#美联储降息 In 2018, I made a decision: I took the 80,000 yuan I had saved up over two years and invested it all into Bitcoin—back then, it was $450 each. Looking back now, I truly understand why my parents were so anxious they cried.

My mind was full of "hot trend" theories, watching the price increases daily and imagining my own fortune. A year later, in a guesthouse in Chiang Mai, my phone popped up that number—2.3 million. At that moment, I really thought I was getting a pie from the sky.

Then the bear market hit, fiercer than a typhoon. By the end of 2018, my account balance was like a burst balloon. 2.3 million. 220,000. Watching it zero out so quickly, I sat at the small table in the guesthouse, calculating the cost of my stay, even the cicadas outside sounded harsh. Turns out, falling down really hurts that much.

After countless liquidations and cut losses, I finally figured out four rules for survival:

**Rule 1: Don’t touch things outside your knowledge.** In my early years, I heard people hyping the metaverse land, rushing in without even understanding its use, losing 220,000 in a week before realizing—you can’t make money on what you don’t understand.

**Rule 2: Position allocation must be scientific.** Now I allocate 50% to Bitcoin and Ethereum, 30% to cross-platform arbitrage, and 20% as reserve funds. When ETH dropped to 1200 last year, it was this 20% reserve that allowed me to top up a good position and not miss the rebound.

**Rule 3: Contracts are a trap.** I once played with full leverage on contracts, and overnight, I went from profit to negative. After that, I turned off the contract feature on my exchange. It’s not an amplifier of gains; frankly, it’s a本金收割机 (principal harvesting machine).

**Rule 4: Information must be verified by yourself.** Those signal groups and influencer coin recommendations are all traps. I only trust on-chain data and whitepapers. Before the FTX crash in 2022, I already sensed something was off with the reserve data, so I withdrew my assets early and avoided that disaster.

Now I no longer obsess over rapid gains. As long as I can earn a steady 20% annualized return, that’s enough—this year, I’ve already achieved 18%. In the crypto world, just staying alive through the journey is winning.

Many people are stuck in the ups and downs, not because they aren’t working hard, but because they lack clarity. The market is always there; the key is to find the right direction and hold the bottom line.