I woke up this morning to crypto hell. Bitcoin’s price dropped to $23,000 level and triggered a slew of margin calls on my Celsius account. Looking to resolve the margin calls, I find my account transfers suspended. This is unusual because it means they are holding my money hostage. To add insult to injury, my margin call have 24 hours to resolve. Since I cannot access my account to find my deposit address, I am unable to add money to resolve the margin calls or add cash to close the collateralized loan itself. I made a mistake I’ll never forget.
I over-leveraged myself. I’m learning this somewhat early in my investing journey and I’m trying to find the light in this situation. My emotions are currently volatile and it’s reflected in the market. There’s really not much I can do. Taking stock of my present options, the wisest choice would be to apply for a separate loan to close the collateral loans once the market stabilizes and the markets re-open. I understand this extreme move to block all transfers in or out is done to prevent clients from succumbing to these emotions. It’s just painful to know that no amount of planning or preparation can predict the possibility of not being able to move capital at all.
The key lesson is: not your keys, not your crypto. Whoever holds the private keys to my crypto assets is the true owner and they have complete control–not me. As soon as I am able, I will be moving my crypto to a cold wallet like Trezor. I enjoyed playing the game and the idea of compounding interest is nice but the world is too volatile for me. I like the concept of collateralized loans for investment but I realized it’s a game I cannot stomach right now. For the normal day-to-day people, it’s not something I recommend. Just buy and HODL.