I am not a financial guy, I've never invested in the stock market, and I don't have a large portfolio of assets kicking around on some mid-level managers commision. Quite the opposite. I'm paying student loans, a car payment, dentist bills and monthly expenses... I'm part of a large portion of Americans who would be financially fucked if an emergency came up. (That being said, this is not investment advice.)
Cryptocurrency investment
Still, I managed to scrape together enough to buy a Ledger Nano S and my first Bitcoin on Coinbase. The fees were pretty high, I put in an initial $25 and the fees were around $3, because I payed with my card rather than linking my bank account. In the future, I plan on waiting the week for Coinbase to authorize a bank transfer, instead of losing a percentage for instant-buy card transactions.
![WP_20171117_22_28_10_Pro[1].jpg](https://images.ecency.com/p/EEEoA8oLaAxvDZG9qYrsSvDqYeABF1GqkXYm2VenKCupFHwfMr2YM9Boz4UDLsdo9iiArxcMBNRAKfQmrf9tNgLpo9bVqTFC3uQCNyoL6FZap29s4ShrfdSVWZgGjVAFkvbjv2PPiEDrhTjJJmm1g.png?format=match&mode=fit)
My intention was to move my Bitcoin onto the Ledger wallet, but the transaction cost brought me down to $20. So I figured I would gamble it away on the exchanges. So I moved everything to Bittrex (way back, when they were accepting new registrations).
As I mentioned, I'm no trader... but I am willing to learn. So, DTube and YouTube taught me only a few things:
research before you purchase - it's a better play to buy into a company you have done due diligence on and find valuable, rather than buy on hype or price
diversify your portfolio - don't hold one asset and expect it to always go up, pick a few assets and expect them to balance each other out
dollar-cost-average - buy in at regular intervals regardless of price, and take profits when you want
My First Trades
After a few minutes of looking around, I settled on a few coins that I thought had real value (that value being: Ledger compatibility) and bought in. Ripple(XRP), Einsteinium(EMC2), and Cardano(ADA) took my crypto-virginity. My excitement nearly got the best of me, I watched the price tickers move for hours.
Back and forth, up and down.
Then Ripple tanked 2000satoshi. I was emotional.
Then Einsteinium dropped, and I almost cried.
A trusty YouTube personality had made a comment that I remembered:
"Don't make emotional trades. Just log off, and walk away." - sorry, I forgot who said it
Sage advice sir.
I came back several hours later, both were back up, and my holdings were even above the $25 I'd initially paid. Score!
Overnight, Cardano blew up over 3x, I have been a dirty-altcoin-whore ever since.
Currently, I've invested a total of $100USD and my portfolio is indeed diversified.