Guide to Amateur Crypto Investors Losing Life Savings

So, like, this chick learned how to speak “meme stock,” huh huh. That’s like amateur investors on social media talking about stocks and stuff with emojis. “To the moon” means a stock is gonna go up, “diamond hands” is holding a stock even when it’s all shaky, and “tendies” is making money, you know? She says she started talking like an “ape,” which is like some bullish investor slang, dude. She couldn’t read a book ’cause she was always checking her portfolio. Her phone made her hand cold, and her boyfriend called it her “Wall Street hand,” huh huh.

But things went bad, man. Ripple crashed, and she got into the GameStop thing too late, losing more cash. “I couldn’t eat, I was just constantly looking at my phone,” she said. She looked for stock tips online and stopped bragging to her boyfriend about her investments. She’s not a natural investor, and she didn’t really know what she was doing, dude. She watched The Big Short but couldn’t explain what shorting was. She just bought stocks based on internet hype and her feelings.

Noor lost, like, £10,000 of her initial investment, the £8,000 she made on Bitcoin, and another £5,000 on top of that. She finally admitted it was gambling, but she still thinks she can make it back. She sounds desperate and kinda deluded, like a roulette player who’s losing big time.

This year, lots of regular people got into financial markets. With lockdown boredom, “stimmy cheques,” and the GameStop thing, everyone’s talking about stocks and crypto wallets. Young people, women, and minority groups are leading the way in this online investing craze, dude.

A recent Financial Conduct Authority report said these groups are into high-risk stuff like cryptocurrencies, forex trading, and contracts for difference (CFD), which is betting on whether a security will go up or down during the day. CFDs are banned in the US, but Noor got into it, just like she got into everything else. So, like, dude, it’s a whole new world of investing, but it’s also a wild ride, huh huh.

So, like, new investors are all over social media looking for tips and stuff, but they’re super overconfident and just want thrills, huh huh. They don’t get the risks, and the regulator even warned them they could lose all their money in cryptocurrencies, dude.

Susannah Streeter from this Hargreaves Lansdown place says it’s cool to see young investors getting into it, but there’s a problem when social media influencers and easy-to-use trading apps make them do dumb stuff without a long-term plan. They’ve seen a 57% increase in app use in the last half of 2020 compared to 2019, dude.

Mintel says more young people like generation Z and millennials wanna invest in stocks and shares after the Covid thing ends, compared to, like, old people. These cryptocurrencies and online platforms are pop culture and appeal to tech-savvy youngsters. Apps like Trading 212 and eToro make it easy to start, but a lot of it is clueless investing. Streeter says people talk about their crypto wallets, but they don’t even know what the coins do, huh huh.

I talked to this dude Shane Blake, 26, from Brighton, and he was all bummed out ’cause of what Elon Musk did. He was like, “He knows how to take money straight out of my pocket. It’s not nice waking up and checking your balance and realizing you’ve just lost £3,000.” Elon said Tesla won’t take Bitcoin for payments ’cause it’s bad for the environment, and that made the Bitcoin price drop. So, like, investing can be a real bummer sometimes, huh huh.

So, like, Blake started investing in bitcoin and ethereum ’cause his friend showed him how much money he’d made. He put his life savings in, and he’s all proud of knowing the crypto language and stuff. He won’t tell me the exact value of his holdings, but it’s more than £5,000, dude. He thinks he’s gonna make £1,500 a week forever, huh huh. But then, the global cryptocurrency market crashed.

These young people go to social media for investing advice, dude. TikTok is full of finance gurus talking fast and using big words, and YouTube and Discord are full of communities where people share stock tips. But most of them don’t follow FCA rules about giving financial advice.

This dude Poku Banks, a 20-year-old student, has a bunch of followers on TikTok where he talks about entrepreneurship and investing. He always says he’s not a qualified financial adviser and wants people to do their research. His big dream is to have personal finance taught in schools. He thinks Covid made people wanna invest and start side-hustles ’cause they were bored and saw crazy returns in crypto, huh huh.

Banks doesn’t like the bad dudes in this space who sell courses with recycled info or show off flashy lifestyles to get views. On social media, some forex traders pose with fancy cars and cash, advertising courses to get rich like them. Even some reality TV stars like Stephen Bear and Chloe Ferry promote these forex trading courses, dude. So, like, it’s a wild world of investing out there, huh huh.

So, like, it’s super hard for average dudes to figure out if investing gurus on social media are legit or just scammers. There are “pump and dump” schemes and some gurus make money selling courses instead of investing, huh huh. This Stock Lizard King dude on Twitter with 125,000 followers says he’s not worried ’cause it’s people’s own choice, and they should know the risks. He wants his followers to play the game right, but he doesn’t have any financial advice qualifications, dude.

It’s kinda weird, but lots of young people are into the risky crypto and stock markets ’cause their lives feel crazy and unpredictable. With stuff like homeownership and stable jobs being hard to get, why not go for the risk, dude? Blake thinks it’s super hard to prepare for the future, and the Lizard King thinks the college system is a scam, man.

People from black, Asian, and minority backgrounds are more likely to invest in risky stuff, probably ’cause they have a harder time getting good jobs and houses. Plus, social media shows off the lives of super-rich influencers, so everyone wants to be like them, huh huh.

Social media and investing apps make people wanna jump on the latest hot stock ’cause they don’t wanna miss out. But that can be dangerous if they’re using money they can’t afford to lose, dude. The apps and platforms are kinda gamified, so they feel like gambling, and that’s not cool.

Robinhood, a popular trading app, is even facing a lawsuit ’cause they’re accused of encouraging risky purchases by making it all fun and game-like with emojis and trending products. So, like, young investors gotta watch out for the traps and chaos in the crypto world, huh huh.

So, like, Blake has seen his buddies go all in on day trading. It’s like a super risky way to try and make money by buying and selling stuff all day long, huh huh. He doesn’t do it ’cause it’s super addictive, and his friends get all messed up and can’t leave their charts.

There’s this therapist dude, Tony Marini, who works at a rehab center in Scotland, and they started treating crypto addicts. Mostly young dudes who got hooked on trading cryptocurrencies, huh huh. It starts out all fun, but then people lose money and get all guilty and ashamed.

Crypto trading is like, super addictive ’cause it goes up and down all the time. People start dreaming about paying off their debts and helping their families, but then they lose money and stuff gets bad, dude. They might even do illegal stuff or blame other people.

This chick, Noor, got into a lot of debt from trading, but she managed to get some of it back by investing in gold, silver, and pharmaceuticals. She’s not mad, but she blames those investing apps for sucking her in, huh huh. She’s gonna be an investor, not a speculator, and stop listening to other people who say they’ve cracked the code, man.

For every Noor, there are tons of young people trying to get rich quick and escape their boring lives. But, like, they should be careful with the risks and stuff, huh huh. If you need help with gambling problems, dude, check out BeGambleAware.org .

So, like, the latest hype is all about meme coins like PEPE, BOB, AiDOGE, WOJAK, WSB, and whatever they’re called. They were hyped up just a few weeks ago, and then, when the airdrop for the creators (you know, the ones actually behind all this) was over and the coins were listed on big exchanges, what happened? They went… down? That’s right, man. Meme coins are NOT an investment, dude. They’re just like gambling in a casino. If you really wanna invest in crypto, you’re better off with Bitcoin and Ethereum than with this meme coin trash!