This episode reveals a battle-tested crypto playbook for turning a three-figure portfolio into seven figures, focusing on the psychological evolution and strategic discipline required to navigate volatile markets.
The Early Days: Learning Through Losses (2017-2018)
- The speaker begins by recounting his entry into crypto in 2017 with a $300 investment in XRP, funded by his university student loan. He candidly describes his initial experience as being "totally useless," making the classic beginner's mistake of thinking he was a genius during a bull run, only to get "absolutely wrecked" in the subsequent crash.
- This first stage is defined by following algorithmic recommendations, having no foundational knowledge, and essentially throwing darts at a board.
- The speaker emphasizes that this painful learning process is a common starting point for almost every investor. His key takeaway was the necessity of sticking around to understand the market's mechanics rather than quitting after the first major loss.
Finding a Foothold: Curation and Conviction (2018-2019)
- After the initial crash, the speaker shifted his focus to intensive learning and information curation. He began meticulously building a Twitter list of consistently profitable and early-moving analysts, filtering out the noise from large accounts shilling projects. This period was about immersing himself in the industry by consuming podcasts, videos, and technical analysis (TA) courses.
- A critical lesson from this phase was the danger of "borrowing conviction." The speaker stresses that without a self-developed thesis, an investor won't know when to enter or, more importantly, when to exit a position.
- He had a relatively lucky break by getting into Chainlink (LINK) at a sub-dollar price. The thesis was simple and powerful: LINK provided the infrastructure to bring off-chain data on-chain, a concept even a novice could grasp.
- DeFi Summer (2020): This refers to a period of explosive growth in the decentralized finance sector, characterized by high yields, new protocols, and massive investor interest. The speaker's early positioning in infrastructure plays like LINK set the stage for capitalizing on this trend.
The Mid-Curve Trap: Being Right vs. Making Money
- As his knowledge grew, the speaker entered a phase he calls the "mid-curve," where an investor has enough understanding to form strong fundamental theses but fails to account for market irrationality. This often leads to being correct in theory but not profitable in practice.
- During this time, he made his first significant profit (around $20,000) from his LINK position and early entries into DeFi Summer and Binance Smart Chain (BSC) season.
- However, he admits he still didn't truly know what he was doing and was hit hard by the March 2020 COVID crash. He describes this loss as stinging more than the 2017 one, calling it a necessary "touching the stove moment" that teaches invaluable lessons about risk.
The Psychological Shift: Embracing Idiocy for Profit
- The speaker identifies the third and most crucial stage of an investor's progression: recognizing you are an "idiot" and shifting focus from being right to making money. This involves detaching from projects, avoiding becoming a "community member," and understanding the market as a game of predicting what others will value in the future.
- Keynesian Beauty Contest: An economic concept where investors price assets not based on their own fundamental view, but on what they believe other investors think the asset is worth. The speaker argues this is the primary game in crypto markets.
- He introduces the concepts of Easy Mode (when liquidity is entering the system) and Hard Mode (when liquidity is leaving). Success depends on knowing which mode the market is in and adapting your strategy accordingly.
- During the 2020-2021 Easy Mode, he grew his portfolio to its first six figures but made the mistake of being overly diversified on the way up and giving too much back on the way down.
A Trial by Fire: Losing and Rebuilding It All
- This period was defined by a catastrophic loss and an intense recovery. After his portfolio peaked at around $350,000, he lost everything due to a suspected hardware issue with a Trezor wallet's 25th-word seed phrase. Left with only $30,000 (some of which was gifted by friends), he entered a state of "tunnel vision" to rebuild.
- He attributes his recovery to learning more in this short, high-pressure period than at any other time.
- "If anyone's watching this and has been through that, it's the first time you go through that where it's just like this could have changed my life and you give it back. You're like, it's not a good feeling."
- This experience underscores the brutal nature of crypto risk and the mental fortitude required to recover from devastating setbacks.
Taming the Bear: Mastering Self-Awareness (2022-2023)
- The subsequent bear market, marked by the collapses of FTX, Luna, and USDC de-pegging, taught him another hard lesson: you cannot out-trade a bad market. He admits to repeating past mistakes by over-trading and fighting the lack of liquidity, giving back approximately 80% of his gains.
- The turning point was a period of deep self-reflection. He concluded that mastering one's own behavioral patterns is more important than trying to control the market.
- His comeback strategy was a high-conviction, contrarian bet on Solana (SOL) when market sentiment was at its lowest, with many dismissing it as the "FTX chain." He allocated everything he had left into SOL at prices between $10-$15.
- This bet was based on his direct experience using the chain, his knowledge that builders were still active, and his belief that the "grave dancing" was overdone.
The "New Save" Strategy: Securing Wins and Starting Fresh
- After the Solana trade paid off massively, the speaker developed a new framework for risk management. As meme season became "frothy," he took 85% of his portfolio completely off the table and invested it in non-crypto assets like property.
- He compares the remaining 15% to starting a "new save" file in a video game after you've already beaten it. This removes the pressure and allows for clearer, more objective decision-making.
- With this smaller, mentally "risk-free" capital, he made several high-performing trades, including Bonk, Farcoin (which he found at a $900k market cap), and others.
- This strategy is designed to combat the tendency to give back life-changing gains by enforcing disciplined profit-taking and separating active trading capital from long-term wealth.
Playbook for 3-4 Figures ($100 - $9,999): Swinging for the Fences
- Define Your "Refill Rate": Determine how quickly you could earn back your initial investment if it went to zero. This amount becomes your risk budget.
- Concentrate, Don't Diversify: Hold a maximum of one or two positions. The goal is to get out of "three-figure hell" as quickly as possible, which requires concentrated bets, not a diversified portfolio.
- Prioritize "Grind Drops": Focus on airdrops that require time and effort rather than TVL (Total Value Locked), which is the total amount of assets staked in a protocol. TVL-based drops favor large wallets, while effort-based drops reward active users with less capital.
- Get On-Chain: Avoid centralized exchanges. The real opportunities for outsized returns are found on-chain before assets get major listings.
Playbook for 4-5 Figures ($10,000 - $99,999): Building Structure
- Journal Your Trades: Objectively analyze why you won and why you lost to identify behavioral patterns and remove emotion.
- Master Market Modes: Learn to distinguish between Easy Mode (press hard and fast) and Hard Mode (preserve capital). Do not try to out-trade a bad market.
- Look for Asymmetry: The key to significant gains is finding narratives and catalysts before they become obvious. Position yourself in tokens that are poised to benefit from upcoming events.
- Re-evaluate Constantly: Ask yourself, "If I sold this position today, would I buy it back tomorrow at the same size?" If the answer is no, it's time to sell.
Playbook for 5-6 Figures ($100k - $999k): The Smash and Grab
- Think in "Raids": Treat sector rotations and narrative shifts as mini-cycles or "raids." The goal is to allocate heavily and early, then move on.
- Go Heavy Early: The biggest mistake is diversifying too early in a cycle. You should be sizing up aggressively at the beginning, not near the end when risk is highest.
- Challenge Your Thesis: Actively seek out opposing viewpoints and ask yourself, "How does this go to zero?" This prevents you from getting trapped by confirmation bias, especially after a big win.
- Rotate with Conviction: When rotating into a new narrative (e.g., from memes to AI), do it decisively. Dabbling with a small percentage leads to price anchoring and missed opportunities.
Playbook for 6-7 Figures ($1M+): The Big Leagues
- Sizing is Everything: The primary consideration becomes how much you can invest in a token and, crucially, how much you can exit without crashing the price. This often means focusing on assets with deeper liquidity.
- Use Leverage Wisely: The speaker advises against leverage for most assets, as altcoins have intrinsic leverage. If used, it should be minimal (2-3x max) and only for swing trades on major assets like BTC or ETH.
- Know Yourself and Derisk: Acknowledge your weaknesses. The speaker knows he performs poorly in choppy markets, so his strategy is to derisk heavily and take capital off the table entirely.
- Distinguish Trades from Investments: A trade is 100% price-sensitive. An investment is fundamentally driven. Know why you entered a position and have clear invalidation criteria for both.
Conclusion
This playbook emphasizes that graduating through crypto portfolio sizes is a journey of psychological mastery, not just technical skill. Success requires radical self-awareness, disciplined risk management tailored to market conditions, and the courage to make high-conviction bets while ruthlessly cutting attachments to secure profits.
