Reading Time: 2 Minutes
Howdy everyone!
Hope we’re all settling into the new year.
Everyone’s heading back to work now (boooo!), you can see it written on our faces.
Depressed look.
It’s why we have to FIRE people! Get some of our time back to do the things we want to do.
Mini-rant over, I wanted to visit the crypto-market today as it’s been a while since the last update.
We all know what happened a couple of years ago, when crypto was on everyone’s lips.
And yes, we all know for every crypto-millioniare, there are hundreds, nay thousands, nay hundreds of thousands, who have lost their shirts investing gambling on them.
Myself included (read here).
But y’know… like a bad smell, crypto is refusing to go away.
What’s Happening?
There’s the usual shill-talk (that’s crypto lingo for scamming), and sensationalist headlines.
I think this is why the vast majority of us turn our noses at cryptocurrency. There’s too much BS and smoky mirrors to even consider dipping our toes in.
But y’know within this murky and unregulated world, some interesting developments are occuring.
Consolidation
Consolidation either through acquisition, such as VISA picking up a company called Plaid (mobile digital technology) for $5.3billion.
Or it’s been consolidation in the industry (there are over 3,000 cryptocurrencies), as the smaller players die off naturally due to lack of funds/interest/time/all of the above, leaving only the major players left.
Or consolidation in terms of real world uses, such as Ripple working with the banks or TRON partnering with tech firms.
There actually has been quite a bit of movement lately.
Time to Buy?
Shuttup TheFrugalSamurai and tell me if I can make MOONAY?!
To that question, I have no idea.
To me it still seems too damn risky. Which is why I have not put any more money into cryptocurrencies.
Chiefly because, I am conservative at heart, once bitten twice shy as they say.
Also, I still don’t understand enough about the underlying framework of cryptocurrency – the blockchain, but I do know that it has potential to change the world one day.
The Blockchain Potential
This view is also backed up by Linkedin, in this article.
“Blockchain has emerged from the once shadowy world of cryptocurrency to become a business solution in search of problems… The promise of blockchain — essentially a shared digital ledger — is huge…The business world, however, is voting with its jobs, and companies seem to be saying that the potential is worth the gamble. Blockchain has become a line of business for a who’s who of the corporate world — IBM, Oracle, JPMorgan Chase, Microsoft (LinkedIn’s parent company), Amazon, and American Express, to name just a few. Blockchain is now being used in industries ranging from shipping to healthcare, from farming and food safety to entertainment and gaming”.
What to do?
If you’re like me, still learning as I go along, it might be easier to try to get your head around the blockchain, and then work from there.
But if that’s too hard, there’s no point punting on cryptocurrency.
Give it a miss altogether, there’s plenty of other asset classes to invest in.
Because fundamentally, this arena is no place for the faint-hearted.
Don’t just take it from me, these are the words of the co-founder of the cryptocurrency which I invested in:
“Are you people stupid or what? You didn’t get rich and you lost money, crypto markets are in the toilet and now you’re all hypocrites complaining about the same stuff you demanded when things were different”.
Ouch!
Did you enjoy this post? If yes, put your email in and click on the little “subscribe” button at the top right. So come on, be a subscriber and get it straight to your inbox fresh out of the oven!
Or you can follow me here:
https://twitter.com/frugal_samurai
https://www.facebook.com/thefrugalsamurai/
