What does speculation actually cost you mentally?

[philipma1957]

Small update: Thanks to everyone who has taken a look so far and shared their experiences and thoughts here. I'm still looking for more responses from crypto users for this independent research survey.

So, if you've shared your experience here but haven't filled out the survey yet, I'd really appreciate it if you could also take it. The discussion is useful but I do need the actual survey responses for the research. It's anonymous, takes about 5 minutes and doesn't collect personal information.

Survey: https://tally.so/r/eqg4QQ?source=bitcointalk (not a ref link)

Thanks.

I filled it out.

I mostly invest not speculate.

Speculating is stressful

Investing is not as bad.

[Cryptoprincess101]

Speculating as a trader is quite different from speculating as an investor. If you're a trader, you will often times find yourself in situations where you will be mentally unstable because the market will dribble your state of mind in such a way that if you are an emotional person, you might just find yourself crying after series of wrong speculations.

An investor don't get much affected by his speculation because he targets the long term and he won't care about the activities of the market until the said time has approached. But still, i don't know why some people rely so much on speculation when it is just a guesswork, no practical proof that the market will work according to how you speculated it.

[Darker45]

I have a small amount on an exchange. I play with the movements of the price once in a while. But I simply execute orders and wait for the next day whether they got filled or not. That's it. I'm not on the screen all day long analyzing which direction the price takes the next minute.

Perhaps the key is to moderate the amount, avoid using high leverage, and be content with small gains. Otherwise, you'd look much older than your age.


https://x.com/Qid_Memez/status/1545234392372887552

[Ashawowo(OS)]

Even if you don't fill it out, curious as to how others here think about both the mental and financial side of speculating.

When I feel hopeless when the price of crypto on the market rises, but I don't believe in speculation, then I blame myself, get depressed, get really stressed, that's when I feel like I'm experiencing mental loss due to crypto speculation.

I think this is a mentality thing, if you hold more mental picture of losses, then you would likely panic steadily when the price is going low. I stop myself from panicking by believing that it would bounce back and focusing more on making more money from my work. I don't like unnecessary emotional tumoil, that is why I don't trade, but I've set my mentality that my holdings would appreciate in due time, so I treat bitcoin as a longterm savings.

There are other things that in my opinion are worse when you experience mental loss, such as emotional turmoil that is no longer stable when you see the market going down but don't buy and when the market goes up but you don't have coins, Sometimes this situation can result in me losing focus in carrying out work activities and also no longer concentrating, being easily sensitive and so on.

Would it not be better you just buy whenever you've funds available, than playing games with the markets, maybe you are in the business of targeting short-term profits and exiting the market. I stopped that a long time ago and have more peace now. I also watch how much I put into buying, I'm definitely not putting more than I can do away with and it is more relaxing when you make much more money than you are putting into bitcoin.

[Haunebu]

Am primarily a long term HODLER who just invests and forgets about them completely for a long, long period of time thanks to which there is literally zero effect on me mentally. What does affect me mentally is the rapid volatility of crypto prices when buying/selling.

For example, I purchased some BTC which I needed for a certain product and the price suddenly dipped like crazy thanks to which I would need to purchase more to complete the transaction. Hate this sort of stuff. Stablecoins help a lot though in this context.

[coinrifft]

Speculating as a trader is quite different from speculating as an investor. If you're a trader, you will often times find yourself in situations where you will be mentally unstable because the market will dribble your state of mind in such a way that if you are an emotional person, you might just find yourself crying after series of wrong speculations.

Right, the clear difference between the two. But I don't know, maybe there are people who wanted to experience trading is, even to the cause of having a mental break down specially if the trades didn't go your way or you have to wait and watch it get liquidated or something.

An investor don't get much affected by his speculation because he targets the long term and he won't care about the activities of the market until the said time has approached. But still, i don't know why some people rely so much on speculation when it is just a guesswork, no practical proof that the market will work according to how you speculated it.

But for the majority of us, it's better to just not complicate things on us. Maybe some of us are old already and we just want to settle our investment without having to think about it all the time. And the answer to that is to become a HODLer, very effective method without putting us in a stressful situation.

[YellowSwap]

I've always hated the feeling of speculation, it's like me having no clue about the market and I am naked completely, anything can happen, the type of feeling I get from gambling.

Until I started learning how to trade and then got my hands on some very effective indicators that I ended up purchasing after good feedbacks from people then now I can easily know where the market is going.

It's not 100% accurate but most of the time it works exactly as predicted, speculation isn't the only thing that I have to rely on to make my buying and selling decisions..

[Doan9269]

Mental strain is one of the first challenges you get from speculating in the market because it takes your time, and you have to think and do it all over again in order to be accurate about the market situation. You cannot speculate without coming out with a tangible outcome from it all.

This is going to solely depend on the decision you are going to make regarding your trading or investment you are about to take, those that go into the market without speculating will definitely know the difference and what it will cost them compared to when they use their mental ability to research before any step is taken.

[B-BossMan]

For me, as a holder, I keep up with the price of Bitcoin, but not because I'm worried, it's because I just want to keep up with Bitcoin's price. The speculation doesn't affect me in any way. This is not to say I don't feel sad when I see the price falling, but I don't get worried because I didn't plan to use the money any time soon. I get affected when I have money I plan to use soon in Bitcoin. In that situation, I can quickly sell when the price is dropping, but other than that, I don't get worried. I have not been in Bitcoin for long, but I have been in it long enough to know that price fluctuations and volatility are normal.

As an investor once you can be able to identify the most relevant differences between the financial situations and a bitcoin's price drop, I don't think you will be affected by any kinds of bitcoin price or bothering yourself about speculation , since we all know the price can fluctuate at anytime. You can only being in trouble when you are been forced to sell at wrong moment, that's it  is good to have an emergency funds for bills, because Bitcoin price can increase or decrease when it likes and non of us can predict the exact time for that or when would the next big move occurs, any investors who chooses to be holding bitcoin for a longer period has would not make any decisions out of panicking. The only issue is, never allow the bitcoin price controls you.

[Marvelockg]

It's not 100% accurate but most of the time it works exactly as predicted, speculation isn't the only thing that I have to rely on to make my buying and selling decisions..

The challenge is that you might appear to be getting it right at this point only for you to start loosing way too much and this is the reason why trading isn't considered to be too profitable from a long term point of view even though the odds that you can be profitable at one point along the way is very possible. It's not so different from gambling only that in place of doing analysis, you might call it speculation but the process is almost the same.

Holding is less stressful mentally because all you need for is to buy and hold. You're not one that's too bothered of short term tendencies and wether or not you should just put when the market is headed a certain direction.. because you're likely commited to bitcoin, you are certain that the degree of bitcoin volatility is relatively moderate.

[Emitdama]

I have a small amount on an exchange. I play with the movements of the price once in a while. But I simply execute orders and wait for the next day whether they got filled or not. That's it. I'm not on the screen all day long analyzing which direction the price takes the next minute.

Perhaps the key is to moderate the amount, avoid using high leverage, and be content with small gains. Otherwise, you'd look much older than your age.

I can relate how exciting is that executing/placing an order part, especially if the amount we set is mostly in favour of us. That is because there is a good chance that it may not be filled yet. So it is either we adjust them again the next day or keep going with that set values. That is how you play this game. In my case, it is a non-mainstream coin that I got from an airdrop last time is the coin that I used here. So I just set the bar low for it, just to liquidate it easily. I do also monitor the coin's value and other stuff to ensure that I don't miss any important updates with it. So I can say that it does affect my mental health a little (in a not so-good way) but good thing that I am graduate with it already .

[osasshem]

The often time price checking is more like a routine for me, just to keep updated with the market price movement. I am not much of a regular trader, but when I have an open trade, I check it often than normal (which is funny even to me, I just can't help it), while when I'm holding, I only check when there is a need to do so. I see Speculation as part of the fun in the crypto market, no one can give an actual market price, because the market is always fluctuating.

I think if there is any mental discomfort about the price movement is when you have an open trade, otherwise, I don't really think it has any effect.

[rbynxx]

So, we talk a lot about strategy, timing (the market), our entries and exits but not much about all the speculation actually does to a person over time. The obsessive checking even when one has bought an asset for the long term (I’m guilty of this, big time), the euphoria when prices go up and our inability to tamp it down in spite of having experienced it before and knowing what’s coming next, and the gut-drop on a loss that just doesn't quite compare to other financial setbacks.

I'm a crypto investor and an independent researcher(/writer), not affiliated with any company or institution and am looking into just how this plays out for people: risk tolerance, financial behavior, and the psychological side of it.

Of course if you're expecting something it will really make your mind race to an unimaginable level of whatnots, but as an investor or trader of course we want the best of it and that's where the FUD comes when it doesn't exceed what you expect. There always has been setbacks not just in the investing world but also what happens in our everyday lives, it's so common. I'll fill the form after this post and would love to hear more about this if you will come up with an article or something.

[Y3shot]

Am primarily a long term HODLER who just invests and forgets about them completely for a long, long period of time thanks to which there is literally zero effect on me mentally. What does affect me mentally is the rapid volatility of crypto prices when buying/selling.

For example, I purchased some BTC which I needed for a certain product and the price suddenly dipped like crazy thanks to which I would need to purchase more to complete the transaction. Hate this sort of stuff. Stablecoins help a lot though in this context.

Dealing with bitcoin, it is expected that volatility will take place, and because of this, if you want to spend bitcoin on something, you shouldn't just rely on the actual amount of bitcoin you want to spend.

It is better for you to add a little more because you can't predict how the volatility of the market will behave, and if eventually there is an increase in price, then you are lucky. Since you understand how bitcoin works, you should be prepared on how to go about it.

[Filicius]

There was a time years ago, when I began to be interested in cryptocurrencies, in which I dedicated myself to speculating with the little money I had, and I confess that being aware of the graphics and the green and red colours even until the early hours of the morning was exciting, fun and almost addictive. I don't know how it will be in other cases, but in mine such a practice was not sustainable, and it didn't last long until I realised the physical and mental exhaustion, apart from the fact that the results were no better than if I had simply settled for investing quietly.

Since then I have not traded, only hodled. Much more peace of mind and all that energy can be dedicated to other more productive or enriching issues, not necessarily in the economic sense.

[ruykeri]

The often time price checking is more like a routine for me, just to keep updated with the market price movement. I am not much of a regular trader, but when I have an open trade, I check it often than normal (which is funny even to me, I just can't help it), while when I'm holding, I only check when there is a need to do so. I see Speculation as part of the fun in the crypto market, no one can give an actual market price, because the market is always fluctuating.

I think if there is any mental discomfort about the price movement is when you have an open trade, otherwise, I don't really think it has any effect.

Do you manage trading and long time holding at the same time? This issue seems more difficult to me. The mentality gets mixed. And in the cryptocurrency market, it is really difficult to follow different strategies for different tokens. I don't know how many tokens you are actually trading and how you can keep your decision without changing after checking the price repeatedly. And if you are thinking of long time holding in investing in bitcoin, then there is no need to create unnecessary mental pressure on yourself by trading in bitcoin and other altcoins at the same time. The goal should be either you will trade or you will hold bitcoin for a long time. Again, if you bring up the issue of trading in altcoins, then the whole thing becomes risky.

[LUCKMCFLY]

Investments are supposed to be strictly strategic, and not moved by sentiments that are not yet concluded as a fact.

It's not a bad approach; investments are meant to build wealth in the long run. In fact, the best asset for that, in my personal opinion, is Bitcoin. When it comes to speculation, if we have an active investment in Bitcoin, it's essential to stay aware of its price action—feeding the position by buying and accumulating more over time. That's how you stay truly active in the market.

Speculation will always be a part of the game. In fact, many profit from it through market manipulation or sentiment swings. News and the movements of high-net-worth individuals buying or selling have a huge impact. It's all part of the market dynamics. It's completely valid to engage in both: market speculation and long-term investing.