It is the same with any other investment, if you do not know what you are getting into, you are doomed to fail. Kudos to the OP for taking the time to understand what cryptocurrency is and the key points that could move the market. And also, a little bit of luck might have helped them get their positive portfolio. 10 months ago the market is in bad condition and they still saw the opportunity it offers. The market slowly recovered from then up to date. If they saw that coming, it is a great foresight and proof that their system is working.
This post also serves as a good example for others who wanted to start investing. Do not just ride the hype like what those wannabe investors who joined crypto in 2017. They bought when the price is heavily pumping and saw bitcoin as a get-rich-quick scheme. They tank afterward. Taking the time to study and learn crypto is hard but it is worth it in the long run.
That's the problem to many people who are new in this industry. They have heard about crypto but what caught their interest is profit. Cryptos are really profitable but profit won't be earned in an instant. Bitcoin became popular because its market price have reached new levels on the previous years, giving new people in this industry, an initial thought that once you invested, profit will follow. But it is not. And since the market prices on the recent years are on downward motions, they started making absurd conclusions that investing would only result to huge profit loss not knowing the actual 'game' in this investment.
If you would be patient, you would win for sure. The market price of cryptos do tend to increase at some point and fall in a sudden, and that's market volatility. Observing those who are not new, they do remain calm everytime the market value of most cryptos are falling because they know what to do and what to anticipate next.
Those who invested recently are mostly losing interest already because the situation at this moment did not meet their expectations of easily earning profit just by investing.
I am an investor of crypto since 4 years ago and I can say investing is really profitable if you do the right thing.
Personally, I don't trust other people when making a decision, I like to do it myself and been doing that since before and I can still some success.
The problem with trusting other people is you have to pay for the premium or the call they'll give to you but it doesn't help you grow as an investor or as a trader, so if you do it yourself, you are also learning as you are making it a long journey for you.
The reason is that, no one could really predict the market behavior or when will downfall and uprise occur, it is just a matter of 'feeling' or speculations of the majority, which affects the actions of some investors to align their expectations to the 'hype' most of the people are creating.