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Bleh, I am volatility battle hardened. My first "important" purchase reached Bitstamp the day Bitcoin reached $266... with the subsequent drop. I made most of my stash in extreme volatility periods. It is low price low volatility what breaks my nerves... Past bear market I just forgot about Bitcoin (while hodling) but this time I am still here and in that way it is a first time for me. Bring the fucking volatility to me for fucks sake!
It is beginning to sound as if you faked your capitulation, unless you were merely trying to self-induce such capitulation - because in some sense, if you have as much equity as you suggest, then even if frustrated, you are likely not too close to capitulation.
Let's say for example, you though that worst case scenario was around $5k and even that the price would have gone back up for now, and so therefore, you failed/refused to cash out a sufficient amount of BTC to cover some of your expenses for the next year.. and so now you are a bit frustrated by your lack of preparation.
That kind of thing can happen to any of us. I have expenses too, and I cashed out some BTC and I did not buy back as much as maybe I should have.. and I am kind of building up my fiat right now in order to prepare for down because I largely thought that $5k to $6k would be the bottom... but if you have equity in BTC, you can probably afford to cash a little out here and there... and still have more than enough when the price goes back up, even if it take more than 2 more years before it goes back up in any kind of meaningful and significant quantities to make some kind of decent wealth appreciatoin difference.
I think I already explained my capitulation is a (real) feeling that maybe we won't be seeing the last ATH in any reasonable time or even ever.
Yeah, "ever" is a bit much for me. But you still know that we do not need to see ATH again, in order to still profit immensely from investing in BTC. If bitcoin goes to $15k or $18, we could still profit immensely from that, no? I just don't see how you could be so pessimistic about the so many great developments in bitcoin... especially some of the lightning stuff going on currently.
I also made it very clear I won't sell and ride this thing to hell. I am THAT stubborn.
I won't sell for lower than I bought, but I am far from that kind of price point. Probably my average price is in the $700s, and the main reason that my average BTC price is so high, is because I had some stolen in a hack... So, anyhow, I don't have a problem skimming a bit off here and there, especially if my selling price is higher than my average buying price. Don't get me wrong, I am not going to sell a lot, and if the price is generally in correction, my inclination is to buy, rather than to sell (using money that I accumulated while selling BTC at a higher price) or merely DCA cashflow money.
I did not fake my capitulation, it was a real feeling and as such I described it.
Fair enough... I might be coming off as too flippant in regards to your actual feelings related to this.
Yes, I feel frustrated by not having *EVER* cash out a single penny. Trade some (sell higher, buy lower) yes. But that's something I have already recognised.
When I was in mostly "accumulation phase" I did not sell any bitcoin, and that lasted for most of 2014 and 2015, and if I am being truthful with myself into 2016 too. If I did happen to sell BTC for any reason, i would replace within a few days.. .I was constantly scared to sell any BTC... but if you look at the BTC price during that time, it was largely lower than my average cost per BTC.
If the price is higher than your average cost per BTC, then you should not feel any guilt to sell a little bit, even if it is only a few hundred dollars worth... such skimming off a few might make you feel better, perhaps?
I also feel frustrated by having to ask for a mortgage to buy a property I could have just bought straight with my paper profits at end of 2017.
But, frustrations aside, I know how this game works and don't complain about anything.
O.k. everything resolved? It appears that you have some ongoing pent-up frustration...
Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do, and you cannot go back to December 2017 and re-do it.
You can only get the mortgage at the time that you get the mortgage, so you decide whether to do it or not.
In other words, each of us make our decision based on the best information that we have at the time that we make it, and maybe from time to time we will tweak, but the factors change, so we have different variables if we are going to attempt to answer the same question at a later time.. ... and at a later times, the variables have changed and the factors to weigh have changed, so we might not be able to act upon the same question that we had previously, but again, we just do our best each time for what factors we have in front of us at that particular time.