I don't know if you've noticed, but ever since this whole cryptocurrency boom started, with Bitcoin, Ethereum, and even those that you don't know if they're a joke or a scam, a kind of collective anxiety has emerged in the air.
I'm talking about the famous FOMO, which is short for "Fear Of Missing Out"… of an opportunity, of a profit, of something that can change your life.
And yes, in the crypto world this fear is felt more strongly than anywhere else, much more than in stocks. I think it has to do with the ease of access to cryptocurrencies; it's much easier to buy them.
You log on to Twitter (or X, as it's called now) and see a ton of people talking about how they bought a cryptocurrency for 0.0001 and that it's now worth millions. You see screenshots of absurd profits, "I got rich in 3 weeks" stories, and of course, you start to sweat cold thinking: "Why didn't I invest when they told me? Did I miss out?" And without realizing it, you're already looking for ways to put money into any rare coin so you don't miss out on the next big rise.
This isn't something I'm currently experiencing, but I did go through such a thing at one point, and in the end, most of the time what happened was that I lost money.
But the craziest thing is that this feeling doesn't come so much from logic, but from emotion. FOMO isn't just an impulsive reaction; it's a direct hit on our brain, which hates feeling excluded. It's like when all your friends talk about a TV show and you haven't seen it. Only here it's not a TV show, but your supposed financial future. And that's when you start acting quickly, without thinking, driven by anxiety rather than strategy.
And the worst part is that this behavior is precisely what the big players in the market take advantage of. Those who already have millions invested, and when they see a spike in FOMO on social media, they inflate the bubble even further, knowing that small investors—those who enter late and desperately—are the ones who will be left with the losses when everything collapses. Because just as they rise, they also fall. And that's where you understand that the fear of being left out can end up leaving you with nothing.
And mind you, I'm not saying that investing in crypto is bad; there are people who have earned well, and who understand the subject, study, and analyze. But what I do believe is that if you're going to enter this world, you can't be driven by the impulse to not want to be "the only one who didn't do it." Because that fear, that desperation to not miss out on the opportunity, is precisely what makes you truly lose.
Well, I don't know about you, but I've felt that FOMO, and not just in crypto, but in other things too. And I think we have to learn to listen to it, understand why it appears, and above all, not let it decide for us. Because in the end, the real gain isn't in following the herd, but in thinking with a cool head... even when the market is on fire.
What do you think? Have you ever felt that FOMO?