When it comes to investing, the rules are pretty simple. You diversify your portfolio and “spread your bets”, as it were, trying to focus on steady, long-term gains. You don’t get excited, and you don’t invest more than you can afford to lose.
That is, until you see some guy on X or Reddit showing how they made hundreds of thousands of dollars overnight by stacking up on crypto.
Oh, crypto. It’s the stuff of legends, and stories of self-made millionaires abound all over the Web. Take Erik Finman, the guy who bought $1,000 worth of Bitcoin when he was 12 years old and became one of crypto’s first “Bitcoin millionaires”. Or Glauber Contessoto, who put $250,000 into Dogecoin, and saw it grow to more than $3 million within just a couple of months (only to lose most of it later!).
Hearing stories like this, many people seriously regret not investing in crypto earlier, especially those who were aware of Bitcoin when it was valued at just a few dollars. But if you count yourself as one of those, you should know that foresight is not a common thing.
“Hodling” Probably Won’t Make You Rich
Fact is, identifying the right cryptocurrency is a tricky business. There are thousands of them, and the vast majority are not going to fly all the way to the moon. Your chances of picking a winner, especially now in the days of memecoins galore, are smaller than ever.
For instance, how could anyone have known that Dogecoin, which was created as a joke, would perform far, far better than something like Feathercoin, which was actually a serious effort to try and topple Bitcoin as a superior payment tool. Feathercoin’s developers made a real effort, but its market cap today sits at just $770,000, left in the dust by Dogecoin’s $29.6 billion.
The days of Bitcoin millionaires hitting the headlines are a thing of the past, and very few are going to strike it lucky by just buying and “hodling” the right crypto anymore.
You’ve also gotta be careful of scams. Crypto is littered with tales of people being blinded by greed. One of the most infamous examples is OneCoin, which was an elaborate scheme masquerading as the next big thing in crypto, orchestrated by the self-proclaimed and now disappeared “Crypto Queen” Ruja Ignatova.
She launched OneCoin in 2014, just as Bitcoin was first making some people extremely wealthy indeed, with promises of doing the same for those who threw their money at it now. Ignatova kept up her pretense for almost three years, during which time she convinced investors to hand over more than $4 billion.
Marketed as a “Bitcoin killer”, OneCoin investors were shown fake trading volumes and made up price fluctuations that illustrated steady, long term gains. But in fact, OneCoin didn’t even have a blockchain, and instead existed on a centralized database that was operated by its creators. It was worthless, and as soon as that fact became public knowledge, the scheme collapsed, and Ignatova disappeared into the night.
Investing in crypto is hard, and it can be risky and dangerous, and it’s nowhere near as easy as it was back in the days when Bitcoin was just getting famous. But does that mean it’s no longer a worthwhile exercise? Far from it. When the best alternative is leaving your money in the bank, crypto still looks like a far better option.
But You Can Make Some Money
Crypto actually provides a lot of ways for people to make money, but the thing to understand is that you’re probably not going to become a millionaire. Realize that those days are gone, but also realize that you can still make a very decent return if you’re knowledgeable and take great care about how you invest.
It’s still possible to buy and “hodl”. Crypto rewards those who are patient and have a steady heart. Bitcoin, for instance, has historically always been on an upwards trajectory over the long term. Simply buy and forget one of the blue-chip tokens like BTC, ETH or SOL, and if you check back in five year’s time you’ll probably be happy you did.
If you’re inexperienced, then actively trading crypto can be one of the fastest ways to lose your crypto fortune. But, with enough skill, practice and research, crypto traders can and do make significant amounts of money for their efforts. To trade crypto, you need to understand how financial markets work and time it so that you can buy low and sell high, taking advantage of the neverending ups and downs. But beware that you need a decent amount of capital to make it worthwhile – and it’s one of those things where you should never bet more than you can afford to lose!
A safer way to earn is to stake crypto. These days, there are dozens of Proof-of-Stake blockchains that allow staking, which is where you deposit funds in a smart contract to participate in validating network transactions. In doing this, you earn regular rewards, but your crypto remains temporarily inaccessible, until you “unstake” it. It’s similar to putting money into a savings account, but with much higher interest.
There are other ways to make money from crypto besides. For instance, if you’re willing to invest in some powerful computing hardware you can start mining Bitcoin or other Proof-of-Work cryptocurrencies, and there are play-to-earn games where you can win crypto rewards each day. There’s also the wonderful world of DeFi, with its plethora of dApps for lending, liquidity providing and yield farming, but you’ll need some technical know-how before you get started.
Why Crypto Beats The Bank
In any case, however you intend to try and make money in crypto, the chances are good that you’ll earn more than you would if you simply left your funds in the bank.
A quick look at Yahoo Finance shows that, as of June 2025, the average interest rate for a traditional savings account is a measly – let’s face it, pathetic – 0.42% per year. Even the better, high-yield savings accounts only offer around 4.31%, and to access them you need to put in a sizable amount, and not take it out. You’re not going to make much at all.
Traditional banks set the bar so low that investing in crypto has every chance of delivering superior returns, regardless of whether you simply buy and hodl, trade or stake your funds.
A great example of this is XBO.com, which is laser-focused on showing new investors the delights of digital assets, with its powerful yet simple and intuitive platform. It has created a “rewards-driven” exchange that pays people just to use it, regardless of whether or not they actually make a profit from their trading activities. Its goal is to incentivize people to familiarize themselves with crypto, and it does this through a comprehensive loyalty program that’s centered on its native asset, the XBO token.
With XBO, users can enjoy a “gamified” trading experience where they slowly level up and earn more and more rewards and perks as they progress. The more they trade, and the more XBO tokens they hold, the greater the trading discounts they’re entitled to. They’ll be able to access features such as launch pools, meaning they can get early access to newly listed cryptocurrencies, and also earn additional XBO tokens. In fact, users don’t even have to trade at all. If they’re worried they’ll lose money, they can just use XBO’s platform to stake tokens like ETH, SOL, POL, TRX and XLM, and earn regular interest for doing that. The more XBO tokens they hold, the greater their staking rewards will be.
As an added benefit, if the XBO platform becomes more popular and grows its user base, that will translate to higher demand for XBO tokens, and likely grow its value over time. So there’s every reason to think it could be much more profitable than what your bank’s measly savings account will offer.
Final Thoughts
Just remember that crypto is not, and should never be seen as a “get rich quick” scheme that will turn you into a millionaire overnight. If you’ve only got $500 in your pocket, you’re unlikely to suddenly become fantastically wealthy, unless you strike it super lucky and buy the next SHITHOTCOIN and it goes to the moon.
But if you’re realistic and make careful, considered investments and trades, there’s a good possibility that you’ll be able to turn that $500 into $1,000 far sooner than you would if you were to just leave it in the bank. There are never any guarantees, and everything carries risk, but as far as investments and savings schemes go, crypto remains one of the better bets.
