In early November of 2017, I brought home a little paycheck from my small part-time job. Unsure what to do with it, I began searching for options. This was going to be my last paycheck for a while (my job is seasonal), so I wanted to do something different with it. I stumbled upon a small investment opportunity that everyone had been talking about: BitCoin.
So many people over the last couple of days had been bringing this topic up in conversations. The Wall Street Journal had posted an article on it (No. I didn't read it). I even had a professor lecture on how it was the future and suggested that all students try to get in on it.
It took me forever to figure out. After watching a slew of videos on “blockchain,” “cryptocurrency,” and “e-wallets,” I decided that I’ve got nothing to lose and invested my entire $88 paycheck into Bitcoin.
I bought the currency for around the rate of $8,000 per coin. Then I transferred the coins to a virtual wallet. After buyer's fees and another fee for moving the currency to a wallet, I found myself the proud owner of .01099318 BitCoins.
It's just as underwhelming as it sounds. I owned such a small fraction of a single coin that it was honestly disappointing. What really hurt were the fees. I ended up paying about $10 in flat fees and over 10% of my portfolio was gone.
After just buying a stock, it's always fun to track it, and as usual, it was incredibly boring. Eventually, I forgot about it and let the stock grow on its own.
A short month later, I finished reading up on another Wall Street Journal article about BitCoin’s rise. I told myself I was going to sell once the stock hit $20,000 per coin, but I balked and missed my opportunity to bail. The price continued to rise and rise and I got a little overconfident.
After sitting above $20,000 for only a short period of time, the price plummeted. My portfolio was up to $160 and I thought I could come away doubling my original investment, but the market had other plans.
I waited a couple more weeks and held onto the hope that it would rise again. I ended up waiting too long however and was able to sell for only $15,000 per coin. However, I had to move the coin back to the seller, costing a fee. Then, I incurred a seller’s fee and had to pay even more.
In the end, I walked away with $120. A shade above 33% gain. I'm pretty happy with how it panned out, but I acknowledge that I may have made some costly mistakes. If I were to do it again, I’d not move the currency to a wallet, but just keep it on the account of a currency converter or I’d have invested more so that the flat fees would have become less significant. I don't regret my investment and never did; however, I don’t recommend trying to invest in crypto in the market’s current state.
