The challenging thing about cryptocurrencies and other new investments is that with the benefit of hindsight, we'd all have bought Bitcoin or Ethereum years ago. We'd have invested in Amazon back when its IPO was $18 a share as well.The Ascent's parent company, The Motley Fool, holds Bitcoin. It does so because it believes it is a solid long-term investment.
What does that mean at a practical level? If the value of Bitcoin falls dramatically tomorrow, The Motley Fool will feel comfortable holding because it has analyzed the digital currency and sees extended value in Bitcoin. So when prices drop, it can wait patiently until the value rises again.But putting money into a project when you don't fully understand the fundamentals in the hope that it might be the next big thing is closer to gambling than investing. Added to which, back in 2015, we didn't have as many secure cryptocurrency exchanges or protections as we do now. Your Ethereum could have been stolen by hackers or taken by scammers.
In July 2014, Ethereum held an initial coin offering (ICO), raising money for the project through Bitcoin. It worked like a crowdfunding project, where investors bought in (paying with Bitcoin) for early access.
A year later, the actual Ether blockchain coins (ETH) started trading live at $0.31 per coin.As of mid-April 2024, ETH trades at $3,157 per coin. That marks a roughly 10,000% increase in value.If you had invested $1,000 at $0.31 per coin, you’d have owned 3,225.81 ETH coins. At today’s pricing, that would be worth $10,183,871.Today’s pricing doesn’t even represent Ether’s peak. On November 9, 2021, ETH reached a dizzying $4,815. If you had cashed out your ETH coins at its zenith, you’d have walked away with a cool $15,532,258.
