This thread is not strictly about investing or trading itself, but more about the life complications and consequences surrounding it, I think this subforum is the right place for this, please let me know if there are any relevant/similar threads. Please let me know if this belongs somewhere else.

Hello everyone, first time visiting this part of the forum for me, but I am very interested in hearing your thoughts on my potential plans, as I think the 2p2 community is fairly unique online. I don't really know another forum that I would expect to get solid advice from.

So, what am I thinking?
As you can see from the title, I am seriously considering dropping out of university in order to pursue crypto investing/trading full time (for at least a year). I am currently enrolled in a Liberal Arts & Sciences Bachelor's programme (which is pretty worthless if you don't do a Master's after). I am about to start my third and last year at the end of January.
I got into crypto in December 2016 and put in €2000. Through 2017 I gradually invested more, until in May 2017 I had invested €10.000, which is now worth roughly €100.000. Yes I have made sick gains, but I have underperformed the market, so there is a lot to learn AND gain. I realise that this opportunity crypto provides will last maybe a few years, at least the really crazy part where you could pull an Ian Balina (who went from 0 to $5MM in under a year). But the sooner you get good at crypto, the more money there is to be made.

I feel like going to university to get a worthless degree (this is becoming an increasingly accepted notion as you probably know) is normally a decent way to spend your early 20's, as you live an awesomely chill and social life. HOWEVER, if it is costing me millions of dollars in opportunity costs, what the **** am I doing in college?

I am fully aware that if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. However, this opportunity seems pretty damn real. If you think I shouldn't leave university, please convince me it is indeed too good to be true. If you think pursuing crypto fulltime is/can be a good idea, please let me know your arguments as well.

The way I see it is like this:
Best-case scenario: I pull an Ian Balina and go ~50x in a year to end up at €5MM, only to coast along after that and end up with €10MM-€50MM somewhere in my 40's/50's (may sound crazy if you don't know anything about crypto, but I think there is at least a few percent chance this happens).
Worst-case scenario:
You can obviously make this as nightmarish as you want, but let's say somehow all crypto becomes worthless (that is $0,00). Okay, in this case I go back to uni, get a boring degree, get a job, make some money, and try to invest that succesfully. Support for student in the Netherlands is very generous, so nothing to worry about there really. It would be insanely painful to waste €100.000 of course, but that is the worst-case scenario.
"Realistic" worst-case scenario:
So let's look at a more realistic bad scenario. I (and many others) are convinced that crypto is not only here to stay, but that it is going to grow in the next 10 years or more. Given this assumption, if I go into crypto fulltime, I will likely make money, unless I am a complete imbecile. Alright, let's say that it turns out I am a sucker. Then I may realize 0-200% gains next year. I would conclude at the end of the year that I failed, and I would go back to uni, because apparently buying and hodling some coins might be better for me.

Considering the above, I would say switching to crypto full time seems +(life)EV.

I think that this forum has people who can look beyond the standard outlook on life most people have (highschool-college-boring job-promotion-still boring but some more money-retire-die), therefore I think you may have valuable insights. Maybe there are even people (who know people) here that have done something similar. Quitting college for poker sure seems a hell of a lot more risky than quitting college for crypto.

Anyway, thanks for your time, and I look forward to absorbing some of your wisdom

Final note: If something like a "crypto house" or other type of local, in-person community exists - which you know or live in, I would be very interested in potentially joining!

The degree is worthless, but the free electricity to mine is priceless.

Everyone thinks they're smart in a bull market. Hodlers have made more than most traders this year. Earning an additional fiat stream from a job is a great way to grow a portfolio.

lol

I am very aware of this, but if there was ever a time to actually become smart, wouldn't it be right now?

unless you are a developer or an economist doubt it really matters what you do on the side. your money invested doesnt really need you so whether you are full time overanalyzing picks or part time and blindly letting it ride

just plow as many university bitches as you can and rub forged chuck e cheese coins all over thier tits

I knew I could count on 2p2's vast ocean of wisdom


BTW, I'm kinda leaning towards crypto>uni right now, so please convince me otherwise

well that worked for Vitalik but what exactly would you do? if you just want to ride your investments that is just a lazy plan. if you just dont have time to attend class because you are up to your ears in math, economics and code then by all means skip class.

I was in a similar position as you when Black Friday hit in 2011. I wanted to drop out to go play online poker abroad. Here's my advice to you:

Stay in school, do well, make friends, meet (and plow) girls, and then throw darts at coins in your spare time. If you are time efficient at all you'll be able to spend 30+ hours a week taking a random walk down crypto lane (which, by the way, can also be completed with 1 hour of work per year, but to each his own...)

Also, idolizing 1 dude who allegedly binked 5 MM (by the way: over 99.9% of humans are delusional liars in some way - we're designed to be) is a pretty poor idea. Think about the risk adjusted return of "smart" guys in the aggregate. If you actually think it's high: Can you reliably do the same in an ever-evolving market?

This is stupid on so many levels. OP knows that or he wouldn't be asking, but fear of missing out and the rush of easy wealth is is driving him like a heroin addict to want to do this.

What's he's proposing is clearly the most -EV strategy he could pick, in every category (life, friends, girls, perspective, and ironically, crypto profits).

The point is not Balina, I only took him as an example because he regularly posts his exact portfolio and seems like a straight up guy, but there are many more people doing similarly well.

My point is: sure I'll do well if I stay in college and buy some coins, but how much better could I do if I were to go allin? Is it enough to warrant giving up a chill student lifestyle (temporarily)? As said, I tend to think it is.

Yes I think it's high.

When putting in the time and effort, I do think that it is possible.


Agree, this is one of my doubts

I'll preface this by saying it's just my impression as a man of reason, and that I know very little about crypto. I think you got lucky to make what you did, and even if you took a year off to learn and trade, you would still have no edge in what is essentially a zero-sum currency-trading market.

The analogy to leaving to play poker doesn't hold, in my opinion. Back in the good years of poker, it was clear that there was an abundance of bad players and that good players, even those just following fairly simple strategies (so simple you could 16-table), were very +EV. Decent players would easily beat bots back then, and the top players weren't competing against the decent players. In crypto though, you are competing against top players, and I assume there are algos that trade on news in crypto that are printing money off of humans like you. And to clarify the fact you're competing against top players, trading cryptos is scalable in a way poker isn't--you can only play a few tables, but you can get down huge amounts of money on various trades and destroy tens of thousands of suckers in crypto if you're an insider or have some tools to accurately predict crypto prices. In crypto, you'll be competing against people in financial institutions and governments, and the developers of the coins themselves. If you were taking time off to work with some coin developer and you guys had a promising pump-and-dump in the works, that would seem a lot more promising, but just as some nobody who's going to learn from available internet materials and then make tens of thousands of euros, it seems so naive to me.

I think by this point, everyone knows about crypto. You're not getting in on some hot new thing that big-time traders with institutional money don't know about. I think you got in at a great time in either a super bull market or a straight-up bubble, and that's fooled you into thinking crypto is where the easy money is.

But don't get me wrong that I don't want you to take your shot and go for it. I want you to do it and fail, since not only would I be vindicated, but seeing the smug sheen wiped from a Dutchman and a crypto-bull sounds pretty satisfying.

Interested in arguments, not statements. I'm sorry you bought Ripple @ $3.30

Hold on--I forgot the best part. It struck me as fairly amusing that turning your 100k euros into 300k euros is part of your realistic worst-case scenario.

Thats crypto for you right there boy. Although it should probably be -80% to 200%

I'm aware that daytrading is tough if not pure luck given efficient markets. That's why I'm more interested in researching ico's to find coins that may pump. Also, yes I know this crypto bubbe can't go on forever, but two things: 1) why not make the most of the bubble given that there is one (they don't happen too often), and 2) after the current bubble, I wouldnt be surprised to see a few more bubbles, just like how the Bitcoin price has evolved over the years

ooh if the plan is daytrading i would definately suggest not. It doesnt make more in rising markets, but rising markets make it seem easy. get a good volatile sideways market and you can make more than riding it sideways...but in this market you lose out on all the big runs if you stick to a strict daytrading regimen....and if you dont stick to a regimen then you just suck at daytrading.

You should tap your heels and say this three times to see if starts to sound strange.

Your skillset would rise bigly if you could consider the possibly that this "opportunity" may have been planted to you by design by richer/smarter people than you to add to their ev.

“It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” Mark Twain.

The fact you are actually considering this enough to warrant starting this thread means u should def get the degree because you have terrible decision making skills and will need that degree to fall back on as you screw up in life.

I was working and going to school during the poker boom and decided to quit my job and drop out of college to play poker full time, so I feel like I can relate a little bit. I had lost my savings playing poker, decided to "get smart", and turned 15$ in 60k before transitioning into full time. I was 23.

The first 2 years I played full time were easily the best years of my life at that time. I grew up really poor in the middle of Oklahoma City and poker let me live in Boston, live in Vegas, travel outside the country, and pretty much do whatever, whenever I wanted. It was the dream. We did the whole poker house thing. Parties, grinding, cooking out, staying out in strip clubs all night, night clubs, etc etc. I met a couple of great guys I am still good friends with now, and for a guy like me, that means a lot.

The next 3 years were some of the worst of my life. Poker was my whole identity. I didn't even know where to start after black friday. I had already seen my profits decline and I wasn't exactly a student of the game, so leaving the country to grind didn't seem like a viable long term option. I had grown accustomed to a certain lifestyle and most of my savings from poker were in an IRA. I had dropped out so I didn't have anything to transition into and went back to my old job from before poker. It was miserable. It really took rock bottom for me to come up with a plan, execute that plan, and really get my **** together.

All-in-all, it was an amazing journey and I am really glad I took it at this point in my life. Though, if you had asked me at rock bottom, I would have told you that I wish I could go back and change some things. I think there is still opportunity to be had in crypto, but poker money was probably much more "guaranteed" back then. Also, crypto isn't very social.

You aren't in America, but here, that degree is beyond useless. My advice would be to switch degrees to something that can get you a job and focus on crypto for the next year. Grind out the degree on the side and you will have that to fall back on if you don't get rich. Open up a vanguard account. If you have IRA's then get one of those. Get in the habit of contributing to your retirement accounts. Think about 5 years from now. 10 years, 20 years. Always have a plan B.

I dropped out of college for poker and I regret it.

I don't see why you'd have to drop out to trade crypto. You should have plenty of free time to do so if you're really into day-trading. Can you make money on a more intermediate to longer term hold? Keep crypto on the side while you finish your degree and get a real 'job'. If you happen to make millions while you're doing this, then sure, quit everything and follow your heart.

If this is your reaction to a pretty accurate response, I don't see why you're even here. TS basically nailed it.

If you don't like your degree, pick a less ******ed degree. Study computer science if you're interested in crypto, and invest on the side.

I like the mental picture of TS being waist-deep in Ripple after buying at an ATH
But you obviously haven't read any of his posts if you think that's true.

I think maybe you had your mind made up before you started this thread and you thought you'd get more support from a community that is full of guys that eke out a living outside the generally accepted "norm".
What does fulltime crypto trading involve though?
Who wants to spend all their time listening to and watching 22yo crypto "experts" and other morons on YouTube, or reading endless whitepapers, most of which are full of typos and maybe a quarter of which can be half understood?
This crypto space is full of some really ****ty greedy people, the majority of whom don't deserve their new found wealth imo, and spending your days amongst that isn't going to be healthy for someone intelligent enough to get a tertiary education.
My advice:
If you want to get into crypto more than you already are then set up some mining rigs and trading bots. You already have the money to get
set up nicely there.
And get the degree.

I drfted a similar post and didnt have the guts to post it. My story is similar. I have an engineering degree and an MBA. And I made a mistake..I was good at poker and make a lot of money very fast. I took a package from work and noone knew why I was leaving. I made 500k in 6 months...It made me not appreciate the money.

I spent soo much because I assumed next month id make more...then there was a long period where I had to adjust to the reality that i wasnt able to pull in that kind of money without taking an uncomfortable amount of risk. Back then...I had several 30 buyin days. Yes 20k playing 600 nl on party.

ITs just not that easy forever. I had a few tough years....not that I was losing...just that my dream was crushed.

whatever the path you take...be aware that the relationships you make are more important than the money you make. And those you meet at university and work give you options down the road. abandoning that seems wise for now...I refuse to regret...because I dont have much to complain about. but ive been through it all.

Maybe pick a degree program that isn't worthless?

Dropping out is terrible

Changing majors is good

Dropping 1-2 classes to free up time for watching the crypto markets might be ok