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What would you do with a bitcoin windfall? (lemmy.world)

submitted 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) by EvacuateSoul@lemmy.world to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

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I'm not a true believer in crypto, but I used to play around with it. I have received a 5-figure USD sum of bitcoin from the MtGox settlement, and I'm considering my options. It is a true windfall. It was worth maybe $100-200 when I used to play daytrader and shop silk road with it.

We are on track for early retirement as it is, but my "smart money" intuition says pay the long-term capital gains and invest in funds, how we do everything else. More money earlier is always good.

My gambler side says to withdraw some maybe, but split the rest into a half dozen likely candidates for someday real world crypto use which may take off. I don't stay up to date on them anymore, so this would take some real research.

The weird Trumpy stuff going on with BTC makes me think it couldn't hurt to hold through the election in case prepper types panic buy it lol.

My wife says it's unexpected so just leave it as a high-risk part of our whole portfolio, but I worry she underestimates the risk and scamminess of it all.

Update: I sold the account down to 0.1 BTC today. I may sell more later on. Thanks everyone for your input.

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[–] HelixDab2@lemm.ee 5 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I'd buy a cold storage wallet, and put it there. (Write the password down and keep it with the drive though!!!) Bitcoin is the least scammy of the cryptocurrencies, and it's likely to keep going up for a while, since there's a limited amount. OTOH, regulatory changes--since it's so electricity intensive to mine--could means it gets banned in many places. Yes, it's a high risk "investment" (I don't think of cryptocurrency as an investment at all), but high risk can be part of an otherwise balanced portfolio. Since it was a windfall, you're not really risking anything by keeping it as bitcoin.

If you don't already have a financial advisor that has a fiduciary responsibility to you, you might want to consider getting one, and asking their advice.

[–] EvacuateSoul@lemmy.world 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I did already get burned by an exchange obviously, but I think I trust myself even less with cold storage lol.

[–] HelixDab2@lemm.ee 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Cold storage does neatly avoid the issue of getting burned by an exchange; your crypto is only stored locally with a cold storage wallet, so unless it's plugged in to your computer and accessible to the internet, it can't be hacked. OTOH, you can simply lose the drive (!), and forgetting your password means that the crypto is likely inaccessible forever (!!!).

I've misplaced things before, but I don't usually throw shit out unintentionally. So I've still got my old Tails drive that has somewhere around .01BTC in a wallet on it. Now if only I remembered my password for the persistent partition.

[–] EvacuateSoul@lemmy.world 2 points 3 months ago

That's what I mean, that it's more likely to get lost/stolen/destroyed in my hands, if I were to bet.