Want to invest in crypto? There’s a consultant for that
New York (CNN Business) Cryptocurrency enthusiasm is skyrocketing , and while information surrounding digital currency is becoming more attainable, there’s still a big gap between access and knowledge. That’s where cryptocurrency consultants come in.
With digital currency markets in turmoil, crypto consultants are in high demand.Cryptocurrency popularity soared in April as trading platform Coinbase went public at a valuation of $86 billion. Exchange platforms like Coinbase have made the crypto world more accessible for the average investor, boosting interest in the sector.
And it shows. Bitcoin surged to a record high in April, followed by a wild 500% rally in dogecoin, an asset that was created as a joke in 2013 . Cryptocurrency backers have spent years insisting that ethereum, bitcoin and other digital assets could revolutionize the world of finance, and with the success of Coinbase’s Wall Street debut, those backers are finally having their moment.
Getting started
Nicole DeCicco, a single mom in Portland, Oregon, started her own cryptocurrency consulting firm, CryptoConsultz, in 2017 after a hacker stole 323 ethereum tokens from her, which she says would now be worth more than $1 million.
DeCicco was working as a nurse at the time she was hacked. She was mining ethereum in her garage as a hobby, and she said the “very devastating experience” completely changed her career trajectory. “It really fueled my passion for helping others have access to cryptocurrency and to learn about blockchain technology,” DeCicco told CNN Business.
Nicole DeCicco, founder of CryptoConsultz, has a mining operation in her garage in Portland, Oregon.
She offers consulting to individual investors and businesses. An initial one-on-one consultation costs $350 per hour and an initial business consultation comes in at $650 per hour. Follow-up consultations cost $300 for a one-on-one appointment and $550 for a business appointment. Along with running her own consulting firm, DeCicco works as the vice president of business development at Blockchain Mint and Cold Storage Coins. Both companies produce crypto-related products in the form of tangible assets including gold and silver coins.
Through her services, DeCicco teaches investors how to navigate the crypto markets, including buying, selling and trading digital currencies, and offers crypto 101 webinars that dive into the basics of digital currencies and the blockchain. She also shows clients how to monitor their investments and decrease their risk of losing money.
Catching the buzz
Tesla TSLA — on May 10, Cryptocurrency is buzzing in pop culture, too.CEO Elon Musk joked about dogecoin on “Saturday Night Live” and he often tweets about bitcoin, which can wreak havoc on the market . Backstreet Boys star Nick Carter tweeted about the recently launched shiba coin — a spinoff of meme-inspired dogecoin— on May 10, sharing the hashtags #SHIBARMY and #shiba with a GIF of a spinning coin.
One shiba coin is currently worth less than one cent, but the cryptocurrency has increased in value by more than 2,000% over the past month, and currently has a market cap of $5.9 billion, according to Coinbase
Pricey advice
The consultant offerings range from investment advice to tech help and assistance for people who want to set up their own cryptocurrency mining rigs at home.
And the prices vary, too. Cryptocurrency consultant Shane Staats started his career working in e-commerce and tech support in 2003. Since then, he’s had a wide range of jobs, and he now owns a crypto consulting firm where he charges clients $650 per hour. “My price affects the clients that I attract,” Staats told CNN Business. But he says some of his clients only need one session, and then they’re off to the races.
Crypto consultant Russ Davis, who has pursued a variety of ventures in the last decade, including credit card processing, has seen his business, In Russ We Trust Crypto, take off this year. He said he consulted about 500 investors in February — a group made up of his friends, family members, and Facebook group followers. Each person invested, on average, around $300 in shiba coin, per his recommendation. At the time, the amount of money invested totaled about $150,000. At the coin’s current value, those investments are now worth about $60 million, Davis told CNN Business. Since then, Davis says he has established a list of celebrity clients.
Risky business
As with the market itself, crypto consulting is totally unregulated, so consultants don’t technically need official qualifications, and there is no way to know exactly how many advisers are pursuing this career path.
And as the public is becoming increasingly interested in investing in crypto, a huge part of the education process involves acknowledging the intense volatility in digital currency values. “It’s a dangerous game,” Mark D’Aria, CEO of Bitpro IT, a company that purchases crypto mining hardware, told CNN Business. And when it comes to investing, “Unless you are prepared to watch your money disappear, don’t even think about it,” he said.
Robert Pagliarini is a certified financial planner and the president and chief financial adviser at Pacifica Wealth Advisors, where he focuses on financial transitions such as retirement, selling a business, inheritance, stock options and other sudden wealth events. “Certainly, over the last year, there have been a lot more conversations with clients about crypto investing,” he said. “It’s sort of just taken everyone by surprise, I think, in the financial world.”
Bitcoin Dips to Lowest Since February Amid China Crypto Warning
(Bloomberg) – Bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies slumped after the People’s Bank of China reiterated that the digital tokens cannot be used as a form of payment.
The largest cryptocurrency fell as much as 5.3% to $42,430 in New York, continuing a week-long slide sparked by Elon Musk’s back-and-forth comments on Tesla Inc.’s holdings of the coin. Bitcoin is now at its lowest level since early February. Ether lost more than 7%, while last week’s sensation, Internet Computer, continued its plunge. Dogecoin also slid.
“This is the latest chapter of China tightening the noose around crypto,” said Antoni Trenchev, managing partner and co-founder of Nexo in London, a crypto lender.
Virtual currencies should not and cannot be used in the market because they’re not real currencies, according to a notice posted on PBOC’s official WeChat account. Financial and payments institutions are not allowed to price products or services with virtual currency, the note said.
Beijing since 2017 has abolished initial coin offerings and clamped down on virtual currency trading within its borders, forcing many exchanges overseas. The country was once home to about 90% of trades but the lion’s share of mining and major players have since fled abroad.
Read more: Bitcoin Chartists See Rout Worsening With $40,000 in Focus
China has recently taken steps to issue its own digital yuan, seeking to replace cash and maintain control over a payments landscape that has become increasingly dominated by technology companies not regulated like banks.
“It’s no surprise to me, as Chinese capital controls can be challenged by cryptocurrency purchases in the country and transfers out of the country,” said Adam Reynolds, CEO for APAC at Saxo Markets. “So avoiding use of them in the country is essential to maintaining capital controls. The only tolerable digital currency to a government with strong capital controls is their own CBDC.”
Many chartists and technical analysts are looking at Bitcoin’s 14-day Relative Strength Index (RSI), which entered oversold levels Tuesday. In addition, an acceleration in its selloff could mean the coin approaches its next support around $40,000. A fall to that level would mark the first time since September that Bitcoin would test its average price over the past 200 days. And breaching it could mean it drops to $30,000, where it’s previously found support.
Story continues
For Stephane Ouellette, chief executive and co-founder of FRNT Financial, the moves have more to do with Musk’s recent tweets about Bitcoin.
“It’s just a bit of a mess. TSLA’s entrance into the space saw some of the most aggressive BTC buying I’ve personally ever seen – and it has to unwind,” he said. The EV-maker’s retraction that it will accept Bitcoin as payment “was the catalyst that accelerated the spread consolidation. Then over the weekend, little comments here and there have continued to confuse.”
Meanwhile, the latest Bank of America fund manager survey showed that “Long Bitcoin” is the most crowded trade in the world right now. The poll captures 194 fund managers with $592 billion worth of AUM overall.
“The fact that the BofA manager survey shows that the ‘long Bitcoin’ trade is the most crowded one on the Street right now isn’t helping either,” said Matt Maley, chief market strategist for Miller Tabak + Co. “When an asset becomes the most crowded trade in the BofA survey, it has frequently signaled a near-term pullback in the past. When you combine this with the news out of China, it’s not a surprise that Bitcoin is seeing some more weakness.”
(Updates throughout, adds technical analysis, adds Ouellette comments)
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Crypto community turns on Musk as tweets dent bitcoin
NEW DELHI : Crypto veterans and industry experts pushed back against billionaire Elon Musk’s recent tweets about cryptocurrencies. Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, has faced criticism from various experts over the past week and has even been accused of not understanding cryptos enough before making comments.
Musk had been seen as a proponent for cryptos in February when he announced that Tesla would start accepting payments in bitcoin soon and that the company had invested $1.5 billion in bitcoins.
However, Tesla went back on that promise last week, citing environmental concerns around the use of fossil fuels for generating the electricity needed for crypto mining. The company also said it won’t be selling its own holdings till more environment-friendly means are developed.
“Most of the things Musk has said have been proved wrong," said a senior executive of one of India’s top crypto exchanges. “More importantly, the problem is that he randomly pushes Dogecoin, a cryptocurrency that was meant as a joke and is against the core idea of cryptocurrencies and affects the entire industry," he said.
“Elon, block times and block sizes cannot be scaled like that. And as long as Doge is based on proof of work, it would be an environmental disaster. New protocols are necessary to scale. The biggest scientific breakthrough since the bitcoin white paper is the Avalanche protocol," wrote Emin Gün Serir, a computer science professor at Cornell University, replying to a tweet by Musk about Dogecoin.
The executive quoted above also noted that Musk’s tweets also give whales, people who hold large amounts of crypto, a chance to take advantage of the market. “Even when I know that what Musk is saying is wrong, I know that most people who don’t understand this market will dump their holdings. So, I (the whale) will dump even more before them, so that I can buy it back when the price is low," he said.
The public being swayed by the words of people such as Musk is “worrisome" as it shows that there’s a “herd mentality" and that decisions don’t come from a fundamental understanding of the space, said Raghu Mohan, co-founder and CEO, Lumos Labs, an innovation management firm specializing in blockchain startups.
All the hype, which includes talk about regulators turning their focus on cryptos, is a sign that we are near the peak of the bull market, Mohan said.
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