Do you mean the big institutions are the major players? It feels like retail is just along for the ride and are at the mercy of the institutions and whales.

All the analysis in the world (both technical and fundamental) doesn't seem to matter at all as long as the big players are in control. As a retail investor it honestly seems like market direction is a coin flip (especially now).

I entered the market this year and gradually put in more and more money to the point where it made me uncomfortable, so I sold with some profit after the recent crash and slight recovery. I'll regret if the market pumps from here but the risk was too great to handle another dump.

It seems to me that the "safest" way to invest is to gradually accumulate in the bear market years and then gradually sell during the bull market, while keeping the most promising bags for the long long term. I just got into crypto too late to build a proper foundation that could handle the volatility. But the lessons I've learned have been valuable. I bought back in at the last mini dip for a fraction of what I had invested before. Will suck if we just go up from here but the stress is palatable now. Just have to learn the right way to invest now.

I had no idea how much market manipulation was involved and how psychological the game really is. After this last crash I have absolutely no idea what is going to happen next so I pretty much took out all of my capital. I had to sell my best performing alts in order to offset the losses of the other ones (which stung really bad).

I might dip in again with much less capital and just play around with small moves here and there just to learn more.

Personally I don't think the bull market is over yet but risking a lot of capital is just not worth it. Now I'm thinking maybe just save most of my capital until the actual confirmed bear market and just dca on the best projects and hodl for long term investing.

 

So do the whales have the ability to dump us into a bear market on their own?

They would be able to buy cheap Bitcoin but if we're in a bear market they can't sell for huge profits (and then rinse and repeat) until the next bull run. Or is Bitcoin accumulation the be all end all for them?

I am looking to take some profits on my altcoins after the next big pump. Need some advice if my strategy is good or not. I'm based in the US.

1. When I start to take profits from my altcoins do I just sell them on the exchange for dollars and then buy stablecoins with that? Or do I somehow trade the alts for stables? Does is matter since selling or trading them are taxed for capital gains regardless?

2. Once I take the profits in stablecoins, is putting them on something like Blockfi to gain interest the best thing to do while I wait for another dip to possibly reinvest them?

3. Once the bull run is over I'm most likely going to keep all my bitcoin and probably most of my Ethereum. I'll sell most of my alts for stablecoins but keep small bags of the ones I want to keep through the bear market. Is this a sound strategy?

4. During the bear market is taking a cash loan using my crypto as collateral (BTC and ETH) a good way to defer capital gains taxes? Won't I have to pay these taxes eventually? I know there are drawbacks to this strategy but it seems like a lot of experienced people do this.

5. After the bull run should I just put my stablecoins in something like Blockfi during the bear market? Or is cashing out to dollars and investing in something like real estate a good way to defer capital gains taxes?

I know these are a lot of questions but any advice is greatly appreciated, this forum has been extremely helpful for a noob that has been in the space for about 4 months now. Thanks!

So I got heavily into altcoins (more than half of my portfolio), but I'm planning on selling most of my holdings in them (except Ethereum of which I'll keep a majority) and hodling most of by Bitcoin through the bear market. I'll use the profits from the alts and to slowly accumulate BTC for the next bull run.

I know the capital gains taxes will suck but I think this is the best thing to do considering the strategy I used. I didn't plan to get so into the alts but it was just so exciting that I went overboard. The alts I picked we're mostly top 100 coins so it wasn't too risky.

Now I'm just debating how much of the alts profits to put back into Bitcoin and how much to convert to stablecoins.

Anybody else take this route before?

I ended up keeping it after it had a little pump the other day. We'll see how it does the next few weeks.

Now just hoping Cosmos, Chainlink, and Elrond can pump a bit!

I know it has a lot of potential but it hasn't been doing anything for me price wise, my worst performing coin by far. Thinking of dumping it into my other alts.

Good or bad move?

For anyone who uses Kucoin I have a couple questions:

What's the best crypto to use for trading on there (least amount of fees, ability to trade for other coins, etc.), BTC, ETH, LTC, TETHER (USDT), USDC?

Since you can't deposit fiat there (I think?) does that make every crypto to crypto trade a taxable event? I'm assuming there's no way around this? I'm a US citizen.

There's some really interesting coins on there I simply cannot find on the other exchanges, and I just can't afford the gas on Uniswap. Any advice is greatly appreciated!

So I've officially been in the crypto game since the beginning of this year. I've been making buys from P2P and exchanges and sold a few coins here and there mostly for small losses for investing in other altcoins.

Since the so called "experts" are saying this bull might end towards the end of the year, I'm planning to sell off (DCA) at least half of my portfolio towards the end of the run.

Since you have to hold your crypto at least a year for it to be tax exempt I'm really concerned about all the capital gains taxes I'll have to pay since I'll most likely be making most of my sells before the year ends.

Are there any crypto tax resources or advice people on here would recommend? I'm looking at some sites like CryptoTrader.tax.

But my main concern is how to lessen the capital gains hit I'm going to take if I sell within a year, it seems like there's no way around this if I don't hold my crypto for a year. Any thoughts?

As a newbie who's "officially" been in the crypto space for about two weeks my biggest issues have been:

1. Figuring out how, when, and where to buy crypto. There's so many exchanges, websites, apps, etc that are similar but also different. Wading
    through all these choices and trying to figure out how to protect yourself and your personal info is extremely tedious and intimidating. When I first
    started to research crypto and how to enter the space the price was around 20k for bitcoin. By the time I felt safe enough to enter it was in the 30k
    region and rising fast. I felt extremely pressured and intimidated because of this. I made my first bitcoin purchase from a P2P site with cash in person
    (at a police station safe exchange zone). The transaction was very smooth and the seller was very helpful. It was only for a few hundred dollars but I
    was ok with it because I just wanted to figure out how to do things. When I got home I transferred the bitcoin to my cold storage and felt pretty good
    about completing the process. My second purchase was larger and from the same person but at about 15% higher price because I didn't wait for the
    dip to reach the bottom (MY FIRST BIG MISTAKE). I didn't buy at the ATH but I should have waited out the dip, but because I had to meet the seller
    at a certain day/time I paid too high of a price. It's also a good way to learn to not buy/trade hastily and with too much emotion.

2. KYC vs No KYC - I joined one of the big exchanges first but stopped short of giving my bank information because I just didn't feel comfortable
    doing it yet. So far I have only done purchases from P2P in person with cash without having to give out any personal info. But I'm realizing that I
    need a better way of purchasing crypto instantaneously to get it at the price I want, and because of this I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to use my
    personal and bank information on one of the exchanges/apps. I honestly don't see a way around this, but maybe that's just because I'm
    inexperienced. But in order to DCA and buy at the dips I feel that you need the instant purchasing power of an exchange or app that specifically does
    this. Pure P2P is great but you're at the mercy of who's online at the moment and their prices, not to mention you absolutely have to be sure your
    transaction is safe from robbery, scams, or even undercover cops.

3. Technical learning curve - Some things you just have to learn on the fly. One example is how bitcoin has unique addresses for each transaction and
    other coins use the same address. Another time an address had some strange icon at the beginning and I didn't know if it would mess up my
    transaction (it didn't). Bitcoin fees, Ethereum network fees, exchange fees, etc I'm still trying to figure out.

All in all it's been a very eye opening experience. Being on this message board has been very helpful as well as watching thousands of Youtube videos. You just have to wade through all the scams and BS, which is not easy. I don't think I'll get rich from crypto, but if I do things right it'll definitely be better off than if I didn't get into the space. It's also pretty interesting and seeing how blockchain works and the potential that it has. I have a very long road ahead of me in terms of crypto but as long as it matures in a mostly positive way and I enjoy learning it I'll stay in. My advice is just to get in for as much as you can afford (even if it's $50 - $100). Take baby steps and learn (read everything you can and watch Youtube tutorials), it's a crazy space now but when it does settle down and mature I think you'll be better off getting into it now before mass adoption.

It's crazy to hear that people are being arrested for P2P crypto exchanges, never really knew about that. I realize that there are risks like this and also a risk of being robbed in person, which is why I have only done in person exchanges at local police stations (safe exchange zones).

But my main issue as a newbie is this - I just want to buy crypto instantaneously at the market price when I feel like it, and I don't really see how to do this without joining a KYC exchange or using a KYC app.

I realize I'm still new to the crypto space and need more experience, contacts, and knowledge on how to do things the proper and safe way (and being on this forum has helped a lot with that). But I'm just finding it extremely difficult to make the moves I want to make when I want to make them without giving up personal and bank information on a KYC exchange or app.

Maybe I was a bit delusional since my first couple of P2P exchanges were in person and didn't have to give up any information at all (not even a phone number), but now since those contacts have disappeared from the P2P site I'm struggling to figure out my next strategy on how to purchase. Not being able to buy during the last dip was extremely frustrating and right now having to give up KYC info seems like a trade off that is necessary to do the things I want to do.



 

Since I just entered the crypto space I've only had a couple of purchases (both from the same seller from a P2P site using cash in person). Both of the transactions were very smooth and the seller was really helpful (although I bought too high on the second one which was my fault, but lesson learned). But I think this has spoiled me a bit since I haven't had to give out any bank information yet.

Another thing I've learned is that you can't always rely on the same sellers (especially during a dip like now). I'll probably try another P2P site with no KYC but it just seems harder to buy at a decent price especially during a dip.

I really don't want to use Zelle or bank transactions but now I'm kind of leaning towards buying from a big exchange since it seems to enable you to buy when you feel like it (although the whole fiat to exchange transaction takes time too and I haven't done it yet) .

I would like to buy again during this dip but my inexperience and reluctance to share my bank information is holding me back from purchasing.

Is sending money from your bank account using Zelle to buy crypto on a P2P site considered safe? How anonymous can it be?

So is fiat to crypto conversion on a p2p more safe/secure on a no KYC site like Localcryptos because it's anonymous or on a KYC site like LocalBitcoins? Both sites have good reviews on Trustpilot while Kraken and Coinbase have some pretty bad reviews.

I checked out the Localcryptos site and it looks pretty straightforward.

The users selling with the best rates obviously have less feedback (if any at all) because they're new users. The most popular sellers rates are a lot higher.

So if the crytpo you want to buy has to be put into escrow on the site first before you send payment, then how can you get ripped off by someone?

I mean I guess it's like Ebay where the more positive feedback a user has the more likely you're going to trust buying from them. But Ebay doesn't put the item in escrow first so it's more of a gamble.

Just wondering because I'm new to this. Thanks!

So would Kraken, Binance, Coinbase Pro be considered secure and reputable sites to buy crypto?

I've seen people using CashApp too. Is that safe?

I'm basically just trying to get started but the amount of sites is pretty ridiculous. I have a cold wallet and just want to get used to the whole process.

Where would you guys recommend buying cryptocurrency for the lowest transaction fees? I've been researching but there's so many sites and a lot of them keep changing their fee structure. It's pretty confusing.

Coinbase seems to be the most popular but their 1.5% transaction fee seems pretty high.

I heard Gemini is good but it seems they recently raised their fees? Any advice is much appreciated.

Thanks!