When Your Crypto Loses $40k in 24 Hours, Do This:

Obligatory Disclaimer: I am NOT a financial advisor, and none of this advice should be taken without speaking to a qualified professional first. Further, do NOT invest more than you’re willing to lose, and do your own research first.

Buy more. Simple as that.

A gut reaction from a lot of crypto investors right now is to sell, sell, sell. Hedging against further loss, the speculators are urging everyone to join them in abandoning ship, but I believe now is a great time to double down on your holdings. Why? Because if you’ve been investing in solid companies that are run by competent people, Mr. Market will eventually exponentially reward your patience.

I just finished one of my all-time favorite books about Warren Buffett, entitled, Buffett: The Making of an American Capitalist, and I think the crypto-community can take a much-needed lesson from it.

The author chronicles all of Buffett’s ground-breaking methods through each major chapter of his life, and a fascinating theme emerges. The Oracle of Omaha follows one simple, yet massively successful, philosophy: never lose money. How does he do it? By investing in long-term value.

If you’re new to cryptocurrency (and even if you’re a seasoned veteran), speculating can be tempting. Tokens begin their life cycle dirt cheap, and see incredible gains in just a few months. Why shouldn’t you get in on as many as possible, then?

Because emotions. Another lesson Buffett taught me is that emotion has no place in value investing. Unfortunately, emotion is all you’re going to get if you read the headlines of the crypto community when all tokens drop by 20%+. Publications looking for the “next big story” lure you into thinking you’re going to go broke and that you should sell immediately. But you shouldn’t panic if you’ve invested in value.

Don’t pay attention to the media. Don’t pay attention to formulas, and graph formations. And most of all, don’t pay attention to emotion. Instead, take a lesson from Buffett:

From “Buffett: The Making of an American Capitalist” by Roger Lowenstein. You can get his book here.

For a cryptocurrency value investor, these pointers can be thought of like this:

• Don’t listen to trolls. Put faith in the team that’s doing an amazing job with their company. The market will reward their hard work.
• Invest in what you know. If you can’t understand it, either dive deeper or take a step back.
• Look for dev teams and CEOs that genuinely care about their community and want everyone to be better off.
• Be detailed in your study! Read whitepapers, join the team Slack or Discord, and ask questions. Don’t take someone else’s word that a particular token is better than another. Look for the “seven footers.”
• If a token isn’t immediately gripping, ignore it. FOMO only leads to loss of sleep. Pick a few solid tokens and go all out.

When my portfolio went down (not lost, because I didn’t sell) $40k in 24 hours, I increased my holdings. In some cases, I actually doubled my holdings. Then, I hopped on my team’s Slack channel to encourage everyone to buy more too. I have faith that the communities I’m involved in are doing incredible work. I also believe that the market will reward them (and thereby me) for their hard work.

Can you say the same for the tokens you hold? If not, maybe it’s time to revise your investment strategy. Don’t know where to start? Check out this toolbox I made for newcomers to the space.

I’d love to hear how you’re helping build up the communities in which you have faith. Drop me a comment and tell me about it!

If you haven’t invested in Bitcoin yet and you want to join the movement, the easiest way to begin is with Coinbase. Get $10 of free Bitcoin when you use this link — it’s my referral link — and get started now!

If you’d like to start using an exchange instead of Coinbase, Binance is a great place to start. Sign up here!

If Binance isn’t accepting new users right now, give Kucoin a try. They’re great too!

When Your Crypto Loses $40k in 24 Hours, Do This: was originally published in Hacker Noon on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.