I guess this isn't the kind of thinking that's very popular lately, but I don't now nor have I ever had long positions in anything blockchain related, for pretty simple reasons.

I don't try to time markets, and I avoid things that seem volatile or overbought, most of the assets in this class have consistently seemed to be both.

Currencies of any kind aren't really exciting to me aside from the utility they provide when utilized for something new that wasn't possible without them, and sure there is some of that activity within the blockchain sphere, but nowhere near enough of it to account for the current capitalization.

Technically, blockchain isn't very remarkable to me aside from the mining Proof-of-Work scheme being an amusing hack when I first heard of it, but is in practice a pretty large detriment. Even if these data structures and algorithms were radically revolutionary, I wouldn't speculate in them.

From my survey, coin schemes gain only attention from being implemented atop blockchain -- no real reason to use the technology and be wrapped up in the volatile markets or to pay the price of the mismatch in design between a trustless distributed system and whatever their actual problem domain is. Most could provide their supposed value proposition while being a boring centralized system, a small trustful distributed system, or (very rarely) a more purposefully designed byzantine-tolerant system, and the only thing they'd lose is publicity.

Aside from all of the problems specific to blockchain, in general I see no reason as an individual investor to be in long positions on commodities or currencies as they are systems of zero-sum exchange; I much prefer to capitalize into the positive-sum system that is industry and owning diversified stakes in the productivity and growth there.

I sold some in the recent run up but by and large still think worth to include some now, given the following potential:

1. Store of Value: Bitcoin is better than gold at what gold does. Gold is about $7tn. BTC ~$180bn

2. Anonymous payments (Monero, Zencash, ZCash): Many use cases for wanting to pay in an untraceable way

3. Global payment network: Move large amounts of money around the world with only an internet connection; faster and cheaper than remittance options today

4. Censorship resistance: As hard as cash to censor, but you can move much larger amounts of it instantaneously, around the world.

5. Diversification potential: Sketchier since its early and return drivers are not yet clear, but early results show no correlation with existing asset classes, which if true would be a huge boon to asset managers

I am less optimistic about in near term about:

1. Smart Contracts: Think we are farther away from the vision of smart contracts creating a trustless society blah blah than most people think. Right now 99% of smart contracts swap ether for ICO tokens. There is potential, but IMO very very overvalued right now.

2. Most ICO funded start ups

Practically, I think due to BTC's head start it will win the digital gold box - it's my biggest digital asset position.

ETH has a head start in the smart contract world, but upstarts like EOS and Cardano promise better scalability and governance - so I have some of those. Plus my view is ETH will have a tough time once ICO bubble bursts, so not holding in short term.

Have some of the privacy coins too (XMR, ZEC). And have tiny positions in tokens from most promising projects.

> Store of Value: Bitcoin is better than gold at what gold does. Gold is about $7tn. BTC ~$180bn

I don't know many women who feel this way, and women's interest in jewelry has historically helped establish an important floor for the value of gold. If civilization collapsed tomorrow women would work hard to protect their gold, but not their Bitcoin (or similar). But of course , it doesn't require societal collapse to put downward pressure on Bitcoin.

startup idea: watches that store bitcoin

You should look into interpretation protocols like Blocknet. Personally that's where I see the future going as it allows for more componentized blockchains and blockchain microservices....think Baas, Blockchain as a Service

Yes. I'm lucky to have invested in June 2011, six years ago, when the price of bitcoin was around ten dollars[1].

I've never sold because I still believe in the long-term potential of Bitcoin.

[1]: https://hackertimes.com/item?id=2612486

Do you think the latest surge is sustainable?

No idea. It's very difficult to time the market.

I am confident we are in the very nascent stages of cryptocurrency, and that it will be huge within ten years. I am not so confident that Bitcoin will be the predominant currency, but it's my best option right now. I invested an amount that I am comfortable losing completely and plan on holding long-term. Maybe it will turn into something big, maybe it will be worthless. No risk, no reward.

I bought ether immediately after the EEA launch and sold roughly around when the most recent China exhange ban news started. Made a 900% return and then pulled out. I've got it tucked away to take care of a house down payment, but I'll admit I'm occasionally tempted to put some back in. The truth is that I got lucky with ether; not sure I want to put any more fun money into it.

We are discussing whether to purchase bitcoin at this moment.

Our thinking:

Possible negative outcomes:

a. Bitcoin is widely regulated or outlawed in ways that reverse it's growing popularity and it eventually flames out.

b. Another virtual currency comes into prominence and bitcoin holders or new investors migrate to that new currency

c. Bitcoin turns out to be a fad and people just lose interest in it.

Possible/Actual drivers for demand:

d. Bitcoin already has a following that values all bitcoins at $180 Billion.

e. Governments have been slow to regulate it. China has regulated it (many have some guidelines/regulations in place or becoming law soon), 5 or 6 countries (of 195 total) have outlawed it.

f. Financial institutions are starting to formally recognize it, including Fidelity (Fidelity is mining bitcoin) and CME offering futures.

g. Bitcoin has a finite supply, unlike all other currencies. So demand cannot be mitigated by increasing supply.

h. Businesses are beginning to accept bitcoin, such as: Microsoft, Virgin Galactic, Expedia, Subway, Whole Foods, (maybe 100 other lesser known companies)

The goal of cryptocurrency is to be used as currency. Few people are using it as an actual currency. So it will potentially go much higher until people start using it for digital purchases, much like credit cards are used today. Even when it is at that size, it would still grow slowly, similar to gold.

It is very much a bubble at this point - something many people buy to sell off at a higher price. The difference between the crypto bubble and many other bubbles is that it's still much less than the potential value.

So personally, I hold on to Bitcoin, which is already stable and proven. The others look good too but are still at very high risk of failure.

I have no regrets not buying earlier because they were all uncertain in the past.

I'm holding a significant amount myself. I work on Blockchain projects and I believe cryptocurrencies are the future of money so it would be negligent of me not to.

I think cryptocurrencies in general have a long future, and seeing as how many exchanges require bitcoin to exchange to other coins, i think the value of bitcoin will climb by default. No reason for everyone to start bailing on it so far. Personally I have some assets distributed among a few different coins because I feel like the value will go up across the board, and also to hedge competing cryptocurrency technologies.

Yes. Some of some. Dodgecoin, hahaha, j/k. Seriously though, everyone should be dodgy about their holdings, for cheese's sake.

My stance is hopeful, but distant.

It's in my portfolio because I believe in the revolutionary value of the technology and the anonymous position of its founder is profoundly unique and powerful.

If you want to invest, in anything, the best bet is to form a plan and stick to it.

What's the overall best plan? There isn't one. But dollar cost averaging with buy-and-hold gets close. What's that? Invest the same amount every fixed period of time. Like, 100$ every Tuesday or $500 on the first of the month. It doesn't matter, do what you're comfortable with. But don't buy more when it looks cheap and don't sell when it looks high. Just keep building, just keep building.

What else? Once your plan is in motion kill all your google alerts and rss feeds and so on and so forth. You need emotional distance or you will drive yourself crazy. Basically build a machine and let it work.

heh, I traded my 0.3 btc for doge 3years ago because it seemed to be getting traction as a microtransaction currency.

I have like 400$ in all the stuff on coinbase (BTC, LTC, ETH) + Factom (Austin startup, head developer is Paul Snow, used for maintaining trail of ownership?), 0x (decentralized exchanges), Augur (decentralized prediction market), and Ripple (private blockchain functioning as a clearing house for banks)

If you need to put your money somewhere, and you've filled up your Roth IRAs, are in index funds, real estate (?), I don't see why not. I think the baseline argument is diversification, the high volatility, and lack of regulation

Now is probably not a great time because the price (of bitcoin) is so high, or maybe it is... No one really knows, it's all pure speculation

I wish I would of put a lot more than 400$ in Nvidia last year personally: https://finance.google.com/finance?q=NASDAQ:NVDA

I hold some crypto.

Though at current, I do feel BTC is currently in a bubble. I have a nagging feeling of manipulation in the BTC market, or maybe it is just me. When corporate big-wigs start talking about Bitcoin, there is no stopping these big corps doing a pump and dump. I would be wary. (Or maybe it is just me?).

I'm holding small amount of Verge (XVG) privacy coin.

Verge team is releasing Wraith protocol very soon (http://www.wraithprotocol.com/).

Happy to see Verge mentioned. The privacy features it incorporates really makes it a great privacy coin. There is an active team behind the coin and like you mentioned, Wraith will be a game changer.

(Throwaway as I don't want people tracking me down but want to be transparent as I find it interesting when other people are)

I'm a mid-30s senior tech person in NY. I've been in and out of crypto over the past few years as a hobbyist speculator.

Heard about BTC in 2012-ish and thought it was an interesting novelty but probably wouldn't amount to anything worthwhile. Tried to buy/mine some but it was hard so gave up. Bought some drugs with it in 2013 (a night out that "cost" me $70k at current prices hah). Made about $3-4K in the 2016 surge, got out for a while, got back in around $1,300 just before it went crazy again.

I have a crypto portfolio worth about $20k, my cost was around $9k. It's about 5% of my net worth which I consider high, but I want to to try and get ahead by taking a few measured risks and this is one of those attempts. Most of my net worth is in boring investments like Vanguard index funds/401k and I have 6 months expenses in cash so I'm otherwise a fairly conservative investor.

My crypto portfolio looks like:

* 40% BTC

* 20% ETH

* 20% LTC

* 10% IOTA

* 10% Spread between DASH, OMG, LSK, NEO, EOS

BTC has been the money maker (up 140%), IOTA was my "missed the BTC boat lets try something emergent" punt (not worked out so far, I'm down 40%), the other 10% are just to give me an incentive to follow the tech.

I think I'm probably too late to get life-changing riches from crypto, but am buying and holding using money I can afford to lose until it either goes to the moon or goes to zero as there is a small chance I am not too late. I'm back to putting my monthly savings allocation into Vanguard now though.

My brother (non-tech industry) put a few thousand into Bitcoin a couple of months back, I advised him not to. I'd stand by that advice.

I think cryptocurrencies are the start of something extremely interesting, but I'm not sure if the current crop will be the eventual winners. I'd recommend people in tech picking up small amounts of various emerging currencies just to understand the ecosystem and how it works. It's a fascinating field.

Played with bitcoin a few years ago, and sold all but a few fragments of the last coin. The few fragments are now worth as much as my original spend!

I consider all cryptocurrencies to be way too high risk for my desired investment profile but I'll happily leave my 0.06 coins and see what happens.

Bitcoin needs to become more stable so that it can be used for payments rather than speculation. I'll probably buy small amounts to spend and trade but not as an "investment".

You sold every single one of your cryptocurrencies? I don't believe it's an all or nothing stage right now at all. Do you plan to buy back in after the predicted dip?

I made a very strong return and sold my holdings. I would buy back in after the dip -- I did the same thing after the last crash.

I have approx 1% of total net worth in the following portfolio

coins:

  BTC
  FIL
  SALT
  LAT
  COB

companies:

  balance - wefunder.com/balance
  polymath.network
  shapeshift.io

I consider all of them short term, except BTC (which I will sell when I retire, or it is superseded) and Shapeshift (which I'm forced to hold until a liquidity event).

I could see going as high as 5% of total net worth in crypto, but not yet.

I think its a new financial paradigm shift. I hold the good ones eth monero neo and speculate with others like the stock market. If this is a bubble you will lose a bit of money. If its not you will lose a big chance.

1 guy shows off his acc on my facebook feed today: https://i.imgur.com/EDNBOiG.jpg

his setup: https://i.imgur.com/T1TPIwI.jpg

Something suspicious about this screenshot, BTCZ isn't worth much at all. Entire market cap is 3m

https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/bitcoinz/

ah i dont know anything about cryptocurrencies :D thought it's same as BTC

Institutional money is coming in next year, via CME Bitcoin futures and possibly ETF. It would be wise to hold some crypto in case the bubble gets even crazier.

Have a "small" amount. Can't be bothered timing the market so will probably hodl for.a.few years.