Today we’re doing something a little different, talking with one of our readers, someone who has come out ahead through crypto investing — though not without some stomach churning reversals along the way.
Why it matters: Crypto is often spoken of as a democratizing opportunity, yet regular people seldom see the stories of non-professionals placing bets in the space. Here’s one.
Details: Canadian marketing technologist Darragh Grove-White is ahead, but not without taking some painful hits.
“I made a lot of mistakes, for sure. I’ve had crypto exchanges take my money,” he tells Axios.
He was one of many Canadians out of luck when the founder of the exchange QuadrigaCX, Gerald Cotten, died (?) in India.
State of play: Grove White is one of the lucky ones. According to his account, he has made a complete turnaround since Quadriga’s loss. He’s up around 11x on his principal, though there have been wild oscillations in that number recently.
Axios has verified the success of his portfolio.
The scoreboard: He has invested in over 180 coins, his first three purchases being bitcoin, Monero (a privacy coin — that trade is still down) and Verge, a coin with salacious affiliations.
“I have had a few that have done really well and even fewer that I knew would do really well,” he said.
The largest loss was caused by a token that was right in its idea (blockchain financing), but was wrong at the wrong time. His greatest win was his lucky guess as to which solution to Ethereum’s speed issues would be most popular with users.
Context: While he only got into crypto in 2018 (a bear market year), he had some advantages. He is a lot more technical than the average person, given his day job.
It has worked in his favor. He explained, “I’m just super curiosity.” In crypto, it’s not enough just to read and watch charts. A person needs to get in to understand it, he contends.
Be smart: He has been in the business for four years and sees new people arrive in waves. The new investors are easy to spot on Twitter and in the Discord channels — they are always looking for the quick buck.
He said, “This latest cohort of noobs was their on-ramp the Wall Street Bets experience.” “A lot of the n00bs go for meme coins. They make it seem a joke to invest in meme coins.
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