Say it with me guys, never invest more than you can afford to lose. If you invest, especially in Cryptocurrencies, this needs to be your mantra. It's the golden rule when it comes to investments, and in my opinion, applies even more so to the crypto markets.
I read about a British guy who had mortgaged his property to invest in Bitcoin and other Alt coins back in December 2017, and needless to say by February of this year, he had lost more money than most of us had made in the previous months. I feel the guys pain, however he broke the golden rule.
Investing in cryptocurrencies is risky business, seriously. From my limited experience, it's best to think of investing in cryptos as the same as gambling. If you had the foresight to invest way back in 2012, you'll be laughing all the way to the bank, but the vast majority of us were too late to the game to be able to buy a mansion and sports car with a small investment, it's just too late.
ETN Market
The market as a whole has been very stagnant lately, although our trusty Steem has been making a strong recovery in recent weeks. One project that I have a soft-spot for is Electroneum, the British cryptocurrency that was launched back in November 2017. It has the respectable if not daunting goal of being the first cryptocurrency to achieve mass-adoption. I'd spotted some adverts for the ICO back in October, and decided to throw £20 worth of ETH at it. In fact, it was my very first ICO, and certainly not the last. Even with the current prices, I'm sat on ~£100 worth now, which is a tidy profit. I started GPU mining ETN the second the blockchain went live, and was lucky enough to receive a few thousand ETN which I sold the second it was first listed on Cryptopia, and again made a nice little profit. Since then, I've refrained from both mining and trading, as it was clear I was not going to see the same kind of profit again for some time, if ever again.
I was lucky, just being in the right place at the right time, but not everyone has a good story to tell. I was fully prepared to lose every penny I'd put into this, I've not got a lot of money to spare but I can afford the odd £20 here and there. The thing is though, investments are not the same as saving. Saving is putting money to one side and it might accrue a small amount of interest over time, but investing is putting your money to work for you. When done properly investing can earn you substantially more money than a savings account, but this big reward comes with big risk. In fact I'd go as far as saying the bigger the possible reward, the bigger the risk generally speaking.
It's this risk that people tend to overlook, instead focusing on the possible big big money. The temptation can be too great at times, which is why I tend to just have short focused bursts of mining and trading, which I try to time just right. It doesn't always work out that way though. It's also important to remember the difference between a short-term and long-term investment, and for me, Electroneum is definitely a risky long-term investment. But it's one I think has a good chance of making, after all, what's better than an underdog story?
Edit: You can read an excellent post by the honourable 
What are your thoughts on investing in cryptocurrency? Have you got any stories from your time spent trading and/or mining? Let me know your thoughts and feelings down in the comments, and I'll hopefully see you there. As always make sure to follow me for the latest Cryptocurrency, Technology, Internet and Pop Culture updates and if you're a fan of strange YouTube videos, you might want to follow me on Twitter. Until next time, Peace!
Sources:
Image from Pexels (https://www.pexels.com/photo/airport-bank-board-business-534216/)
Electroneum on CoinMarketCap (https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/electroneum/)