Category: Investments

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Crypto Investments Mobile Crypto

My Thoughts on mobile crypto “mining” projects

As you all should know by now, I am a huge fan of these mobile crypto “mining” projects. I started doing all these mining like way back in March or April 2021 and have not stopped. My favourites have been Pi Network and Eagle Network. Of course there are a few new projects that popped up recently that seemed to be quite decent as well. The crypto verse seem to be ever changing and there have been some great developments and innovation. That is why I am confident that these “more stable” projects will not just simply fail or disappear. Of course there will be a lot that will. Some projects didn’t even last 2 months. One of which was the Shark Network which started in September and by the start of November, the team just disappeared without a trace. Anyway here are some of my thought about these mobile crypto mining projects.

  1. A good project usually takes time. And I mean like a few years from start to something remotely considered “finished”. If you see a project that promises everything to be done within a few months, I think you might want to reconsider the project. And yes, it does take time right? Just imagine building up the brand name, getting and training developers, negotiations with other services and companies and so on. These will take time. So you will need to be in for the long haul.
  2. “Miners” or members don’t usually last very long. This is usually very true, which is kind of sad. They expect to “mine” and get rewarded within a few weeks. Furthermore, some expect the price of the tokens or coins to be sky high at the date of launch. This just doesn’t happen. Even if the project and the corresponding tokens are released quickly and can be publicly traded, it will probably a few years for the token to even gain traction with the public. Nobody is going to believe in a token that was just released a few weeks ago and start investing their hard earned money into it. Again, you will need to be in for the long haul. Patience my friends, patience.
  3. A lot of projects are just scams. Sadly there are a lot of projects popping up everywhere and most of them are just scams or rugpulls. Some don’t even have any experience in the crypto industry and they are just hoping to ride on the crypto wave to make some money. If you read a project whitepaper and it seems extremely fishy or things just don’t make sense, you need to double check the project again. There are even mining apps that just make the user click on advertisements with no intention to reward their users. So please be aware.
  4. Investing. Beware on what you are investing in. If you really want to invest in these projects, I would highly encourage my readers to make sure that the project has some financial backing and the project team is active and constantly updating both the application and adding new features. I have an interesting story about the Eagle Network – at first glance I thought that this is most likely a scam project. But as time progress I started to realize that it isn’t a scam project and the team behind Eagle Network seems to be serious on what they are doing. Yes, so always do some research first. This is very important as a lot of projects tend to claim that you will probably make 100x like by next year and you will miss if you don’t go in NOW. All rubbish. Don’t just rush/FOMO into any project.

Please take care. If you are unsure of a project, it is best to be avoided then. There are just too many scammers out there.

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Crypto Investments

Kucoin Trading Bot Update

It has been a few months since I entered into Kucoin’s trading bot. I started with just like USD 100 and now I have placed about USD 1000 on to their trading bots. Here are some lessons I have learned about using the trading bot and what you guys should expect. First and most important of all – this trading bot is NOT an automated money making machine. You will not be guaranteed to be making money just because you allow a machine or some logarithm to do trading for you. It does not work like that. You should expect to make losses especially when the market is in the downtrend. Of course I am talking about the grid (or spot) trading bot on Kucoin. There are other trading bots available for their users but I am specifically talking about their spot trading bot. Why? Because it is actually pretty much easier to understand.

So timing the market is still key. How much profits you are making will depend on when you enter the market simply because you are trading with two assets. So if you hold onto an asset that is going down in value, your overall profits will still go down. The trick is to ensure that the arbitrage profits is more than the dip in price. Basically what the bot does is to divide your funds into parts and buying at certain intervals. So if you put in 1000 USDT, they will divide that 1000 USDT into smaller portions (perhaps like 10 x 100 USDT) and start buying up assets at intervals. How it makes traders money is by profiting from ups and downs in the market. So if by choosing an asset that is more volatile, it will have a higher chance of being profitable. Of course all these are in theory only.

For me, I have been making a loss for my bots for the past few days. This was due to the dip recently. I was making some profits for the past month or so and then this happened. Very disappointing to say the least. So yes, it is still very dependent on market forces. I would also recommend those interested to diversify their assets as well. You should go with a few trading bots instead of just dumping everything into one. Why? Well it can be very hard to predict which crypto asset will tank. So diversifying into different assets is actually a hedge as well. For me, I go for one trade in meme coins, one in layer 1 coins and maybe 1 or 2 in other tokens as well. I try to avoid using trading bots with Bitcoin if possible – BTC is usually less volatile compared to altcoins. So grid trading will not be that profitable if you ask me.

There are also some advanced features for the Kucoin Trading bot which might be useful for investors. One of which is let the bot know when to get into the market. You can set the price where the bot will enter to maximize your profits. I think I will be setting them up once I get out of the current trading bots. It is stupid to just go in without any idea on what is happening in the crypto market anyway. Remember, grid trading bot is a lot like spot trading. Timing is key. Of course if we knew when and where to get into any market, we will all be billionaires already. And Kucoin has different types of trading bots as well. These might be worth while to explore as well.

Anyway I will update you on how the trading bots are going. And don’t forget to take profits. Please do your own research when it comes to investing. I am not a financial advisor. Take care!

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Crypto Investments News

Bad Start For Crypto This December?

Well, it looks like a rather bad start for the crypto markets as seen by the recent dip in prices of most cryptocurrencies. So will this December buck the trend for cryptocurrencies? Traditionally, it seems that December will usually be a good time for cryptocurrencies. I was also expecting December to have a decent rally, hence I was pumping some money into a few select crypto assets just a few days ago. But alas, looks like it is not going my way. Of course it is very early in the month and we still have like 26 more days to go before 2022. Crypto markets are extremely volatile and we could indeed see a rally in the coming weeks. It can be very hard to tell sometimes.

So do you guys expect to see a rally in the Crypto markets soon? If so, how big a rally will it be? Are there just too many black swan announcements to dampen the market sentiments? I just don’t know. This time round, it does look rather uncertain. Even the recent market analysis by Coin Bureau shows conflicting results, even if they feel that we are still in a bull market right now. The market was all red yesterday. Even the market favourite LUNA had dipped quite a lot yesterday. Yes I know that there is no such thing as certainty in the crypto sphere but this time round, it does feel a bit different. Perhaps this year will be the year that the markets didn’t really rally that much. Note that I am not saying that the market will dip significantly for December, but I have a feeling it will not rally. More than likely, we will see a mix of bull and bear resulting in the market trading sideways. And the traditional stock markets seems to be dampen as well. So it does look like investors do not have that much confidence overall. And it will spill over to the crypto markets.

Anyway enough of the bad news. If things are trading sideways, it might be a good idea to look for alternatives. One of the alternatives could be using trading bots which leverages on arbitrage. Basically these bots will divide the funds and buy and sell at different levels. For me, I usually split my funds into different trading bots funding different crypto assets. So in theory such trading bots will make you a little money for each trade. But of course in reality, it is just not that simple. So please be careful. My own trading bots (set to whatever default settings the bot gives) is still making me losses at times.

Thank you for reading my post. I need to tell you that I am not a financial advisor. Please do your own research when it comes to investing your hard earned money.

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Crypto Investments

Good New For Binance – France as their headquarters?

Do you remember several months ago where there were rumours that Binance might make Singapore their headquarters? Well after our government authorities decided to go ahead and start banning their services to Singaporeans and residents, it seems that they are looking elsewhere to list as their headquarters. I don’t blame them right? I mean the sad truth about the Singapore government is they tend to want to follow what others are doing, even when it doesn’t make much sense. I had thought that Singapore wanted to be a fintech hub but it certainly looks like the government isn’t really that into it. I am honestly not too sure what all the fuss is about regarding Binance. It is just a crypto exchange. No matter where I look, I don’t see them claiming that they were regulated by our monetary authority at all. Not on their website or their blog or anywhere. So not too sure why the government decided to clamp down hard on Binance. And losing the support of the company which might bring in a lot of jobs for Singaporeans and the residents. It is still the largest crypto exchange by trading volume in the world right? But you know, Singapore government does things like that every now and then.

Anyway it looks like Binance might be aiming to setup their headquarters in France. Of course nothing has been confirmed yet. But one of the biggest complaints regulators often have with Binance is that they don’t have a fixed headquarters. Having one in France (as they are in the EU) might help mitigate all these complaints. Furthermore I have contacted Binance support a few times and they were resolved promptly. Even when I was doing my KYC and issues arose, it was handled very professionally. So not too sure why regulators are targetting Binance. Probably because they are the largest crypto exchange. Sometimes it sucks to be the largest because crosshairs will be planted on you.

Yes too bad it isn’t Singapore but I guess our government burnt that bridge a few months ago. When I heard the news that Binance might be looking to setup their head office here, I was so excited. But then governments around the world started their clamp down and of course the Singapore government followed. I sincerely hope that Binance will be able to resolve their differences with our authorities and start allowing their users to use the Binance platform to trade. Come on, the Singapore government should not reserve crypto trading to just for the rich and the elites. That would not be fair. And they even allowed our DBS to have their own crypto license. A bank that probably do not have much experience in the crypto markets?

What are your thoughts on this? Do you think that the ban on Binance by our regulators is justified? Or do you think there is more than meets the eye with this ban? And why aren’t their differences resolved yet?

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Crypto Investments News

Bear Market Yet Again? Me excited?

You might start to realize that I am pretty active and excited whenever there is a bear market. Most of my peers would get themselves extremely hyped when the market is bull but for me, it seems that when I see lots of red candles, I start looking for stuff to buy. Maybe it is the consumer in me. Maybe because I am somewhat of a cheapo and I love bargains. I just find bargains always so irresistible. Of course in the crypto market, there is no way to know for sure when the actual low is. So sometimes I am left with wondering whether I made the correct decision to buy the “dip”.

But this time round, is it really a bear market? Yes, Bitcoin did drop back to 56k today. Or just a general correction which if you ask me, is pretty normal and healthy. Lots of those so called experts are saying that November and December will be a bull market and everything will be going up and up. However I tend to agree that the market is still in a bull trend. Cycles are pretty common in most markets and Crypto is no exception. In fact I think crypto markets are the ones that will often have wild swings. So I am in agreement that this is NOT a bear market. Probably will start uptrend in a few days time. And it is also coming to December, usually a very bullish month for Cryptocurrencies. Furthermore, there isn’t that much FUD coming out this few weeks. And even in a bull market, the value of assets will not always keep on rising, so you should expect some drawbacks at times. Investors will surely want to take out some profits.

However if you ask me, I think most small time investors should always buy or invest for the long term. We will never be able to time the market by trading. So instead we should invest for the long term. Go buy an asset you think has great potential and hold on it until it raises. For me, it is ADA. For some, it is Bitcoin or Ethereum. For some, it is some dog meme coin. Yes of course, if you think that meme coins have great long term potential, by all means invest and hold onto those coins and maybe in a years time, it should again be something like SHIBA INU.

So what are you thoughts on the recent price drawback? Do you think that it is the beginning of a bear market? And what would you do if the bear market really comes? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below. I am not a financial advisor. Please always do your own research. Take care!

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Crypto Investments

Low Risk Crypto Strategy – Yes you should.

Yes indeed it is a very good idea to keep part of your portfolio in low(er) risk investments. That is why I keep a small portion of my crypto assets in stablecoins and even on centralized lending platforms. I even keep a chunk of my funds in savings plans by banks. Sure they aren’t just as exciting especially during a bull market like what we are facing right now, but it is exactly what you should be doing. You need to mitigate the volatility in your portfolio. If not, when things turn south, you might have no choice but to offload your assets at a huge loss. And not to mention, when the market is bear and everything looks gloom and doom with your portfolio, you might make irrational decisions and start selling out at the wrong time. That is how the market works against the retail investor. That is also why most of the time, it is the retail investors that are taking most of the loss.

If you are looking at how I try to mitigate risk, here are some of the things I do. I have part of my portfolio in stablecoins. They do get better interest from earnings, so they are actually quite decent to hold. At Nexo, the highest earning interest rate are usually those stablecoins. And having stablecoins in hand is good if you need to urgently purchase other assets as well. For example if you think that a certain crypto currency will moon, you might want to quickly take the opportunity and buy up some of the assets using your stablecoins to maximize your profits. Instead of waiting to sell your other lackluster cryptos and then buying it up.

And another another way to reduce the risk in volatility is to actually diversify your portfolio. That is to have a good number of different assets, preferably those from different classes. I hold on to some (not a lot) BTC & XMR which are basically old school proof of work cryptocurrencies. I also hold onto ETH, XRP, ADA and CAKE tokens as well. I also invested some in the Hi Dollar tokens. So if certain black swan events were to happen to perhaps the Defi sector, the rest of the cryptocurrencies might not be that badly affected. Sure your Defi tokens might take a hit but at least not all of them are down in the dumps. That goes the same for stablecoins as well. Try not to just keep USDT but keep other stablecoins just to be safe. Their value SHOULD NOT fluctuate that much, but you should be concerned that some government authorities might target a certain stablecoin. And you don’t need to look further than our favourite SEC and how they are now aiming at Tether. So basically don’t keep all your eggs in one basket.

Staking is can be considered another way to mitigate against risks. There are quite a number of proof of stake cryptocurrencies out there already. Staking do generate some returns but the more stable ones usually don’t have the kind of returns compared to those newer or small cap coins. So again, if you are looking for some lower risk investment, staking big cap tokens like ADA might be your best bet. There are also stuff like arbitrage trading which can be considered to be a low risk venture. However I am not familiar with them so I will not go into these. However I do use Kucoin’s trading bot. The returns are not fantastic but I do see them as lower risk. When the market turns south, they do help to mitigate some of the losses. Their spot trading bot is basically the same as arbitrage anyway.

Oh I am not a financial advisor. When you do investing, you should always do your own research. Please take care.

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Crypto Investments News

Bull Market Craze – Everything Up?

That is the problem with the bull market. Nearly everything goes up. Just look at some of the biggest gainers (as in price) in the crypto market these few days. Quite a few I have never heard of in my life. And I am someone who is kind of a busybody and love spending my time looking at all these lesser known altcoins. It has become my obsession for the past few months. Yes I know it is unhealthy but it can be kind of fun though. Of course I never bought any of such tokens or coins except for a few in the mobile crypto mining side of things. And even that I merely put like less than 100 dollars into these projects. I do not recommend anyone going down the same route same me. You should NOT invest in such coins or tokens. Most of them will fail and you will probably lose all your money that you invested in those projects.

Anyway as it is the bull market right now, it does seem that nearly all the tokens or coins in the market is rising. So should you just throw whether cash you have lying around into any small cap coin you can find? Well this can be a very tough question to answer. But my simple advise would be whether you can time the market. Most people can’t. And if you can’t, are you willing to lose what you have invested? If the answer is yes, then sure, go ahead and try your luck at all those crazy possibly 1000x coins. You might just get rich and become the next SHIBA INU millionaire. And if you are someone who can “time” the market, won’t you be better off investing in something slightly less volatile? But do note that even the so called experts out there can’t time the market to perfection. Just look at those hundreds of millions of dollar lost by people who short the market but got burnt instead.

I think I have said this very often in this blog. But I will say it again – I am someone who invests for the long term. I avoid meme coins like the plague. Sure I might throw in some money now and then to smaller projects if I find that they might have some potential in the future but that’s about it. And my investments in those are tiny compared to the bigger tokens or coins in my portfolio.

If you are playing the markets right now, everything does seem like they were going to the moon. It happened during the May bull run as well. Everyone seems to be FOMOing into the market and throwing money around like everything they touch will turn to gold. Lots of people go in blind. But honestly speaking, is there really such a thing? Market manipulation is so rampant in the crypto sphere. It doesn’t take that much for the markets to fall again. Again this happened only recently – in end of May and June. That was one huge tumble and lots of small retail investors like you and me got burnt. But apparently 5 months is such a long time that everyone seems to not to remember. Pretty sad.

Just remember how hard it was to earn what you initially invested in the markets. All it takes will be a few “black swan” announcements to make the markets fall. And don’t think it will not happen. It will. Just a matter of time. So take care! And remember what I say. I might not be a financial advisor or have a crystal ball, but I do have some experience in the crypto market.

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Crypto Investments

Inflation – The main reason for the crypto bull run?

If you ask me, I think it is part of the reason why the crypto market is having such a bull run recently. Just look at the inflation that is spewing over from all the money printing that is going on. Again this is basic mathematics – if someone is increasing the supply of something (lets say this something is named $), there will be an increase in the number of that something. And if demand remains the same, won’t that make that something worth less? It just makes perfect here. Of course whether the government officials will pretend that inflation is not “that bad” or that inflation “doesn’t exist” or that inflation “is not here yet” is another question.

But if you have been reading just the headlines this few months, you know that governments have been printing money. All in the hopes of pumping their economies up and hoping to stave off a recession. The pandemic that currently still on going right is probably the main cause of concern. But if you ask me, they have went overboard. Especially when we are talking about the US and their monetary policy. They have been one of the worst offenders when it comes to pumping out the green and this probably is why smarter investors are starting to get into crypto. It is a hedge against inflation. I know that traditional investors always say that there is no logic for crypto. Or that it is just “fake internet money”. But honestly it is more than that. Of course there are plenty of scams going on in the crypto sphere, but there are scams everywhere as well. Not just in the cryptoverse. If you want to invest in something, that something should be something which will see at increase in value in the future. The US Dollar or whatever fiat currency you are holding right now will most probably not increase in value in the future. Again this is just maths. You just cannot pretend that it is not happening. Well at least you cannot pretend for too long anyway.

So that is why I do think that even if you are a low risk investor, you might want to start looking at cryptos. BTC and ETH are still decently safe compared to other crypto currencies. And for the low risk investor, these two are probably the best bet as we can see from their lower volatility. Your best bet against inflation as well. However you will probably need to hold them for sometime first, unless you time the market right. And big time investors have already bought in a while back. They do know that BTC and ETH are their best hedge against the upcoming inflation. These are especially good if you are a new comer to the crypto market if you ask me. They will not fall too far even during a bear market. And if you ask me, I don’t think there will be a crypto winter happening anymore. Sure market cycles will happen. But I find it highly unlikely that prices of BTC will drop to 10% of its value for 2-3 years with nobody (including institutions) daring to buy and hold BTC. Come on. I think this will never happen again. Unless of course if a major black swan event happens. I am looking at you SEC. These are the people we should all look out for.

I am not a financial advisor. Always do your own research when it comes to investing. Take care and I will see you in the next post. Bye for now.

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Crypto Investments News

The problem of being a cheapskate – FTX issues

[Update: 05-Nov-2021]Finally the funds went through and I can start using them on FTX. After so much back and forth, I can finally use the funds. Thank you to the FTX support team!

So as you guys know, I can be a little bit on the cheapskate side. Probably because of my upbringing. If I can save on something, I will definitely save on that, especially if it is not that difficult to do. And as Binance is being blocked by the Singapore government and there is no way to trade on Binance for Singapore users anymore, I have to go look for other alternatives. I have been using Kucoin for some time and it seems fine. Not as good as Binance of course but still acceptable to me. The interface is nearly exactly the same as Binance too. However me being me, went along to look for other crypto exchanges to test out. And while I was browsing, I discovered that FTX allowed SGD deposits in their DBS (Singapore local) bank. (Note that this has been changed just recently.) I was shocked and surprised that our government allowed to to happen. Especially what happened to Binance recently.

So of course I went ahead and deposit some money into FTX’s SGD account in a local bank. I mean FTX is indeed a very good exchange. According to plenty of reviews, their platform is considered one of the better ones. And their transaction fees are also lower than Kucoin. You can watch Coin Bureau’s review and comparison on the exchange here. Plus if I transfer money to a local bank from another local bank there will be no wire or any bank fees. That is a definite win-win for Singapore users! And that is what I did. However lo and behold, just like two days later, I see a notification on their deposit page that they had changed the deposit method. I am guessing that our dear Singapore authorities found out about this and decided to stop the little loophole. Or that DBS themselves found out and stopped it because DBS themselves only want crypto sales through their own platform. Yes apparently DBS has been approved by MAS (Monetary Authority of Singapore) and given crypto licenses. They certainly don’t want any competition from FTX! Just imagine if crypto investors found out the advantages of trading in FTX rather than DBS’s own crypto platform. No one sane would then go to DBS for crypto trading services at all.

Although my money was transferred across, it might be somehow stuck. Even FTX support seemed to be lost and their replies extremely cryptic to say the least. It has already been like 2 weeks and the only thing they said was to hold on while they get to the bottom of it. If you ask me, the bank account might simply be just frozen by DBS themselves or by the government. So this looks like a very long haul for me. I wonder how long it will take for my funds to get unfrozen. It is not a huge amount but for a small time retail investor and the current bull run happening, it is very disappointing.

So take care! And hope the best for me funds. Investors should not always go for the cheapest method. Sometimes you will lose even more. See you guys later in another post.

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Crypto Investments Technology

Kucoin Trading Bot – 100 USDT experiment spot grid

[Update: 16-Nov-2021]Users who are interested might want to compare whether holding an asset is more worthwhile rather than using a trading bot. I feel that if you are looking for ways to lower your risk, then the trading bot would be a decent option. It is arbitrage anyway. But if you are thinking of maximizing your profits, then I don’t think using a trading bot is the way to go. And if you are bullish about a particular cryptocurrency, it might be better to just buy and hold that cryptocurrency instead.

Ok I am not someone who likes to just buy assets and then forget about it. Sure I have some cryptocurrencies which I will buy and hold onto for the long term. But frankly speaking I am someone who loves to login to my crypto Exchange and go check how well my assets are doing and to check the crypto news daily. That is just me. However it can be very tiring to say the least. And the mental drain is quite something for me. With full time work with a silly little blog and a Youtube channel to look after, I can feel the strain already. And my overall investments are pretty small. All in all about USD 10k only. But it is just so tiring to keep track of everything. So you can see why a “free” trading bot appeals so much to me.

When I say “free” I mean there are no additional charges to using the bot. However there will still be transaction fees being incurred on each transaction. If you choose spot grid (or classic grid), how this Kucoin trading bot works is simple – they will buy and sell on your behalf. The idea behind it is to buy low and sell high and they do it at various intervals. The term used is arbitrage. This also helps to spread some of the risks. So every time the bot buys or sells assets, you are incurring the transaction fees. This is definitely good for Kucoin. Of course it might be good for you as well. The key word here is MIGHT. However the biggest advantage of using a trading bot is that you won’t need to spend your time in front of your monitor or your mobile device to monitor the charts. You just let the bot do all the work for you.

Do note that if you expect the price of a certain asset to go up – you would be better off buying that asset instead. You will incur less fees and the price of the asset hopefully will go up. The trading bot buys in at various intervals and these will seldom be that optimal when compared to buying in at a lower price. And yes you can lose money from trading bots as well – this is especially true when the cryptocurrency in question is dropping in value. Again the trading bot might cushion the drop in price for you as they will sell in intervals. But then if you know when the price of an asset will rise or fall, you won’t need a trading bot in the first place. If I can predict prices, I would probably won’t be writing a blog post about it too. Probably be one of the richest person on the planet.

So when should you use the trading bot then, you might ask? Well the consensus seems to be that you should use the trading bot if you believe the asset in question is going to be trading more or less sideways but can be rather volatile. The prices will go up and down but still be trading around a certain range. This way, the trading bot can make good use of the “buy low, sell high” strategy constantly. That is in fact what it is designed primarily to do. In most cases, this should generate a little profit for you. It also make sense as a human we can’t really spot the top and the bottom of such a cycle. Even experts in this field will have a hard time as well. Just imagine how precise you need to be to spot all those tops and bottoms. And you will probably need to invest into the bot for some time too. Don’t expect to come in and make a quick buck. It just doesn’t work that way.

I have put in about 100 USDT just for this experiment. Will do using the DOT/USDT trading pair as I don’t think the price of DOT will raise or drop that much these few weeks. I will update you guys in about a month or so. However this is a reminder that just because you use the trading bot does not mean that you will make profit from it. If the price of the asset you are using the bot on falls, you will most likely still make some loss. And you should not just leave the trading bot alone as well. If the price is trading outside of the parameters, the bot will also cease to trade. You will still need to come in once in a while to check.

Take care all!