Recently, a reader informed me that a bogus Instagram account had been created in my name, with the perpetrator reaching out to others to promote a cryptocurrency scheme. Despite not being a prominent influencer, I found it somewhat flattering that the scammer believed I was significant enough to be incorporated into their fraudulent activities.
Ironically, as someone who shares various methods of earning additional income, including opening new credit cards and bank accounts to capitalize on signup bonuses, I can understand how my interests could be misinterpreted and associated with cryptocurrency investments.
So, in the interest of completeness, let me make things clear. I will never recommend crypto! I have personal objections to it, including the following:
- I think it’s a terrible use of energy and resources (Bitcoin, for example, uses more energy than entire countries).
- It has no value beyond speculative value – i.e. the only reason you are buying crypto is with the hope that someone else will pay more for it later.
- I don’t like how it seems rife with scams and how inherently, much of crypto seems designed to prey on the uninformed and desperate (for example, see the case of the “Cryptoqueen,” who scammed investors out of $4 billion and then disappeared).
Needless to say, if you ever see me promoting crypto or some crypto exchange, you should assume I’ve been hacked or someone has created a fake account of me.
But even beyond my personal objections to crypto, the fact is, for almost everyone, the inherent risk that comes with crypto simply isn’t needed. Indeed, for almost everyone, doing anything outside of normal investing and saving isn’t necessary.
Crypto gets its allure from how much you can seemingly make from it – it’s like winning the lottery if you get in at the right time. And while we all want to hit home runs, the truth is, we don’t need home runs to win at most things in life.
You Don’t Need Crypto To Win At Investing
Investing is a critical aspect of personal finance, and it’s an activity that can help individuals build wealth over time. However, there is often a lot of confusion and misinformation surrounding investing, particularly when it comes to newer financial products such as cryptocurrency.
Many people believe that investing in cryptocurrency is essential for a successful investing career, but this is not necessarily true. Even if cryptocurrency turns out to be the best investment option, there are still plenty of other investment opportunities available to investors that can help them build wealth over the long term.
One common misconception about investing is that it’s all about finding that one stock or cryptocurrency that will make you rich. Many people have seen articles about how much money they could have made if they had invested in Apple or Amazon stock early on or how much their Bitcoin would be worth now if they had invested thousands of dollars in it when it was still worth almost nothing. These stories can create the impression that investing is all about striking it rich with one lucky investment, but this is not the case.
Successful investing is not about finding that one needle in the haystack that will make you rich overnight. Instead, it’s about creating a diversified portfolio of investments that can help you build wealth over the long term. This means investing in a variety of assets, such as stocks, bonds, real estate, and perhaps even cryptocurrency, depending on your risk tolerance and investment goals.
While it’s true that some people have made a fortune by investing in cryptocurrency or picking the right stock at the right time, these individuals are the exception rather than the rule. For most people, the key to success in investing is to focus on building a well-diversified portfolio and investing for the long term.
In conclusion, while investing in cryptocurrency can be an exciting and potentially lucrative opportunity, it’s not necessary for a successful investing career. Investing is all about building a diversified portfolio that can help you build wealth over the long term, and there are plenty of other investment opportunities available to investors besides cryptocurrency. By taking a disciplined and long-term approach to investing, you can increase your chances of achieving your financial goals and securing your financial future.
Winning At Investing Is A Long Game
Investing isn’t a get-rich-quick scheme. It’s a long game – and the formula to win is pretty simple. Here’s how you win with money (at least when it comes to investing and saving money).
1. Buy Index Funds And Do It For A Long Time. Buying index funds isn’t as glamorous as someone saying they’re a millionaire because they invested in Bitcoin back in 2010 (how many people even fit in this category?).
But buying index funds (things like the Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund or Vanguard S&P 500 Index Fund) is about as safe a bet as you can get when it comes to investing your hard-earned money. And importantly, it’s all you really need to do.
Ignore the stuff you see from influencers on YouTube or Tik Tok. Those are distractions that are designed to take your money. You don’t need any of that.
2. Keep Costs Low. Beyond investing correctly, the next most important thing is to keep your costs low. Fortunately, these days, it’s so easy to invest in low-cost index funds that it baffles me why anyone would invest in anything else more expensive.
If you need convincing on this point, you should read John Bogle’s The Little Book of Common Sense Investing. It makes the case for index funds and low-cost investing in a far more convincing manner than I ever could. The book is so short and easy to read you can read the whole thing in a day. If you read that book and still think you’re smarter than Bogle, then I don’t really know what to say.
3. Create Or Build Your Own Assets. Finally, if you do want to take risks and have some more fun with your investments, don’t give your money away to make someone else rich. Instead, put your money into creating your own businesses or assets. Things like a business or real estate can have huge, outsized returns with the added advantage that they are things with value that you control.
I think this is the much better way to go for home runs if going for home runs is something you simply have to do. Instead of investing and hoping things go your way, you can use your money to create something that is in your hands.
Sure, there’s no guarantee that your business will work out, but if boring investing isn’t enough for you, then this is what I recommend. If things don’t work out, at least you tried and had some control over whether you succeeded or failed.
Final Thoughts
We’ve all fallen for the myth of overnight success. All it takes is one lucky break to make it big.
Interestingly enough, it’s the way I thought about this blog for a long time. I thought the secret to blogging was getting discovered by some big publication. If just somehow, some big newspaper would notice me, this blog would make it big.
It turns out that’s not how you make it with most things in life. It’s not about that one big win. It’s about consistently putting in the work and having the patience to keep going over the long term. It’d be great if we could win the lottery or find that diamond in the rough. But that’s not really how the world works.