You don't actually lose until you sell...
A subtle yet important difference...
People keep talking about how much they have lost on bitcoin and crypto, but they technically haven't lost anything until they sell...
Are you down on crypto?
If you are like most people currently you are likely down on at least some of your investments, if not all of them.
However, that is all you, down.
You haven't lost a single penny as of yet.
That's the exact message that the president of El Salvador delivered yesterday as pundit after pundit keeps clamoring about how much money El Salvador has lost due to their bitcoin investments...
He said very simply, no we haven't lost anything. We only lose when we sell.
And he's not wrong...
(Source: https://twitter.com/BitcoinMagazine/status/1575943263546011648/photo/1)
Upvoted! Thank you for supporting witness @jswit.
Well, don't take it as anything but devil's advocate I suppose (I do agree mostly with the sentiment), however, I have been investing in stocks/crypto for the better part of a decade now and you can can't simply assume prices will rebound. In general they probably will, but I have also been invested in companies that went the way of the dodo and took my money.
Right now, the market is screwed across the board so it does feel like the playing field is leveled a little bit.
True, though in this scenario I am referring specifically to bitcoin. If bitcoin doesn't eventually make new highs I would say it is because it failed. It's somewhat of a binary bet, either it goes to nothing or it goes up tremendously from here. Selling in between the two is certainly possible, but mostly just noise in the the overall picture.
I feel like you can say the same about many assets, from most speculative stocks to most cryptocurrencies.
I certainly don't feel Bitcoin will fail, and do agree with the basic premise that you don't lose unless you sell. Unless, of course, the underlying asset does fail. Again, I don't see that in the near future for Bitcoin. Even if it does fail, it won't be now. Still though, no matter the asset, it is certainly possible and I have witnessed it first hand more than once for a variety of reasons.