There's a formerly local young shyster here that got rich and quit/retired on Bitcoin gains right before I moved to town in 2017.
He spends his days smoking weed and generally wasting his life. I'd like to try that deal out, but, really, what the hell good is his life now?
I'd find another or other ways to waste my life
I’ve seen this with one of my Scottsdale friends (early 30s). His six-figure crypto profits netted him enough to make payments on a new BMW M5 (
$130k) but not enough to trade up from his apartment to a +$1M house common to north Scottsdale. After his crypto cash-out, he’s much more of a spender than a saver/investor. He wears luxury fashion accessories like Tom Ford sunglasses (
$800), gets laser skin resurfacing for his face (
$1200 per biannual treatment), places sports bets on FanDuel, and takes weekend golfing trips to Palm Springs.
To his credit he kept his job as a Finance Specialist at a Pheonix area auto-dealership, where he processes all the leasing, insurance, and registration paperwork for new car buyers. It’s dependable income (
$70k?), but not enough to make payments on the BMW without the crypto top-off. And keeping his job is more of a credit to his Dad (mid-60s) who stepped in and convinced him to stay in the workforce after talking him through how living solely off what was left of his one-time crypto windfall would only last another year or two. Then what?
So, has
$500k-$600k in crypto profits bettered my friend?
Yes, but only to a showier, superficial degree, and for a limited time.Notice my friend is making payments on his BMW. With the way credit is used by so many of us Americans to buy into and convey higher status, it’s gotten to the point that when I see others with luxury vehicles, like my coworker driving an Audi Q8 (
$85k) or my neighbor driving a Porsche Panamera (
$110k), I automatically assume it’s all on credit. And in turn, I find it a mark of refreshing honesty to see my Uncle, an MD, driving his 2014 Ford Taurus (
resale $7k) around Marshall Texas.
