I agree with you here. There is nothing more important than an investment that is risk-free and where emotions are not attached.
it's either one is ignorant of it or intentionally ignored the obvious signs of risk but basically in bitcoin investment we are only on a better angle of not gambling our investments but staking it for the future which we are guaranteed for with the four years circle that we know.
At Churchillvv, staking bitcoin on a centralized exchange is not a good practice for a long-term investor; you are already gambling with your bitcoin if you do so, and you can lose your bitcoin to a centralized exchange if something bad happens at the backend before your staking maturity period reaches because it's not your key, not your coin. It is only when you hold bitcoin in your self-custodial wallet that you are guaranteed that your bitcoin is safe because only you have access to it. I don't know why some investors who have spent so many years accumulating bitcoin will want to risk their bitcoin for a few dollars or rewards in return.
Of course it is a bad thing, risking our bitcoins on any exchange in my opinion is not feasible for us who aim to invest long-term, it is possible that they could go bankrupt and take our bitcoins, as happened to other large exchanges in the past, just make it a lesson and don't let us be fooled again in this case, store bitcoins with your own control to be much safer.
Exchange is only made for us to buy and sell bitcoin, more than that I think don't ever be tempted by the percentage of storage on their exchange, it indicates that they lack liquidity in their exchange, you need to think twice if you want to keep betting on it.
I also agree with you, usually the private keys of the wallet are fully under our control, giving you full control over your holdings. If you use a hardware wallet, it is more secure, because it is offline, there is no possibility of losing money in hardware wallet. It is the most secure.
And holding on to the exchange is fraught with risk. Because exchanges don't give you full control over your money. Moreover, the possibility of money being hacked on exchanges is very high. If you want to hold cryptocurrency long-term and security is your main concern, then wallets are more suitable.