The Cost of Chasing Quick Wins

Hi there,

An Iraqi Dinar, a Bitcoin, a Tulip, a Railway.

What do these things have in common? 

No? Let me narrow it down. 

An Iraqi Dinar and three quarters of a bitcoin? 

Still no? Fair enough. 

An Iraqi Dinar, and a 0.75 of Bitcoin are both things that I have bought. 

Bought in the hope of making serious money, quickly. 

Why? Promise of 2-5-10x returns, or more, in a short space of time. 

As a young man, eager to make his mark on the world and earn money, they sounded like great ideas. 

Buy now cheap, sell high. Exit. Retire at 15. 

After the 2003 War in Iraq started the Dinar fell from 3ع.د to 1$ to 1,310ع.د to 1$. 

I would have been around 14 or something at the time and bought £50 worth of IQD.

About 80k odd in Dinar, which would have netted me, wait for it….

$27k / £22k or so, which was serious money, Caribbean here I come.

The story goes that the Dinar was due to be revalued after the war, as I was researching for this article, I

can see the stories have started circulating again now Trump is in.

 The reality - my Dinar are gathering dust somewhere.

Yes, it may eventually be revalued, but it’s not a great strategy for wealth building or retiring early. Clearly. 

The 0.75 Bitcoin? 

Am sure you can guess what happened here.

Bought this at $67k/BTC in Nov 2020…. Just before the hallowed 4th year bull cycle was about to start. 

In for £30k. 

Predictions of $100k, $200k, $250k per BTC.

I was so sure it was going to happen, FOMO, sound advice from my expert mates, those cool chart things

and some guy on Twitter said so. 

That would have made me $75k, $150k or $187,500.

Carribean, i’m really coming this time. 

Then.

Crash.

Held on for as long as I could, bottled it, pulled cash out at a 50% loss (when BTC was at it’s lowest),

used it for a property. 

Lessons? Plenty of them. Don’t get sucked into markets you don’t understand, or bubbles, as I did here,

and as others did with Tulips and Railways. 

Could these be good strategies?

Potentially, if I had followed my own advice and held for the long term.

Potentially, could have made $75k plus in January 2025, if I still had my BTC.

Potentially, if they had been a small part of a diversified approach, as opposed to all in. 

Potentially, if I had done my research, as opposed to going with my ‘gut’.

Potentially, if I knew more about the markets I was getting into. 

Potentially, if I was not chasing a ‘get rich quick’ approach.

A thought that has been with me a fair bit this week.

Consistently good beats occasionally great.

I was trying to be occasionally great in the above examples. 

Now? Consistent. 

Consistently looking for ‘wont shoot the lights’ out opportunities. Consistently looking for good basic

property. Consistently putting cash into ETFs. Consistently looking for long term, slow, wealth building

approaches. Consistently looking for higher risk approaches for a small amount of cash. Consistently not

overreaching.  

As Oliver Burkeman says in his book ‘4000 weeks’.

4000 weeks is the average human lifespan.

That time will pass you by either way. 

Weather you take consistently good steps or not.

So, my questions to you, why not? 

Start taking some small, good, boring steps.

And remember, the sky my be cloudy now.

But the blue sky is just behind it.

Think a friend would like this? Forward it their way.

Have a great Saturday ahead,

Callum