What is the best strategy for someone who has $1,000/5,000 to invest?

[botolo86]

Hello Friends,

I have been following the Bitcoin world for a couple of weeks now. I am super excited about this, not only because of investment opportunities but mostly as a tech lover.

One of my coolest moment as a computer geek was when I installed the Seti @ Home client many many years ago on the first iMac I bought with my own money (a bondi blue) and I was in love with the idea of crowdsourcing.

Now mining deeply excites me for similar reasons but I understand that it is not profitable anymore, at least without huge investments. I thought for some time to buy some Erupters and have fun building a small farm but I realized that it would be a complete waste of time and money. One thing is to have fun spending $100/200, another thing is to buy tons of Erupters hoping to make a profit.

Now I want to dig deep in this Bitcoin revolution with the money I have, not a lot. I can invest something between $1,000 and $5,000 (not a lot, unfortunately). Of course I could just buy some Bitcoins and wait but that would be super boring. Is there any other strategy you would use? Maybe buy some old mining equipment on eBay and mine alt coins?

What would you do if you wanted to start being a part of the Bitcoin world but at the same time if you don't want to just throw money our of the window?

TIA

[botolo86]

I would buy and keep it. Mining alt-coins won't pay off that much. Some people are waiting for the bubble to burst before they invest in buying more coins.

The value of BTC/USD keeps on going up at such fast rate that I doubt whether there will be a new burst. Anyhow, thanks a lot for your suggestion. If I want to buy some BTC, where would you recommend to buy them? Coinbase? Localbitcoins?

[pliznau]

I have started to be part of this crypto currency mania. What i do is simple: read learn read some more and read some more. I don't want to do something because of someone else. Make your own choices and you must take the blame if you fail and the glory if you land a nice deal.

[botolo86]

I have started to be part of this crypto currency mania. What i do is simple: read learn read some more and read some more. I don't want to do something because of someone else. Make your own choices and you must take the blame if you fail and the glory if you land a nice deal.

Well, giving suggestions and getting tips is part of being informed. I read tons of stuff and I just wanted to check with you guys what you think would be the best strategy. I am interested in what you guys think.

[Birdy]

I wouldn't recommend mining, just buying the Bitcoins seems to be the best options.
But make sure you read enough about how to store them securely.

[corebob]

My current strategy, being poor on btc, is to wait for the burst, then buy with fiat.

"I wait, therfore I am..."

[deadweasel]

I would buy and keep it. Mining alt-coins won't pay off that much. Some people are waiting for the bubble to burst before they invest in buying more coins.

Set yourself up, completely verified, on several exchanges.  

Get your fiat money wired in and ready in your exchange accounts -- this takes a while!

Research BTC historical prices, mood swings, current btc events, etc so on and so forth.  Determine your strategy/plan, set your buy-in point.  

Set a limit order on the exchange of your choice for 1/5 of your fiat at the price level you want to get in at.  Now set buys distance above and a distance below that (you determine this).

Once you have your coin, it's your decision to hold, day trade, invest, gamble, etc.  


Good Luck!

[RodeoX]

I would advise these steps, assuming you are in the U.S..
First set up a trade account at an exchange. Let's say campbx.com.

Now you will need to fund your account. Send a USPS money order to them and wait for it to be credited to your account (maybe a week, maybe less).

In the mean time I would download the bitcoin-qt client from bitcoin.org and start the long process of synchronizing with the network. Downloading the block chain may take days and is not very interesting.

Now that you have dollars in your exchange account you can begin buying bitcoins. You can pay current price or set a lower price you will pay and hope someone comes down to meet it. When your buy price and the ask price come together a buy will be executed and you now have bitcoin. Yay.

The next step is to withdraw the coins to your bitcoin-qt client. The exchange will need a receiving address to send the coins. Your qt client will generate receiving addresses when you request one. You withdraw your funds to that address and you will soon see them on your copy of qt.

The last and MOST important step is making multiple copies of your wallet.dat file.  If you were to loose that file or it became corrupted, you are screwed. Your coins are gone forever.

Keep your wallet copies secure! Put one in a safe deposit box, mail one to your Uncle in Boston, whatever. Almost all problems are fixable if you have that file.

[po1992one]

Best is buy small amount every month in fixed day if your not good trader. This way, you cant go wrong, at least historical data says so 

[Gator-hex]

What would you do if you wanted to start being a part of the Bitcoin world but at the same time if you don't want to just throw money our of the window?

Install Bitcoin-Qt and help keep the network decentralized.

[Odrec]

Best is buy small amount every month in fixed day if your not good trader. This way, you cant go wrong, at least historical data says so 

Forgive my ignorance. What is fixed day?

[MassDivide]

Buy BTC when low, sell when high.

or

Buy a small mining assembly 60GH/s and let it run. Then invest in the same way above.

[Birdy]

Buy BTC when low, sell when high.

[sarcasm]Genius.[/sarcasm]

[exstasie]

I would suggest it buying and holding. I don't have much but I've bought some and accumulated a bit since I started. I've gotten about 0.2btc for free in the last week by wining for free promos, getting free BTC from people, etc. just going to keep accumulating and hope it'll be worth something in the future.

[Lauda]

Depends on what you want to do or how you want to proceed with it.
If you are okay with holding the funds for a longer period of time then just buy and store bitcoin offline.

[hope4me]

Just buy BTC, the days of buying mining hardware is over - not profitable anymore.

[po1992one]

Best is buy small amount every month in fixed day if your not good trader. This way, you cant go wrong, at least historical data says so 

Forgive my ignorance. What is fixed day?

Like 1st day every month, so you will not guessing if buying or not because if you say I will wait for lower price, you may not buy anymore..

[Lauda]

Just buy BTC, the days of buying mining hardware is over - not profitable anymore.

Well until we have Gen2 it's unprofitable.

[bluemystic]

Buy BTC at a low price and wait till it goes up.. simple as that

[mobilephone92]

I'd stay away from mining hardware like the plague.

There are already a lot of people with some very powerful asic hardware that have their setup running as you read this. By time you received your order difficulty could have risen by anything from 25% to 100s%, depending on who you order with and whether they have a preorder backlog...