I'm always amazed at how many people have witnessed the crypto cycle, yet don't have a plan going into the next cycle.
Today, we're going to use every crypto experience we’ve had, good and bad, to formulate our plan of attack for Boom4! This is without a doubt the most important step on your crypto journey. We're planning years into the future not just to make money, but to accomplish out goals in life!
We're not just gonna wing it this cycle! We're going to sell some crypto and lock in our goals, because that's the reason we're all here.
Selling is hard, but you'll never regret accomplishing your goals - even if the prices go higher after you sell. It certainly disappointing when you sell too soon, but locking in your goals is something you'll never regret.
I learned this lesson in 2017, during Boom2, when my goal was to buy a house. I sold a lot of my precious BTC and I bought my house, and I've been living in that house ever since. Bitcoin price has 3x'd since that time, but I don't regret selling for one second! Let's do this for you and your goals going into Boom4.
I just mapped out my Boom4 plan based on my goals, and I built a spreadsheet you can use to do the same. Punch your email address into the form at the top of this page and I’ll send it to you.
Obviously I'm not a registered financial advisor and this is not investment advice. My goal is simply to share what has worked for me in hopes that it helps you formulate your plan of attack leading into Boom4.
So let's go through it - and be sure to get the spreadsheet and copy it to your account so you can edit it! You'll only be editing the cells with a gray background. I pre-populated the gray cells with a bunch of examples and assumptions. You can leave the assumptions as is, or you can adjust them - it's all up to you.
Step 1 - Establish Concrete Goals
In step one, you're going to start by listing your concrete goals. Don't worry about the dollar amounts yet - just list your goals. In other words, things that money can buy!
Surprisingly, a lot of people don't even know what their goals are. Now is the time to figure them out. Maybe you want to pay off loans? Maybe you want a new car. Maybe you're saving up for a wedding. The more details you add the better! And when you're done, you can go back and apply a dollar amount to each goal. And once again, the more specific, the better.
This will give you a total and the amount you need to accomplish all your goals after you pay your taxes (we'll touch more on taxes later). For now, don't worry about the total - we can also adjust it later if we need to! Don’t start scrapping your goals based on dollar amounts just yet.
Step 2 - Current Crypto Portfolio
Step two is simple: simply punch in your crypto portfolio - every crypto you own across all your wallets, the current price, and the quantity. You're also going to add a row for cash - this represents how much you're willing to invest in crypto over the next year as we approach Boom4.
Step 3 - Consider Your Risk Profile
Step three is to consider your risk profile. How much risk are you willing to take with the money you've invested in crypto? Obviously higher risk equals higher reward, but taking big risks could also mean not reaching your goals. Typically the more money you have, the lower the risk you want to take.
If you're trying to turn $10k into a million dollars, you'll need to 100x your investment. How realistic is that? Perhaps going back and adjust your goals here is a good idea.
Personally, I landed on about 50% low risk, 30% medium risk and 20% high risk. And for me, BTC is the only asset in the low risk bucket, and ETH is the only asset in the medium risk bucket. Everything else is high risk! It's up to you to decide how risky you think each asset is and how much risk you're willing to take.
Step 4 - Rebalance Your Crypto Portfolio
In step four, we're going to rebalance our portfolio based on our risk profile. Are you going to need more BTC or do you need to sell some? Which high risk assets are you going to add? What are you going to dump? These are the moves you're going to make over the course of the next year.
You can play with the numbers - just make sure that the percent of your portfolio matches the risk tolerance you considered in step three. The total dollar value needs to equal the same total from step two (it'll show a green check mark next to it if you've properly balanced it out).
Step 5 - Predict & Plan
Now step five, that's the fun part! We're going to predict the price each asset can reach during Boom4. For example, I think Bitcoin can reach $100k. It's around ~$23k today, so that spits out a 4.34 Multiplier.
I've talked about how ETH is a $1 trillion asset when it reaches $8,300, so at $1,600, ETH has a 5.38 Multiplier.
Now alt coins, meme coins, shit coins, all those fun coins - those are tricky! For these I like to use their previous all-time highs (at least as a guide). And if they're super new, you can run some comparisons by finding similar assets and looking at the multiples they hit back and Boom3! Do the math and figure out a price that reaches a similar multiplier.
There's two important things everyone forgets - myself included:
- How much crypto are you actually willing to sell? Are you going to sell 100% of your BTC to accomplish your goals? I certainly wouldn’t recommend it! Apply a percentage of how much you’re willing to let go next to each asset.
- Taxes. Unless you're living in a utopia, you're going to have to pay taxes on your gains. Be sure to apply your tax rate towards the bottom - it's currently set to 20%. As a rough guide, capital gains are 20% on longterm gains and 40% on short-term gains in the US - but mark sure to consult your tax professional on that one.
Ideally you would buy everything at least a year before we hit the all time highs, so you can lock in that lower long-term tax rate. The Bitcoin halving isn't until Q1 of 2024, and the bull market typically doesn't kick off until at least ~6 months after that. That's why we're doing our planning now, while everyone else is sleeping!
Once you've added your multipliers, the percentage you're willing to sell, and your tax rate - it'll give you a grand total. This is the amount that you could make if everything went according to plan!
The spreadsheet will also tell you if your grand total is enough to accomplish your goals. If it is - BOOM! You're done. If it's way over, you can adjust your risk profile to take less risk.
If it's not enough to accomplish your goals, you have three options:
- Adjust your goals
- Adjust your price predictions and assumptions
- Adjust the amount you’re willing to sell
The only thing you can’t adjust is your tax rate!
Conclusion
So that's it! This is how I'm planning for Boom4. I hope more than anything that you accomplish your goals for Boom4 - or at least that this planning exercise stimulates some ideas for how you're going to approach Boom4.
I know for certain that if you've listened to this far you're way ahead of the pack! Most people don't do anything like this - and that's why when the time comes to sell, they're not ready. But you will be! I hope you are. And I look forward to celebrating with you as we crush it in Boom4!
Written by: @gerbz Gerbz is the founder of BitLift and has been journeying down the crypto rabbit hole since 2013.