Do You Envy Those Who Got Rich on Bitcoin?

By envy i mean i am happy for them but i have a massive regret feeling of why da faq didnt i jump on this earlier

Bitcoin is now worth ~$40,000 USD (~$51,000 AUD) - I cant help but feel like a missed out on the ultimate golden ticket in which bitcoin started a $0.08 USD ($0.11 AUD)

I know a few people that sold out around- the $10,000-20,000 AUD mark and are now kicking themselves

But for me personally i am just like the ultimate missed opportunity - I am someone who plays the lottery, home raffles, takes a guess on speculative shares etc Not once has it ever paid off.

But the biggest gains in history has slipped right past me and i cant help but feel shattered ….

I guess a lot of people dont mind and good on you, perhaps I can learn a lesson for that thanks.

Comments

  • -1

    Do You Envy Those Who Got Rich on Bitcoin?

    No.

  • +1

    I sold my my doge coin at 0.004 aud July 2020, it has now 9000% since then, ah well

    • It will be 2600%

      .0104/004

      • oh woops i don't know where i got that from haha

  • +1

    "But the biggest gains in history has slipped right past me and i cant help but feel shattered ….

    Im getting a lot of boomer (esq) comments on slow gains index funds/EFTs etc trying to give text book investor advice - ill just add this if you keep doing the same save s**t with your money then your going to be lurking on OzB for the $2 cashback deals, driving your boring Corolla, living in a suburb no one has heard of for the rest of your life."

    This is probably good advice. One person always wins the lotto but that doesn't mean you should base your FOMO or expectations on winning it. Likewise you could with the risk get rich on something like bitcoin, however solid investing on companies, ETFs even are a tried and tested method of the right amount of risk for a reasonable reward.

    I'm assuming youa pretty young person and like all inexperienced 'speculators' you haven't learnt the difference between gambling/speculation and actual investing. BItcoin, dodge coin and all these get rich quick schemes aren't the 'norm'. and each generation has these pump and dumps and yes, a heap of people get rich, but the 'everyday' persons - i.e. most likely you, are left holding the bags when/if people exit.

    Sometimes experience is the best teacher, and those above words will mean something to you when you look back, OR if you are lucky you will be filthy rich.

    But there is a cognitive bias and it certainly holds true - where sometimes the right decision does not appear . Had you struck it with bitcoin it still doesn't mean an opinion/decision saying to avoid it was not the wrong one,as on the balance of all outcomes (unknown and those that did not eventuate) it could have been 999 times out of 1000 been a bad outcome, but you ended up with #1. Just remember, one person always wins the lotto, the other millions dont.

    Edit: for some perspective think about what you are getting with a $40 000 coin vs $50000? Now think about buying a business, and what the price going up means when you pay for it. One leaves you with a productive asset, and another a means of transacting, And I certainly would much rather be buying productive assets than bidding up the price of the transaction method used for it.

    • You are not a speculator if you understood the potential years back, you are ahead of the curve.

  • Bitcoin has gone up again! I only had $20 for free via an offer with Celsius (worth $29 after 2 weeks) I have to follow a Udemy course to understand better how it all works. Who knows, might still be able to make a bit of money!

  • Say you FOMO'd and bought bitcoin when every man and his dog was talking about it back in 2018 and it was at like $18k USD. Would you have had the nerve to hold on to it when it was pretty much hovering at $4k-$6k range over the next couple years?

    • +3

      Don't forget March 2020, where bitcoin fell 50% within a few days. It's easy to look back with hindsight and say 'of course it was going to come back!'

    • True believers with diamond hands held.

  • +6

    Having more money doesn't necessarily equate to a better quality of life. Being happy with what we have is a more efficient way to live IMHO.

    • Well, money helps lol

    • Until you need elective surgery to solve a chronic pain situation and have to wait three years for the public system.
      Or you live somewhere when the rent goes up, or you get a short amount of notice that you have to move out of your house and the rental market is so tight you might not find somewhere before you have to leave.

      Money doesn't equal happiness, but a certain level of it, being able to buy a house, being able to afford top-tier health insurance, being able to pay $30K for 'elecitive' surgery, or $220 a session for a psychologist are things that take a lot of pain, stress and struggle out of life.

    • Money allows you to experience more happiness

  • +1

    In hindsight we would all do things differently. But no one gets a remake. I do sympathise with OP, I personally deleted a lot of Bitcoin in 2010 (enough to have been a multi-millionaire by now), and am now sitting on half a Bitcoin after finding out I really don't have a future in day trading. BUT, I'm still way ahead in real terms! Sure I wish I was sitting on the thousands I had in 2010, or the few I had in 2015. I won't be getting rich quick on a lucky guess. But I am learning to take some risks and spread my bets, and don't follow other people's ideas but to back myself instead.

  • i still remember when bitcoin was free..pretty much given away

  • +1

    Crypto is just gambling, no fundamentals at all

    • Agree.

      There are few types of crypto investors:

      1) Libertarians who love the decentralised non-government control aspect
      2) Speculators who think they understand the technology and are genuinely convinced it will change the world. In my experience they may understand deeply how the tech works, but have no real idea how it would actually be useful in a business. Smart contracts my ass.
      3) Regulars who see quotes from speculators in news reports and assume they must know what they are talking about. So they also invest for a quick buck.
      4) Gamblers who are convinced they can predict the swings on alt coins and day trade them. Always celebrating their big wins, forgetting their constant small losses. And probably dont properly report any earnings they actually do make.
      5) Criminals who like the anonymity or who see plenty of targets in the gullible dabbling in the technology.

      Crypto is an interesting idea and the blockchain technology is also interesting. However, there really isnt a demonstrable commercial application for the coins out there that makes any of them worth what people are putting into it. It really is gambling at this point in time.

      • What does Elon Musk fall under?

        • +1

          1 probably.

          Maybe 4. I mean maybe he's just hoping this will be an easy way to give a boost to the Tesla bottom line if he can reap a profit by pumping and dumping. But i doubt it, it's probably 2) as he thinks he's smarter than everyone.

        • +3

          Mostly 4. The difference with Musk is that he's so influential that all he has to do is buy it and tell people that he's bought it and it appreciates in value - so it's not really gambling.

        • I imagine 1 as well.

          Hard to leave $14billion in the bank when the government can manipulate currency, and laws at it's will. He's always clashing with lawmakers, eg the FAA with SpaceX, California's lockdown rules shutting down the fremont factory.

          The free market can decide bitcoins 'value', and he still get's more EV's out the door.

          The richest dude in the world never had a desire for more money. I can't recall any of his past actions which had profit motives, if anything he's constantly risking bankruptcy to see his plans achieved.

      • +1

        Lmao what an uneducated comment.

        Which bucket do Stan Druckenmiller and Ray Dalio fall in then?

        • -1

          Well my categories were in jest, as was the Elon comment.

          But on Stan "I do own some of it," he said in a recent episode of Talks with Goldman Sachs. "It's gone up a lot since I bought it. It's just sort of a plaything. I don't really believe in it. I don't really not believe in it. It could be a new asset class. The answer is - I don't know." https://markets.businessinsider.com/currencies/news/stanley-…

          And Ray "To reiterate, as I am not a Bitcoin/cryptocurrency expert, I believe my views are not valuable enough to be relied on so I shouldn’t put them out." and "Bitcoin looks like a long-duration option on a highly unknown future that I could put an amount of money in that I wouldn’t mind losing about 80% of."- https://www.bridgewater.com/research-and-insights/ray-dalio-…

          Dont just blindly follow billionaires 'investments' as most of them will readily tell you. Part of what they like is that it keeps going up, and they also readily admit they dont really understand it.

          So Stand and Ray probably fall in a bit of buckets 1 and 4. Although perhaps not quite as pompously as i've described those catagories above which was in jest.

          • @modiika: People who are downvoting this comment need to calm down their little crypto insecurities. This is a reasonable post.

    • If you DYOR, there are plenty of fundamentals, and is starting to become more and more adopted by business, government and individuals

      But I always laugh when I see "bitcoin is just a gamble", "its not real", "there are no fundamentals", "its the modern day Tulip"….because at the end of the day, the ones who are invested are making a shit tonne of REAL money to buy REAL things, with little more than a few clicks of a mouse

      • -1

        If you DYOR,

        A phrase that is rings alarms bells as much as i've done my own research in relation to any conspiracy theory out there. It's exactly what anti-vaxers and flat earthers say.

        What are the ever increasing uses out there? Excluding the darkweb.

        Are there countries or cities where we have seen mainstream adoption of Bitcoin as a currency? My memory is that its volitiatliy has meant retailers have given up using it as a currency. What industries has it started to become adopted in as a key technology for a product or service?

        Even if you believe in everything about crypto, the specific coin you buy is a gamble, because its not clear which will take off. The people making money seemingly are speculators who buy one crypto and jump out and buy another trying to predict where the wave will be.

        with little more than a few clicks of a mouse

        this part of your comment really just makes is seem like you think its some get rich quick, fool proof thing. Just 3 clicks of your house. sell your house, put it all in, and sell in 3-5 years time and retire. It's so simple its fool proof.

        But your right its very easy to buy crypto as long as you dont mind trusting dodgy exchanges, or gouging exchanges.

  • +4

    If it was easy OP, then everyone would be rich. I'd argue that everything is gambling. Everything is luck. Just hope one day you're lucky, if not you die like the rest anyway.

    Hard not to feel like you missed out, but that's normal to feel like that.

    I have no good advice, because I FOMO, and no advice I say to myself makes me feel any better other than saying, "Damn!" 100 times a day.

    • +1

      Great comment exactly how I feel

      • +1

        Try to think ahead many years. Would you be worried about this on your death bed, or that you missed out on Tesla shares or CSL or what have you?

        • -1

          Death bed money means fuk all

          But it is the life you live lead up to that point - ie spending it working 40+ hours a week till fukn 67 or retire in your 40s and live life to its fullest

          Money doesn't make you happy it is what money can buy that makes you happy whilst you have the time to utilise it

          • @Trying2SaveABuck:

            retire in your 40s

            What if I can give you an example of this (and even earlier), without needing to have made it big in Bitcoin?

            • -1

              @ihbh: Well good luck if thats you im 30 now and i can see the next 10 years being anything other then 50 hours weeks unless i win the 20m this Saturday

              • +1

                @Trying2SaveABuck: Leave your partner/kids etc. Move into a share house. Live on 20% of your after tax income. Invest the rest.

                In 10 years, you should have enough to retire on, assuming you are happy to continue living in share houses.

                Not real advice.

  • +1

    At least you wouldn't feel as bad as this guy

    "A man who threw away a laptop hard drive containing bitcoin he believes is now worth about £210m wants his council to let him search for it in landfill." - https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-55658942

    My hard luck story is a guy from school telling me he made a profit buying BTC at $4 and selling at $50. I considered buying some but money was tight so didn't. Most people never even heard of it at the time.

  • No.

    Those who chose to gamble and won - congrats.

    Those who chose to gamble and have lost - that's the game you play.

  • Bought and sold a little btc over the years. It sucks not to have stuck it out but even with hindsight I don't think it would have been wise tale to say "you have stuck with bit coin" when there's that much money involved. It is still a ridiculous gamble without much foundation for real investment and I am happy to not have to look at the markets every hour to see if I lost everything yet.

    Those who stuck from the beginning to now probably won't let go for a long time yet. So while their wealth is increasing so is the time in the market…

  • Get on cardano it's headed up

    • Why being downvoted. I put 500 on the other day and it's up 200 already.

  • I don't envy them, but I do wish I bought some at $3500.

    Funny because I bought and sold at 10x that price and lost money from transaction fees.

    Also bought in December 2017 and sold when it crashed. Probably one of the very few that have lost money on BTC

    • For those who get rich on BTC, there are also people who lost on BTC (but you don't hear about them)

      I too also lost on BTC

  • +1

    Most people I know who dabbled in it sold as soon as they made a small to modest profit.

    Anyone who bought and held on long enough to make life changing money deserves it in my opinion. It's just like riding a rush at the tables in the casino, at some point in time you will go on a rush and win 10 hands in a row. If you have the balls to let it ride each time then you deserve to make a big windfall (as long as you also know the right time to leave)

  • -2

    I think everyone is missing the bigger picture here.

    Fact is, if I had 1 Dollar or 1 Billion dollars, I'd still be lurking on OzB.

  • +1

    no. i had 5 and cashed them out in 2019. put half back into other cryptos and its looking strong again. about to put some more into alt coins that show promise to have financial freedom within 5 years

  • +2

    Mate - there are many ways to get wealthy. If you want to do it likewise people, work hard, save money, invest wisely and retire with savings to enjoy the rest of your life.

    Or you can stress about what if scenarios. If I had just bought Tesla stock in Feb last year…..

    Worry only about what you can control or regret every step you didn't take and the road it might have led to…

  • no point being jealous, you can't live in the past, you can live in the present and start DCAing in now

  • Tesla is going to accept BitCoin as payment now for cars, that scary. The $40k -$50k will surely drop like it does every yr, post CNY if you look at the charts the past 3 yrs it spikes on the run up to CNY then drops just as fast. Think GameStop all over again but on repeat.

  • Yes, I envy them. Brought my bitcoins at $12 each many years ago. I envy the people who brought more than me.

    So don't worry about it. There'll always be people who've done better than you.

  • +2

    What's wrong with 'driving your boring Corolla, living in a suburb no one has heard of for the rest of your life'? Why does that bother you?

    Why are you on OzB if $2 cashback deals are an issue? Isn't that one of the things that this site is about?

    Bizarre

    • -1

      Nothing wrong with it

      But i dont take dieting advice from people that are obese… i dont take money advice from people that aren't rich.

      I asked a question, if people were jelly of not getting into what has been one of the ultimate money makers in history. Instead 90% of the comments i got a bunch of financial advice - and it isnt bad advice but it just have no need for it or tbh no interest in it im doing 'well' by an Australian standard as is….

      But as i say the world is much larger than Australia and Australia has very low standards for being wealthy…

      • +1

        You really sound like someone who will never find happiness. Sorry to say it.

        • +1

          …. if you think the amount of wealth one has determines happiness then im not the one with a problem….

          • @Trying2SaveABuck: that's exactly not what I'm talking about based on how you wrote the original post and replies.

            Be happy with what you have - whether it's a lot (which you're saying you have plenty of) or not much at all.

            If you're well off, and you had the balls to hold a BTC from 10cents, not sell it and hold it until now, then $50k isnt going to change your life in any meaningful way. This is a little baffling which is why it sounds like you'll just never be happy with what you have.

            • @csider: I never said anything about 'happiness' you make an assumption thats all ill say to that

      • yet here you are, posting on Ozbargain - a website that is predominantly about saving small amounts of money.

        Wow. Just wow.

    • exactly. people who are rich and stay rich are sensible with their money - they don't show it off by buying flashy cars and expensive houses in "desirable" suburbs.

      google "f**k you money" (John Goodman in The Gambler)

  • Fwiw you're still getting in early if you buy now. We are not even close to mass adoption. Almost half of the available Bitcoins aren't even in circulation yet.

    If you have weak hands then don't waste your time though.

    • +1

      Like 85% of bitcoin is currently in circulation.

  • +1

    "if you keep doing the same save s**t with your money then your going to be lurking on OzB for the $2 cashback deals, driving your boring Corolla, living in a suburb no one has heard of for the rest of your life."

    Most millionaires do exactly this. The people who have earned and are able to keep money are the ones who are not frivolous with it. They are the ones you live next to but don't know it, and are content and set for life.

    • Fair enough i guess i got a lot to learn

      thx op

  • please don’t tell this guy abouy gamestop lol!

    • This guy was part of GME and WSB

      But i made money on that so no FOMO

      • +4

        why are you in regret if you made money on gamestop which is 30x instead of bitcoin 2-3x?

        Can’t win everything in life mate!

        Be glad you didn’t lose like a lot of people…

        Remember this, money is nothing if you don’t have the health to live out your life!

  • Notice you never hear about anyone turning BTC into real dollars, wonder why..

    • +2

      Heaps of people have turned their bitcoin into real dollars, what are you on about?

    • aardvarks wtf u smoking bro? it is a pretty simple process….

      • Give us some places u go to withdraw from btc to Australian bank

        • Any ATM that accepts VISA will dispense fiat for crypto.

  • +3

    I put $1000 into crypto in 2016 - rode through the highs then the crash of 2018. I only invested (betted?) what I was prepared to lose so I wasn't fussed about the drop and just kept hodling.

    Just sold it all yesterday for $92k and that's gone straight into my home loan.

    I'm not gonna lie the payout is nice to have, but watching the ups and downs of the investment over the last 5 years has been incredibly fun and I am really going to miss that feeling of checking my portfolio every 20 minutes.

    • Congratulations i love a good news story

    • Just sold it all

      No 🚀 bag?

    • +1

      make sure you keep a chunk aside for CGT

    • You only put in 1k. That one time? Or you always kept putting in more?

      • Just the one time in eth and btc. ETH was $20 back then and btc about $900. Invested a couple of hundred into xrp not long after after that I'm still holding but that's it.

    • Sold too early. Bitcoin will be $500k within a few years.

      • BTC will slowly suck liquidity from the gold market. A 10% of the gold market is USD 58500 per BTC.

      • Quite possibly, but I'll just have to be content with my 9000% gains. I'm happy with the investment and returns regardless of what happens to the price in the future. We are looking to buy to a new house so this really helps right now.

  • +1

    I've been holding mine since 2013/14. It's not much but I'll sell once it gets to a mil

  • Trying to sell my coins anyone know which sites/apps I could withdraw to bank account

    • Swyftx it's Aussie

    • btcmarket

  • +2

    I did my research and concluded Bitcoin was the no brainer investment for me. Picked up a bunch of alt coins too. Big gamble yes but a calculated one for me. Not too concerned about volatility. Picked up more during the march crash (best sale of my life). Proud to be in before Michael Saylor and Elon Musk though!

    Larry Ellison of Oracle and Twitter next?

    Who knows..

    • +2

      Well done man

      credit where it is due ur a genius

    • +1

      Not too concerned about volatility. Picked up more during the march crash (best sale of my life).

      Never waste a good crisis.

  • -1

    If you want to 100x your money most horse races of the day offer that for a first four…..chuck a hundred on and its same $10k as getting in bitcoin at $500

    plus no cgt

    • Say no to the CUP.

      • They have the artificial horses now

  • You can get rich off cardano right now..

    • USD0.90 now. Easily 2x from here this year and i'm serious.

      • +1

        Imagine shilling your bags on a bargain website lmao

        • That's fine. We'll see.

          • -1

            @Tiredman: I'm not saying it won't go up or it will go down, just find it funny you're shilling your bags to these poor ozbargainers lmao. There's nothing to "see" except for the pure fact you are shilling a coin that has been one of the average performing of this bull market where even the shittiest shitcoin has 2-5x.

            It's fair to say you can get rich off other coins apart from bitcoin but shilling cardano on ozb just because you own it is low. There's no "easily' in crypto it could be bloodbath in one day and cardano back to few months ago price.

Login or Join to leave a comment