Author: Dyme

Compiled by: Luffy, Foresight News

The market is a fascinating thing. It often rewards bad behavior, but it always reverts to the mean. Those who never consider this will eventually suffer the consequences and become humbled.

Several people have recently asked me how I was able to start from zero and gradually achieve consistent and substantial profits, surpassing previous trading results and pushing my portfolio to new highs.

In short: deep capitulation, stupid mistakes, and luck.

My "zero" is different from others', but it also has similarities. It's never literally nothing, but a spiritual collapse, a complete abandonment of myself.

I failed miserably in everything I tried, and had to slowly crawl out of the dark abyss. Then, I bounced back. You have no idea if I'm playing a role-playing game. I'm not, but you don't have to believe me.

I've never written down all of these experiences, only sharing snippets here and there over the years. My friends and many of the people who've been following me know what happened. I went from "a stupid top signal" to "now Dyme seems to have a clear understanding of the market."

Unless you understand the pain I went through, you won't get anything useful from this article. So, buckle up, we're about to embark on a journey. It's going to be a long story.

If you don't want to listen to my boring story, feel free to skip to "What You Want to Read (The Best)." It's time to put these experiences into perspective.

2019

After about four and a half years at a job I didn't enjoy, I finally quit. I'd been a staunch Bitcoin supporter for years. But seeing people getting rich through leveraged trading, I wanted to try it too, so I decided to take six months off from work to learn how to trade.

I knew nothing about chart analysis or trading, yet I started dabbling in options and stock trading, learning to draw lines on charts. Anyone who remembers my early charts knows they were a mess, and my judgment was often wrong. More importantly, I had absolutely no concept of risk management.

However, I realized that reading market signals was becoming increasingly important. I kept playing with those amateur charts, and after 2017, my online friends became increasingly skilled at it.

Many of us became incredibly wealthy in 2017, but with Bitcoin's 80% plunge, our fortunes slipped away. I'm sure I wasn't the only one who thought, "It's time to learn chart analysis so I don't lose so much money again."

In 2019, I had about two to three thousand followers, mostly cryptocurrency enthusiasts.

I didn't get into this to become famous; I just wanted to spend six months focusing on trading and learning the basics. Techniques like chart patterns and moving averages. I had no idea which ones would work and which ones wouldn't. But I had to try anyway.

I had six months' worth of savings, plus unemployment benefits. My life was secure for the foreseeable future.

So, in August 2019, given my years of service, I asked my employer to let me go (notoriously, they never objected to unemployment benefits). They agreed.

Unfortunately, Bitcoin reached its 2019 high shortly thereafter, and the market remained volatile and flat until mid-2020. It couldn't have come at a worse time to quit and dedicate myself to trading full-time.

I finally had time to think, learn, and do things I never had time for while working 40 or 50 hours a week, with all the risks and drawbacks that come with that freedom.

I set out to take action. I traded S&P 500 call options, traded stocks, and studied charts daily, hoping to make at least $100 to $500 a day. The cryptocurrency market was sluggish in the year leading up to 2020, and I only managed to make sporadic profits, but I managed to persevere.

If I hadn't been a complete novice, the trading environment would have been quite good.

2020

Things were going well. I logged in daily to share my (bad) opinions, and my followers grew. I occasionally made a profit, and my account balance generally trended upward. People appreciated me sharing valuable information online, as not everyone has the time to think about it (after all, they have jobs). I lost a lot of money, but I always recovered it quickly. For a beginner, that was more than acceptable.

Margin trading became my lifestyle. I stared at 15-minute charts, trading with 20x leverage, desperately trying to profit from the market, and it wasn't until my position hit its highest point on February 20th that I felt confident I was trading well.

Then, the nuclear weapon of COVID-19 hit.

Almost the same week, my unemployment benefits expired.

So, my plan to study for a while and then find a regular job was instantly shattered. It felt like the end of the world—a new virus had emerged.

I managed to short sell, and during the pandemic-induced market crash, I turned 0.5 Bitcoin into 1 Bitcoin using 50x leverage. That was the only thing that went well that week; my stocks were decimated, and I was certain my income was going to be wiped out.

It was as if fate had orchestrated this, forcing me to dedicate myself to trading.

Thankfully, Jerome (Federal Reserve Chairman) and his "printing press" saved the day.

Everyone knows what happened next. The market soared for a year. It was truly the peak of "only up, no down." While the market could be profitable, it was also ridiculous.

FTX

Even more exciting than a rising market is leveraged trading. I had some experience, but it was limited, and I had little understanding of the macro environment. All I knew was that Jerome was printing money, and the market would definitely rise.

Then, our "savior" arrived, leading us to a paradise and doing nothing terrible.

We didn't know it then, but FTX was about to take us on a journey of a lifetime.

I deposited about $4,000 to $5,000 into FTX and bought FTT (the FTX platform token) in installments of $2 to $4.

FTT appreciated 3,000%. I suddenly had $40,000 to $50,000 in my leveraged account. I'd never had that much money before. (This was the first red flag.)

I deposited more, hoping to trade more leveraged, because my FTT was staked and couldn't be used as collateral. By then, I was completely emotionally invested in the FTX ecosystem.

I still can't believe this chart is real.

The day I hit 10,000 followers coincided with the start of the "only up" market. This world is full of surprises.

I went from someone who only replied to other people's tweets to someone who has become a minor celebrity.

In the following months, despite the incredibly good market conditions, my physical and mental health deteriorated. The lockdown in my area was very strict. My weight skyrocketed, and I only left the house two or three times a week. My routine was a mess. I became close friends with the DoorDash delivery drivers and ate 4,000 to 5,000 calories a day to cope with the despair and doom brought on by the pandemic.

Those were terrible times.

But I was making a killing in the markets, my bills were paid, and all my assets were going up, so I kept increasing my investment.

I often used 10x to 20x leverage. Some days I'd make $40,000, others I'd lose $20,000.

I also ran a lending business, traded perpetual contracts for yield, and blindly invested in various new altcoins (like COPE).

I often stayed up late because I didn't like waking up early, and since I didn't have a job, I would wait until the market opened, make a few trades, and then sleep until 4 p.m.

It wasn't good for my health either.

In addition, I earned a decent income by referring others to register. During peak weeks, I could make $1,000 a day.

I used that money to trade and even covered some of my losses.

I caught several rallies in Dogecoin, SOL, Bitcoin, and various altcoins.

I was a classic bull market "genius."

The market rewarded me.

https://x.com/CryptoParadyme/status/1388019214515118080

My highest account balance on FTX was around $250,000, primarily thanks to Sol, FTT, and Bitcoin.

Later, SBF (the founder of FTX) reduced the daily withdrawal limit for accounts without KYC (identity verification) from $9,000 to $2,000. Looking back, this might have been the first sign of his subsequent legal troubles, but who knows?

I withdrew my funds every few days, but they were still effectively trapped in FTX, and I was insatiable, wanting more. I calculated that it would take about 120 days to withdraw all my funds, and I had to log in every day to withdraw them.

Part of the blame lies with SBF's new rules, but it's also my own. There was a moment when I thought, "I should withdraw this $250,000 and improve my life."

I could have withdrawn all my funds before FTX went bankrupt.

Even after the market peaked in November 2021, I continued gambling. I was no longer trading, I was bucking the trend. Even when market buying dried up, I was still fighting Bitcoin's cycles.

Every day brought new losses, and combined with my constant withdrawals and losses, my account balance quickly dwindled to zero.

I lost two-thirds of my funds on FTX because I forced trades. I spent most of my trading career in "only going up" markets, with no one warning me to change my strategy, except Jim and Insilico, whom I considered pesky bears. But they were one of the few who accurately identified the top. They deserve credit for that.

During that time, there were no golden opportunities to enter the market, only endless suffering.

2022

Things got worse.

In the first week of 2022, my grandmother, who raised me and was one of the most important people in my life, passed away.

We knew this was coming, but it didn't make it any easier. She was in constant pain, and we were somewhat relieved that she was finally at peace.

With the death of my family, the outlook was bleak, and the market still had no upward trend.

By sheer luck, I inherited some money a few months later. It wasn't much, but it was something.

I was in awe of the money because of where it came from. But it wasn’t life-changing in any sense.

So, like a gambler, I tried to invest in dividend stocks for income on my dad’s advice, and I lost 20% in four or five months.

Obviously, in a rate hike cycle, no one wanted dividend stocks.

I didn’t want to risk the money anymore.

So I saved the cash (the first sign that I was learning something) in an account that I barely paid attention to. I needed to think, and I didn’t know much about the market at the time.

Hit the Bottom

Stocks were still generally up until early 2022, and I was doing pretty well trading them.

My brokerage account balance peaked at $120,000 in 2021, compared to about $20,000 when I started—pretty good for a beginner.

Interest rates had been low for 14 years, and I had no idea what I was doing. I'd made money going long the S&P 500 for the previous two years, so I continued to doodle and try to make a big bet.

A few months passed. I occasionally went short, but didn't make much money. I kept losing money. I kept trying to buy the dip.

What people don't remind you about in trading is that both losses and gains compound. But so did the mental fatigue from the losing streak, just as the euphoria of the previous streak had blinded me to potential declines.

My need for income grew, leading me down a risky path as I tried to recover my losses.

I was trading on emotion, and I was still overweight, with lockdowns still in place. I lost a lot of weight and wiped out my entire portfolio.

Then I finally hit rock bottom. In a moment of extreme mental uncertainty, I invested my last $40,000 of personal capital in some S&P 500 call options, because the market was finally turning around, and I was never going to make that mistake again.

Jerome raised interest rates again. The market plummeted. In a matter of hours, I was down about $30,000 to $35,000.

Looking back, I think I was avoiding the thought of my grandmother's death, pushing myself into a corner to feel some pain. It wasn't easy at all; it was a tumultuous period in my life.

I think I had about $8,000 to $10,000 to my name (not counting my IRA and inheritance, which I couldn't touch) and a bunch of worthless silver.

My confidence was completely shattered.

That was my "zero."

I think I lost over $400,000 in total. I've never done a complete count, though.

Everyone's "zero" is different. It's never literally zero, but for me, it meant that the hard work of the past few years had been wasted and I needed to make a change.

My attempt to trade full-time from 2019 to 2022 ultimately failed.

I had bills to pay, and my money was going to be gone in two or three months.

The stupidest thing I could have done was to dip into my meager funds to try to recover the losses. Fortunately, I suppressed that thought.

I started selling physical assets to pay the bills, even selling some silver to pay the rent, which I had never done before.

I started looking for a job. But I was emotionally broken and a complete mess. There was no way I could find a job in that state. I imagine many of us in 2022 are probably feeling similarly.

My parents had to step in to help me pay the bills several times.

After years of self-sufficiency, having to ask my parents for help to avoid being evicted was incredibly difficult.

I found some online odd jobs to make ends meet, but it wasn't enough to live on.

Things couldn't get any worse. It was probably the most humbling moment of my life.

I focused my energy on going to the gym and thinking about the market. I even temporarily logged off Twitter several times. I didn't know what to do next.

I spent a lot of time in the library. I read a lot of macroeconomics books. I'm not sure how much I've retained, but it did provide some comfort.

2023-2024

In May 2023, I did the responsible thing—I got a job.

Once I had settled down and my income covered my foreseeable needs, in August I used money my grandmother had left me to buy some Bitcoin for around $25,000. It wasn't a large sum, but it was my first significant investment in over a year.

This decision wasn't made lightly. I spent months thinking, researching the market, and rebuilding my financial reserves.

Again, it wasn’t a lot of money (less than $100,000). I knew Bitcoin would continue to rise, and I did what I thought was the responsible thing.

I also put my meager IRA money into Bitcoin, betting on the approval of a Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) through the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC).

I put these investments aside and left them alone. To this day, I haven't cashed out any of these funds to my bank account, but I've cashed in some profits at various times.

I continued working. I continued to accumulate Bitcoin.

I'm sure my grandmother would be delighted by the appreciation of these investments; this final act of her life pulled me out of the depths and pointed me in the right direction.

I continued working. But I drew on the experience I'd gained in the market over the years and learned from past mistakes.

I bought more Bitcoin and Solver. I deposited the money into other accounts every week (out of sight, out of mind).

About three years later.

Everything clicked. Now, my portfolio has reached new highs multiple times.

Since mid-2023, I've been consistently profitable and minimizing losses.

I finally figured out how to do this right.

My Portfolio Value

What You Want to Read (Highlights)

Did you skip right here? That's okay.

I'm sure you've realized I've done a lot of stupid things, and maybe you've done some too (you definitely have).

I completely changed the way I trade and invest in the markets.

I became more focused, rarely sold, and looked for multiple factors influencing my trades. When I feel confident, I increase my investment and responsibly invest a portion of my income to rebuild my cash reserves.

I've had several major successes. Besides Bitcoin, I've also had success with meme coins like ARM, COIN, SPY, SOL, and DOGE.

These trades have yielded substantial returns because I understood the underlying narratives, patiently invested at critical moments of market panic, and decisively took profits when I sensed a market peak.

Once I exit a trade, I keep a portion of my money for the long term and look for the next opportunity.

These $10,000 to $20,000 gains quickly turned into six-figure profits, allowing me to experience something only a few can: the power of compound interest.

Take advantage of compound interest. As your portfolio grows, its effects become increasingly pronounced.

90% of my trades involve holding high-quality assets in spot trading, with some options thrown in.

The Hard Lesson

Mindset

Making money no longer brings me the euphoric rush it once did. Sure, making money is "good" for me and my portfolio. But you're a money manager, working to grow your account. You made $10,000 last week, but how were your quarterly results?

If you're "excited" about a trade, you're probably doing it for the wrong reasons. You need to be a ruthless operator when it comes to growing and preserving capital.

Reality Check

The cash or assets on the exchange aren't real. They're fake.

"It's fake, it's all fake. It's a scam, a trap. It's like fairy dust. It doesn't exist. It's never been made. It's irrelevant. It's not even on the periodic table... It's fucking unreal."

Withdraw your money to your own account, otherwise someone will always take it away.

Leverage

Use leverage sparingly and responsibly. I've only made about four leveraged trades in this entire trading cycle. I've tried it many times, but leverage no longer excites me. I still trade options weekly, but on a fraction of the scale I used to—just for fun.

Follow the Money

It's easier said than done, but it was clear last year's meme coin frenzy was a great opportunity to make money. So I participated, but always with small positions. Small bets, big rewards.

There are several coins where I've turned 1 to 5 Sols into 40, 50, or even 100 Sols.

I've had a few losses (Boden coin, which cost me $100,000, RTR coin, and various other scam coins). But because I manage my risk size, the losses are now more of an annoyance than a real threat.

Just don't get stuck in any market you're following.

Understand the Narrative

Whether it's artificial intelligence, Solana Summer, a Bitcoin ETF, or Ethereum's decline, there are always narratives emerging, and charts often reveal market trends. Is anyone buying on the dip? Buy it too.

Bitcoin? BlackRock is buying heavily, and other institutions are following suit. Then buy in.

Artificial intelligence? Great. Going long Nvidia was (and probably still is) a great trade.

HOOD? The bank for young people. Then buy in.

Don't fight the trend. The market keeps rising? Then follow the trend until it becomes unreasonable.

Hold Spot with Confidence

There's no exit price or maintenance cost for spot positions. I wish someone had told me this earlier. If you want to trade perpetual contracts, make sure your core capital is separate from your trading account. Don't put your entire net worth into perpetual swaps.

I fell into the leverage trap early on, thinking it was the "only way" to make money.

Accept Losses

The market doesn't care how smart you are. If you lose a lot, accept the loss and start over. Don't harbor illusions that a trade will just work in your favor, especially when using leverage.

Market psychology is real

Think back to 2023 and 2024; a lot of meaningless things caused the market to plummet. Even on a chart, a broken support level was a bullish signal.

Put yourself in the shoes of those who are dumber than you. When they're fearful, do the opposite. Focus on longer time frames and mark your price levels. Sell small when the market gets overly optimistic; buy when it dips.

Typically, when cryptocurrency liquidations exceed $1 billion (in a bearish direction), it's time to buy. However, as the cryptocurrency market expands, this number may need to be adjusted upward.

Time is your greatest asset

Everyone has time, until the end of their lives. You can use it through patience.

Learn to observe the market

It sounds simple, but one of the mistakes I made at market tops was not recognizing shifts in market conditions, such as interest rate fluctuations, the cryptocurrency bear market, and so on.

In hindsight, it's clear that people aren't generally making money anymore; the market landscape has shifted.

It's okay to not make money for a month or two.

Waiting for opportunities is a good thing. Identify market extremes and take advantage of big moves when they occur.

The market will present you with opportunities for compound growth; all you have to do is stay calm and seize them.

If you trade for the money, you'll be emotionally predisposed to make money every day, forcing you to trade.

When you become a comfortable spot swing trader, you develop the patience and insight to think things through.

Stay focused

Managing 40 positions is a fool's errand unless you're doing it full-time. You only need 1-3 good trades and increasing your position size.

When you have the ability, a blind robo-advisor is a great place to park your cash.

Hedge against your excitement and foolishness with a third party was a huge breakthrough for me. Most of them don't do anything fancy; they just invest in index funds and sit back and enjoy the profits, charging a few basis points in fees.

I can't express how much better it is to have a real wealth manager or robo-advisor where you just put your money and forget about it. Trust that the market will rise in the long run, and let them do what has worked for decades.

This is especially helpful if you're new to technical analysis or have trouble trading.

The market is simply a reflection of emotions, and once you can control your emotions and hedge against your own foolishness... good things will happen.

I believe this account reflects my recollection as accurately as possible.

I hope you enjoyed reading this. I hope it helps someone. And never commit suicide (I almost did).