Topic originally posted in CryptoCurrency by Psychology_Club [link]
TL; DR: I invested with loan money, gained a lot, lost a lot, scammed, crashed, got even, profited again. Therefore, prepared a "Do and Do Not List" for you. Enjoy the ride.
First, I want to give a background, a context to the whole list. So, here's a long background.
BACKGROUND
I started to learn about the tech right after 2017 ATH (Because in 2012 I read the Bitcoin whitepaper & comments about it and thought "Nah, it's not gonna change the world; it could but it won't" and lost interest as time passes. The last time I heard about BTC price, it was about $200 and in 2017 I heard it again as $20k. I was shocked and immediately started to read again). At first, I only read. Read a lot. Everyday I woke up thinking "I was so dumb yesterday." Then started to engage in "Crypto Twitter" because I knew nothing about trading at the time; even order types or order book were new to me. Unfortunately, people were in euphoria - they were simply buying shitcoins randomly; even I was able to notice the irrational madness - and didn't learn much about trading at the time so I thought "Okay, let me start with a couple bucks first, it's a decent price for an education about trading" and decided to learn from the experience. Started with a local exchange and bought $100 of ETH. Notice that this action was performed in hope of "an expensive lesson." I thought "$100 isn't that much to learn one or two lessons about trading." Unfortunately, gained ~%50 at first few trades. Moved another $200 into crypto "so I can test it better with bigger numbers." Unfortunately, gained another ~%40 of my whole portfolio in a few trades. I was impressed by the gains and the amount of time & effort I spent for such gains. By the time, I was able to learn a few things and felt a bit confident so decided to throw another $2k into crypto. Unfortunately, by day-trading, my whole portfolio was doubled under 2 weeks.
I hope you're able to see why these are unfortunate events even tho I profit so much. IMO, success after success is one of the worst things to happen to a newcomer. I felt sMaRt and thought "Aight, I'm able to get things done."
I knew that you shouldn't invest with loan money long before that time but I just thought "with these gains, I'm able to cover the loan in a few weeks." So, I soothed myself with phrases like "If you wanna get your financial freedom you have to take risks. Here lies the opportunity. You are single and able to take the risk." Got a loan from the bank, worth 6 months of my monthly salary and put it into crypto. Gained a few, lost a bit more and - then again - gained some more. At the time, figured that if I use much more money, I can cover the loan even quickier and have more decent profit (oh, greed). Since I'm being a succesful trader and a genius, immediately gave the idea a go and had a chat with my mother about how I gained so much in a short time. Since she always trusted me, she lend me 1 year worth of my monthly salary. I was dreaming about surprising her with a new car which she needed for the past 2 years (sorry mom). I started to trade and did a few mistakes, lost a bit but learnt my lessons and gained more. Shortly after, I got lost in trading because I was making decent profit. Before work, after work, sometimes during work and whole night I was trading with little percentage profits. I was happily giving my whole time because in my understanding of the concept of money, money = time. I was creating time for future me. And already had a trading plan before getting loans: Double the principal money, cash out the principal money and go on trading with the profit without the unnecessary risks. Flawless plan.
Of course I didn't stick to the plan. After the principal money doubled, brilliant me just thought "Hey, you are making money and came all the way. Why stop there and start all over again, just go along. Your goal is closer than ever." By the time, I was getting better and better at trading. Of course I made some mistakes but those never hurt too much because I learnt to manage the risk, learnt the principals of technical analysis and always covered the lost. Set daily percentage goals and stopped after hitting the goals. Eventually, I decided it was wise to go all in.
My portfolio became bigger and bigger; had ~11x of my original portfolio. I lost my original goal and started to dreaming about retiring in my twenties. And, with some courage I dived all in altcoins. At that time, I knew that there is gonna be a huge drop in BTC price but - of course - I would be able to manage the crisis. Because I just needed another 2x of my whole portfolio and I could gain it on those shitcoins. At the time, there was just one day that I wasn't available to check the prices but I trusted my analysis and didn't even had a stop. That day, BTC dipped to 6k and my whole portfolio dropped ~%50. It was still ~5x of my principal money but I couldn't accept the loss and all my precious lessons are forgotten. I stopped trading (with fear of a huge rise in my shitcoins) and repeated to myself "If I don't sell, I won't lose money." My shitcoins contiuned to drop and eventually I was back at my principal money. That was the first time I faced the truth about me; I was greedy. At this point, I just told myself "Okay, now you must wait for the next bull run. Be patient and faithful." Right after two weeks of that decision I got scammed with a phishing attack. I mean, PHISHING ATTACK! I felt miserable, dumb and despairing. I was at %50 of my principal money and was too afraid to take action. In time, it dropped to %10 of my principal money because shitcoins never stopped to drop. While these happening, I met love of my life who is now my wife and got married. I was already decided to never spend the money in crypto but it was really hard to explain "why we are not spending that money while we need it." Also it was hard to explain it to my mother or telling her "be patient." Both my mother and my wife were extremely understanding with me yet the whole process was hard to take. They never understood the concept of crypto; it was only their respect and support towards me.
Finally, the last bull season started and I saw some gains. After reaching my principal, told my wife and mother that "we are OK." Then things went well while I'm still not trading and still had decent profit. Nowadays, I'm aware of my greedy side and I build my plans while considering it. Always sticking to the plan. Cashed out after reaching the goal. Gonna start to trading at some point in future again.
DO's:
- Always set your final goal before the trading. Once you reach the goal, don't hesitate or change your mind. Stick to the plan. Always.
- Always use "stop-loss." It doesn't have to be automated, you can do it manually. A "Stop-Loss" means "If the price drops/rises to "that" point, my technical analysis was wrong and I need to make a new plan." Use stop-loss or else.
- Have a trait for yourself with your profit to understand the power of those magic green numbers. It will help you to lower your greed.
- Always plan your trade before actually doing it; have your targets and stops. It will be hard (and most possibly inaccurate) planning after starting the trade.
- Always have a solid fundamental analysis. You need to know and understand what you are buying.
- Try to involve in new mechanics of the ecosystem. Real profit is lying there. Just be careful and do your fundamental analysis beforehand.
- Having steps to your final goal helps; regular cash outs can help you to maintain your principal money.
- Start with small money. You will lose small and learn big.
DO NOT's
- Ever, never, ever trade while drunk or stoned. You will definitely make huge mistakes at some point (lost %20 once, because of a simple mistake - missclick).
- Don't trust yourself too much, especially if you are a newcomer. We are in a bull run and everything goes up. You are not that smart. It's the trend.
- Don't trade against the trend.
- Never invest with a loan money. Its logic is in contradiction with the idea of investment.
- Never put more money than you can afford to lose. Before putting in money, assume "it's gone."
- Don't even consider margin trading before getting real professional. Even professionals get easily liquidated with margin. And this is crypto market. You don't even have a chance to get lucky multiple times.
- Don't trade an asset if you don't understand or know the fundamentals of it. It will lead you to fail.
- Don't presume about prices as "that's the dip, it can't go lower." There is no dip. It can always go lower.
- Don't get in FOMO or FUD. Those are your enemy. They will mislead you almost everytime.
- Don't stick to a coin unless you really did a perfect research and made your mind. Stick to the plan.
- Don't copy some internet peoples trades. Most possibly they will mislead you and make profit on you.
- Never join pump/dump groups. You will end up losing your money or becoming a bagholder.
- Don't even bother to buy trading robots. A real profitable trading robot won't be sold.
- Don't borrow money for investing (especially from your relatives). If you lose money, it will be extremely hard to explain "what really happened."
- Don't be greedy :) You will always be able to profit in this market unless you lose all your money.
I will add more when I have the time. Until then, with respect,
Buy Bitcoin.
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