past some shady teams to take advantage of growing prices and dump a whole lot of locked coins on the market overnight for a payoff.
For investors, charts could also be misleading when you’re looking at previous ATH points. For example, Axie Infinity previously reached an all time high price of $158.54. Let’s assume demand grew so much that it managed to reach that price with the above current circulating supply. But shortly after, the team eventually releases an additional 100,000,000 coins on the market and the price takes a hit. Unless new demand continues to grow, expect it to be a challenge to reach that ATH price again.
And that is one of the main reasons why I steer clear of projects where the locked supply is much bigger than what is currently being circulated. I just don’t trust teams enough to effectively manage the locked supply well enough vs. growing demand.

5. Let The Charts Whisper To You
You don’t have to be a TA wizard to be a successful trader. But, at the very least you should be able to look at a chart and know what’s happening on a basic level.
A chart can guide you and give you a good idea of when it’s an optimal time to make a purchase or when to sell.
When I’m working out my ROI, I consider a sell price target that is close to the last ATH price. Sure, it can go way past that, but I prefer planning targets and taking profits based on what has already happened instead of a number in the future that may or may not materialize.
It can also give you an indication of a project’s health. Whether there is potential for growth, or decline. Charts are your friends, let them guide you!
This is what a healthy project looks like on a chart:

Healthy Crypto Project
And this is what death looks like (Complete opposite of the above chart):

RIP
6. Stay Away From Toxic Communities
Whenever you’re investing in a new project always go and have a look at the project’s Twitter feed. What do the comments look like? If you have an overwhelming amount of negative comments, you may want to stay clear.
And this isn’t referring to a few posts where you have one or two clowns complaining that the project must be a scam because the price is low. What a toxic community looks like is an onslaught of abuse aimed at the project team. If you want an example of this, go have a look at Saitama’s Twitter feed. Every single tweet has a lot of people complaining about not having received their V2 coins months after the team was supposed to have replaced their current V1 coins.
The drama occurred when the Saitama team informed their community that they were going to automatically exchange everyone’s coins and that they didn’t need to do anything. What ended up happening, was their community is so large that they were not able to manage it properly and so many were left months later still waiting to receive their new coins.
The team has since communicated that those still waiting would be able to facilitate the exchange themselves through a few steps they could undertake. But a lot of community members may have missed the message or simply don’t know how to follow instructions. And so, to this day, you have members who continue to troll Saitama with abusive messages.
If I was an investor in the project, simply put, I wouldn’t be happy about that. A lot of potential buyers do visit these feeds for information and if they see countless messages calling the project a scam, they don’t invest. That’s not helpful to any current holders who expect their investment to come to fruition when potential investors are turning away from the project.
So when you have a bunch of possible investments lined up, keep in mind that you’re also adopting a community. Make sure that community doesn’t sink your investment.

7. Vary Your Projects And Your Price Entry Points
Never put all your money in a single project. Big no-no! It may work out once, twice, thrice but make it a habit and that’s a one way ticket to eventually getting wiped out.
Rug pulls and hacks do happen more often than you think and all it takes is one bad choice. Put all your money in a single project that turns out to be a scam or gets hacked and you’re done. I can understand why some would see it as a good idea from a strategic point of view. The more money that you put into a coin which happens to 20X or 30X the better the payoff will be which you can then spread on to other projects. It could work out that way. But it’s always better to be safe than sorry!
You may think that you’ve done your research and there’s no way the project you’ve invested in is a scam. And that may be so. But hacks and exploits happen and you better believe they can decimate projects.
All you have to do is google a list of coins hacked in 2021 and you’ll get quite the comprehensive list. Badger Dao, Paid Network, Cream Finance (How many times has it been now?), Compound Finance and Poly Network, all losing millions of Dollars. And there’s many more.
Sadly, many of these projects have still not fully recovered from being exploited. People lose confidence and mostly just move on to other projects. Those who are left holding, often wonder if the price will ever recover and if they’ll ever see those previous highs again.
If you’ve been in the crypto space long enough. You will get caught. One of the projects you’ve invested in will get exploited. So ask yourself, do you really want it to be the only one you’re invested in and have to wait for a recovery which may or may not come, or would you rather have spread your money to a number of different projects which allow you to recover any short term losses which the hacked project was responsible for? The answer is easy.
It’s never a good idea to put everything into a single project. Don’t do it. Ever.
But what about price?
Similarly, don’t get into the habit of buying at a single price point. It’s just not smart. The only time this would work out is if you’re so sure that the price is close to the bottom and you won’t be seeing it again for a long time, then that’s ok.
Consider this, Ethereum costs $1,600. You have $10,000 to splash on it and so you go ahead and spend everything you have at that price point and you end up with 6.25 ETH. Its price then goes down to $1,400 and since you threw all your money at a single entry point, you can’t buy anymore!
This is where Dollar cost averaging is a safer option. You could have allocated 10–15 percent of your budget to a starting price point, and then used 5–10 percent to buy more ETH at every significant price drop until your whole budget has been spent. You’d probably end up with more than 6.25 ETH and have more options to maneuver. Dollar cost averaging helps you to reduce risk of getting stuck at a single price point and gives you more flexibility in terms of buying and selling. It’s a buying strategy that works well even for people that have no idea about TA. So learn to use it well!

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I am a crypto related writer on Medium.com. My work is 100% free and hopefully provides value to those who are new to the crypto space. If you enjoy / like my work, please consider supporting with a tip. Thank you very much!

The Wild West world of crypto is a fascinating one. Once you’ve entered some of its communities, you’ll run into some of the strangest characters out there. Perhaps, the anonymity of the internet and its ability to bring out the inner weirdo in some people is what’s doing it. The best way I can describe it, is the Mos Eisley Cantina scene from Star Wars. That is what a lot of Telegram’s crypto chats look like to me. So many different characters, all in one place, all have their own agendas. Some innocent, others — not so much. So without further ado, let’s look at 7 strange characters you’ll encounter in the crypto world.

The Mourners

Why Bitconnnnnnnnnnect, Why?! Photo By Meruyert Gonullu
Mourners fill chatrooms with their sadness. They’re often seen proclaiming how they unfairly lost crypto and that if there was someone who would be kind enough to send them some, well, that would be really great. The tale of misfortune that befell them is often repeated to whoever will listen. Many of those tales, speak of a mysterious man who approached the mourner and promised that if the mourner gave them 0.5 ETH, they would send them back 2 ETH in about 15 minutes.
The Mourner — clearly being inspired as a child by fairytale books such as Jack And The Beanstalk- sends the ETH. Only to never hear from the stranger again.
Mourners also bemoan moments where they bought crypto at peak prices only to be left months later with bags which reminded them of their long lost fiat value. Or when they put all their money into a single project that turned out to be a rug pull.
Indeed, if you’ve ever heard of or seen the terrible horror movie La Llorona you will already have a good idea of what a crypto mourner looks like. A sad vengeful figure that roams crypto chatrooms mourning their lost crypto which they had a hand in losing.

The Lonely Ones

Hello Friend, Will You Be My Friend?
Not gonna lie. I don’t know much about these guys other than that they creep me the fuck out. The lonely ones will usually pop out of nowhere when you’ve written something in the main chat room(Try the Binance Telegram Chat). They’ll send you a private message and ask if you want to be friends. You can tell them to bugger off, but then they’ll ask more questions like- where are you from? Or What are you doing? or why don’t you want to be my friend?
I think the last time someone actually asked me if I wanted to be their friend was back in the 3rd grade. On the other hand, having a grown ass adult asking that question unequivocally creeps me out and the above picture represents the horrors of what my mind believes is on the other side of the chat window.
It makes me wonder how many people these guys have managed to rip off. Or MURDERED! Ok, maybe not murdered. But they’re still very creepy.

The Customer Support Guys

Hello Sir, Thank You For Contacting Us. How Can I Take Your Cryp…Err, How Can I Help You?
Remember that time when your credit card wouldn’t work. And you had to call up your bank to get it fixed. Only to find that you needed a map to navigate your way through a menu maze that would have made even Theseus cry out in frustration- who designed this shit?! And once you finally reach a human, you’ll be passed around from one guy to another. Placed on hold constantly, until you finally make your way to the customer service guy who just started the job today. Nice.
Yeah, I feel your pain.
In the crypto world however? Fret not! You have the best customer service guys in the world. Have a question in Binance’s chat? All you have to do is ask and in seconds, you’ll get 9 or 10 of them DMing you to help!
Don’t have a problem? Worry not. 9 or 10 of them will DM you anyway to ask if you have a problem. You may be thinking, what outstanding young men! The world needs more of these heroic customer service guys.
Except, they’re not actually customer service guys. They’re all scammers. They’ll use the Binance logo as their profile image and call themselves “Binance Customer Support”. Most people won’t fall for it, but some do. And all they need is that one guy. so ignore them. Unless you need some relationship advice, they do offer some great advice in that field.

The Crypto Babes

Highly Qualified Crypto Coach. Contact Me For Lessons.
I challenge you to go to any Telegram crypto based chat and tell me that you can’t find one of these “Crypto Babes”. They’re everywhere. What’s more is they’ll have the fakest sounding names like Casey Cales or Jennifer Janetson. And surprise surprise, their English is more broken than your Kazakh uncle’s English.
These scammers steal these images from some Instagram accounts to be used in their con jobs. All you have to do is a reverse image search and you’ll likely find the account.
They’re one of the easiest con jobs to spot. And even with that, you still get quite a few chumps out there are being relieved of their crypto. It makes sense to see a a lot of scammers go this route, sex sells and there are no shortage of desperate, foolish guys out there willing to take the bait.

The Sleazy Promoters

I Have This Money Right Here To Give You, Friend. Follow Me And It’s All Yours, Promise. Photo By Anete Lusina
Those guys mostly dwell on Twitter. They have large followings which they’ve amassed through their lies. For example, they’ll say they’re giving away $100 to those who follow, like and retweet their tweet. Except, they’re all liars. If you look at their feed, it’s full of tweets like that. That’s how they get these large followings without giving back anything.
How do I know they’re probably lying? Because non of them actually post about any winners. Why wouldn’t you do that? It would at least provide some legitimacy wouldn’t it? But then again, they don’t really have to, since nobody seems to ever question what they’re doing.
Here’s what one of these tweets usually look like:

Now it’s not to say that every single one of these people are liars, there has to be one or two in a thousand that are honest. But, from what I’ve mostly seen, they’re not legit. Furthermore, their accounts don’t offer any value whatsoever. But that’s to be expected from twitter. I have yet to see any “influencer” account on there that actually offers any sort of value to its users. It’s like finding a needle in a haystack.
In any case, if you follow one of those people. Know that you’re just a number being used to grow their account so they can profit from it.

The Oracles

I See…Ummph…I S…I See Bitcoin at $50,000,000 Per Coin!
We haven’t touched on the supernatural side of the crypto world. Yes, there is a supernatural side to it. How, you ask? In case you haven’t been around communities much, you’ll find that there are an incredible amount of mediums. Indeed, when they’re not helping the FBI solve crimes or finding missing bodies, mediums tend to gravitate towards the crypto world.
And it makes sense! What better way to use your God given gift than to share with others what you believe a coin’s price will be in exactly one to five years from now. Truly astonishing!
Okay, the truth is, most of the price predictions you find in Telegram chats are pulled straight out of that person’s ass. For example, they’ll proclaim that Bitcoin- currently priced at $20,000 will go to $100,000 in two months. Their logic? Screw logic, they have seen it in their vision! It’s quite comical watching these guys in action. I do recommend it.
On the flip side, there are a few who actually do their homework and quite adept at TA. They offer good reasoning behind why they believe a coin will hit a certain price. So listening and considering what they have to say isn’t always a bad thing.

The Moon Boys

LEEEEEEEET’S FUCKIN’ GO!
The Moon Boys are the “Alpha dudes” of the Crypto scene. They’re quite easy to spot. In every crypto project chatroom, you’ll have a bunch of them that belong to a sort of wolf pack. A brotherhood that was formed from being overly available regulars in these chatrooms. Their sudden appearance is most distinctive when the crypto of their choice has gone up at the very least 5% in price and that’s when the fireworks and celebrations break out.
The chat room almost instantly erupts with the celebratory war cries of the Moon Boys. Rocket & moon emojis, pictures of mansions, Lambos and half naked women paint the walls of the chat. While phrases like “LET’S FUCKIN’ GO!”, “LAMBO TIME BITCHES”, and “YACHT PARTY WITH HOES ON ME!” are echoed loudly through the chat. They’ll confidently tell you how XRP is going to $1000 and Doge to $50. But heed this warning, if you offered up some sort of reasonable mathematical refutation as to why that’s impossible, be ready to open yourself up to abuse or a disturbing revelation involving your mom and the moon boy being your dad and that you shouldn’t speak out of line.
Moon boys are so wild, you can almost feel the testosterone popping right out of your mobile screen. They’re what you’d get if Jordan Belfort had a baby with a Call of Duty player.
But as with any party, it eventually and sadly has to end. In most cases when it becomes evident that the coin price isn’t going higher than 5%, Moon boys retreat back to their stations. Waiting. Until the next time when there are signs that their coin is about to pump and another party needs to break out. Such is the life of a Moon boy.
Alright. I know what you’re thinking, this article makes it look like it’s all bad out there. The good news is no, it’s not all bad. There’s some decent people I’ve met along the way who I’ve learned a lot from. And, a lot of normal folks just grinding it out day by day. Unfortunately, the bad apples do take much of center stage and make the most noise. But, pretty much like any noise, when you’ve heard it enough times, you eventually learn to ignore it.
Be safe out there!

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I am a crypto related writer on Medium.com. My work is 100% free and hopefully provides value to those who are new to the crypto space. If you enjoy / like my work, please consider supporting with a tip. Thank you very much!

Image by Storyset on Freepik
Since we’re smack dab right in the middle of a Crypto Bear Market, what better time is there to talk about some of the mistakes that traders make during what is supposed to be a huge buying opportunity. Still, inexperience and bad decisions among the many will reign supreme and cautionary tales have to be acknowledged.
Over the years I’ve seen some people make massive blunders that have wiped out their portfolios, and while some of the errors I’ve outlined below are not so dire, they represent missed opportunities to accumalate during a time when you’re supposed to be accumalating. And, if you’re not doing that, you’re wasting your time.
So without further ado, here are 4 big mistakes that you may be making in a Bear market.
Note that I am not involved in Margin Trading — the following article is related to spot traders
They Don’t Let Their Crypto Work For Them

You’re holding strong and you’re feeling good about it. Your crypto portfolio is down by 90% but it doesn’t phase you — people around you are losing their heads. You on the other hand? Ice cold. What you do know is that you won’t sell and give these damn whales the satisfaction. Great. That’s the right attitude. Except, what‘s your crypto doing for you while you continue to hold through the long Crypto Winter?
If you’re just holding your crypto and nothing else, you’re losing out. Put it to work! A lot of exchanges have staking programs which lock up your crypto for a number of days usually 30/60/90/120 and you gain a specified Annual Percentage Rate (APR). Obviously you’ll wanna go with projects that give the highest possible APR. The point is, since you plan to hold long term, let your crypto earn for you in the meantime. Don’t just keep it in your wallet and sleep on it.
But, you have to keep in mind that locked staking does come with risks. You could be staking X coin for 30 days and it’s price could increase or decrease, and since your crypto is locked, you won’t be able to sell even if you wanted to.
A good practice is to determine a price target you’d only sell at for each coin and a time estimate on when you think that could happen and just stake accordingly.
For example, Think that that X coin might reach $500 in 120 days? Stake it for 90 days or less just to be on the safe side. I’ve bought a lot of Crypto so far with money I’ve earned staking. Not letting your crypto work for you during a Bear market is simply wasteful.
On the other hand, if having your crypto locked up for a set amount of time doesn’t sit right with you, you can always choose the savings option. The APR is much less though, but your Crypto can be redeemed any time incase you wanna sell and at least you’re gaining something during a long hold.

2. They Take Profit Too Early

Coins losing 80–90% of their value does not come around every day. It’s an opportunity to buy very cheap coins and flip them later for huge profits.
And while people do recognize these opportunities and buy, they then turn around and sell for meager profits just as prices start moving up again — Big mistake!
Again, ridiculous discounts don’t come around often. If you sell too early, know that Bull Markets like Bear markets can last for months / years and the opportunity to buy at such a low price may not present itself for a long time.
For example, If Coin X was previously trading at $900 before it crashed down to $50, and you managed to grab a bunch. Selling and taking profit at $100 is would be leaving a lot of money on the table.
There are exceptions of course, you could sell, take profit and enter a more lucrative position that would have a better ROI in the long term or some sometimes life just throws curveballs where you need the cash. But, in general, it’s best to hold on for a bigger profits with coins that are obviously oversold.

3. They Allow Themselves To Be Manipulated By Liars

It’s one of the dirtiest tactics you’ll see in any crypto related social media setting. Prices crash and lose 80–90% of their value and you’ll get an army of manipulators coming out in droves to create FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt) and get emotionally reeling, inexperienced traders to save their Fiat and sell their Crypto, because the project is unlikely to recover.
Over the years, I can’t count how many times Bitcoin was pronounced dead only to shoot back up again.
Check out a lot of charts and you’ll see a ton of projects which seemingly looked dead shoot right back up.
The main idea behind this manipulation is to stir up the fear and amplify it so that more and more people continue to sell and Fudders would take advantage of even lower prices.
Always keep this in mind. Most people in the Crypto space, don’t give a shit if someone else is making or losing money. They’re concerned with themselves. So having a number of do-gooders pop up on the Telegram chat you frequent all of a sudden to advise you to sell because they care about and don’t want you to lose your money, is laughable. Don’t fall for it!

4. They Sell Their Crypto In A Crash

Unless You’re adept at TA (Technical Analysis), and you’ve mastered the art of knowing exactly when to sell when a crash happens so you end up buying more crypto later, don’t even try to attempt this.
Massive crashes can happen so fast and they’re absolutely brutal. If you don’t have the nerve which comes with experience to stay calm during the turbulence, you’re jeopardizing yourself big time by hitting that sell button.
What can happen is right after you sell into Fiat, there’s a rebound and prices start going back up again, leaving you stressing to get back in again and eventually buying back less amounts of the same coin you owned before — Had 30 Litecoins before? Well now you bought back in with 20 Litecoins. Excellent!
Learn to not react when blood is flowing in the streets and everyone is losing their heads. Look at crashes as an opportunity to buy. Never ever sell what you already have, and just deposit new money to the exchange and buy with that.

5. They Get Desperate To Profit And Make Bad Decisions

Let’s get one thing straight — holding and trading in Crypto is a long term battle of wills. You wanna make money, the biggest asset you have as a trader is patience. I can’t emphasize that enough.
You need to have patience and an iron will to succeed in Crypto otherwise desperation and frustration start to seep in. Many of the big players can throw obscene amounts of money on coins and just wait out months, sometimes even years to make big profits.
The average trader doesn’t have that luxury, they’re caught up in the idea of getting rich as soon as possible or earning a salary from trading and when reality sets in and they see straight line markets for the longest time, they get angry and frustrated and that’s when the emotions start to take over.
They start looking for any way profit. They’ll get involved in bullshit Pump and Dump groups. They’ll continue to trade when there isn’t much volatility. They’ll listen to horrible advice and buy shit coins that may end up being rug pulls (scams). They see some coins getting pumped and they sell some of their crypto and buy in only to have the price crash and they get stuck holding some shit coin for the longest time. There’s a plethora of bad decisions just waiting to be made by the desperate when the chips are down.
Always keep a cool head and know that by entering the Crypto space be ready to have your emotions and patience tested. Know that if you do act on a whim, you’ll likely get wrecked. Always try to rationalize and think through what you’re doing in terms of decisions made cause you’ll be making a lot of them.
In the end, It’s natural to make mistakes, that’s how we learn. Just make sure they’re not ones that end up wiping your portfolio out.
And remember — Never ever invest money you can’t afford to lose!
Good luck and stay strong!

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I am a crypto related writer on Medium.com. My work is 100% free and hopefully provides value to those who are new to the crypto space. If you enjoy / like my work, please consider supporting with a tip. Thank you very much!