Bought at top, sold at the bottom :-( (?)

[Mikcik]

Hello, i would just like to ask, how many people (here or those you know of) bought bitcoin at top (in april (above $200) or at the end of 2013 above i dont know... around $800 or similiar) and when the price had fallen down (to around $100 or below in April and around $500 or below in the end of 2013...) they have sold :-)... Was anybody so naive and stupid :-)?

I bought it over $200 in april and then the price has fallen to $70 and stabilized around $100 for several months, i didnt sell, or even think of selling, i was just reconciled that i have lost my money and be it, or i will just wait, i did even stopped paying bitcoin an attention or just checking the price in the months between :-), but for god sake i didnt think about selling :-).

Did anybody you know bought at top and sold at the bottom? How many % of the new adopters are they, 20%, why are the people so stupid and impulsive?

[lonsharim]

It might be naive but most people who bought high and sold low - would have done it in the belief that it is going to drop some more, but they gravely over estimate the bottom price.

In your example you bought at 200, what if you sold at 100 and bought back at 70? then you would end up with more Bitcoins. If you badly miscalculated then you sold at 70 hoping to buy back at 50 but that never happened, it went back to 140 and you paid a big price, you bought at an inflated price and you have less than half of even that.

I think that's what happens to most people who try their luck on the exchange. If you are a newbie, and you are on an exchange like btc-e then you don't take the trollbox with a pinch of salt.

Also I feel if you have never traded before (like in regular stocks etc) then the inexperience of trading itself can become a handicap if you are not well prepared.

I lost of couple of litecoins before I found my feet. I am actually glad I lost it because it was a great learning experience in what not to do. As yet that loss is not big enough to hurt but the lesson I consider is big.

[Kazimir]

Nobody bought or sold at the top, cause we haven't seen the top yet.

[LeChatNoir]

I think your post is stupid and impulsive.
Not having sold when the price has fallen to 70$ doesn't necessarily make you a smart person but having bought over 200$ during the insane April mania makes you look a little bit impulsive.

[bryant.coleman]

I sold 10% of my Bitcoins at $1,010.... but then panicked and bought them back for $1,015. Damn... it went all the way to $480. I'd have gained a lot had I waited for some time.

[LiteCoinGuy]

Nobody bought or sold at the top, cause we haven't seen the top yet.

  could be true.

[Frost000]

All of my buying in the past month or so averages out to just under $700, so I'm happy. I won't even consider re-selling for a while and when I do so, it'll only be a fraction of my coins that'll go.

In it for the long haul... No panic selling for me!

[tclo]

Did anybody you know bought at top and sold at the bottom? How many % of the new adopters are they, 20%, why are the people so stupid and impulsive?

I don't get it either...seems like it would be smart to put a tight stop on any purchase. If you buy at 250 and it drops 5% on you, then get out and you can always buy back in later.  Some people say it's smarter to watch it go down to 65 and lose 75% of your money but I would disagree with that opinion and "strategy".

[thesouljourner]

I bought at 800 when it had stabilized there for a while late November (and was pretty happy when it went over 1100) and then bought at 725 as it was falling from 1000 after China closed up shop.  There was a little bump in the drop and that's where I bought, figuring it was going back up and a 25% drop was all that was likely to happen.  Well.... not exactly.  I wanted to buy more when it hit 500, but I'm not made of money, and my wife said we'd spent enough already, heh.

[yenom]

Hindsight is 20/20

[Bismarckbkk]

Why do people make stupid threads?

[jongameson]

hey i was stupid once, i bought Amazon.com at the peak in 2000 at $103 a share, and panic sold at $71 a month later.  i was stupid cause i didn't hold on.  now it's at $403     

[Mikcik]

I think your post is stupid and impulsive.
Not having sold when the price has fallen to 70$ doesn't necessarily make you a smart person but having bought over 200$ during the insane April mania makes you look a little bit impulsive.

Actually no :-), not selling when the price dropped to 70 makes me smart, buying above makes me not stupid or impulsive but a newbie, since i really didnt have experience in trading (like somebody) said and i didnt know that much about "bubles" or "temporaty bubles" :-). But even I with zero trading experience wasnt so "afraid" or stupid to sell so low :-). But on the other hand, i did give into BTC only a small ammount of cash (quite), not all my savings, so i was pretty comfortable even if i loss everyting. On the other hand people who go all in on bitcoin i think that they are stupid, or STUPIDLY HIGHLY RISKY :-).

I don't get it either...seems like it would be smart to put a tight stop on any purchase. If you buy at 250 and it drops 5% on you, then get out and you can always buy back in later.  Some people say it's smarter to watch it go down to 65 and lose 75% of your money but I would disagree with that opinion and "strategy".-----


Well i dont know, but im in for the long run so i dont know how people think who are in for a short term gain. But i think everybody would agree that when you buy at the top (not knowing that IT IS the top and realizing it only when you see the price decling, its worth simply to "hold on" (in a long term at least).

So you are suggesting that the majority of the people who bought high and sold low were just newbies to trading and it was all a panic sell :-)? (in that case the people are almost stupid :-) )

[sir faps]

hey i was stupid once, i bought Amazon.com at the peak in 2000 at $103 a share, and panic sold at $71 a month later.  i was stupid cause i didn't hold on.  now it's at $403     

I would argue that the future value of the money you had from the sale at $71 on 2000 would have been better put to use in other stocks, so maybe it wasn't such a bad thing for you to sell 

[wachtwoord]

hey i was stupid once, i bought Amazon.com at the peak in 2000 at $103 a share, and panic sold at $71 a month later.  i was stupid cause i didn't hold on.  now it's at $403     

I would argue that the future value of the money you had from the sale at $71 on 2000 would have been better put to use in other stocks, so maybe it wasn't such a bad thing for you to sell 

$103-->$403 is 11% per year on average for anyone wondering.

[sir faps]

hey i was stupid once, i bought Amazon.com at the peak in 2000 at $103 a share, and panic sold at $71 a month later.  i was stupid cause i didn't hold on.  now it's at $403     

I would argue that the future value of the money you had from the sale at $71 on 2000 would have been better put to use in other stocks, so maybe it wasn't such a bad thing for you to sell 

$103-->$403 is 11% per year on average for anyone wondering.

Which I will agree is much higher than the return has been on $ parked in an index fund since 2000

[piramida]

You did well op. Some people here are much less smart than that, and repeatedly do the buy high - sell low cycle. They usually believe that bitcoin is going to drop 10x or more at every dip. They don't learn. We call them bears and feed them, they are rare almost extinct specie.

[DPoS]

hey i was stupid once, i bought Amazon.com at the peak in 2000 at $103 a share, and panic sold at $71 a month later.  i was stupid cause i didn't hold on.  now it's at $403     

I would argue that the future value of the money you had from the sale at $71 on 2000 would have been better put to use in other stocks, so maybe it wasn't such a bad thing for you to sell 

$103-->$403 is 11% per year on average for anyone wondering.

it was around $6 after 9/11         

[notme]

Did anybody you know bought at top and sold at the bottom? How many % of the new adopters are they, 20%, why are the people so stupid and impulsive?

I don't get it either...seems like it would be smart to put a tight stop on any purchase. If you buy at 250 and it drops 5% on you, then get out and you can always buy back in later.  Some people say it's smarter to watch it go down to 65 and lose 75% of your money but I would disagree with that opinion and "strategy".

Good luck with a "tight stop" in this market.  If the volatility doesn't shake you out of a good position, this market moves so quick you can expect between 5 and 40% slippage between your stop price and execution price.

[porcupine87]

I sold 10% of my Bitcoins at $1,010.... but then panicked and bought them back for $1,015. Damn... it went all the way to $480. I'd have gained a lot had I waited for some time.

So true. If you call someone's all in with 10J and win against the AA, was this a smart move? If you have only few chips left, and you go all-in with AJ and lose against AK or A10, was this a bad move? No!
The same thing is with prices. Buying at $200 or $1200 and selling at $70 or $500 could be either smart or stupid. In hindsight you are always smarter? When I know, somebody has AA, then it is stupid to go all-in with KK. When I know, the bottom is at 70/500 it is stupid to sell. When I know the price will drop after 200/1200, it is stupid to buy.

But nobody knows!

So it is all about propabilities (and time preferences).

Professional trading is like poker. You make many, many, many trades. You lose, you win, you lose, you win. But in average you win. Maybe 55% of all trades are with profit and 45% not.