That night I will never forget. At three in the morning, watching ACT fall on the screen, my investment of 8k shrank to the point where I had to calculate whether I could afford a pack of cigarettes. People in the group were still shouting to buy the dip, but there was still lower below the bottom - in the end, it dropped 99%. If that money were to be withdrawn, I guess I wouldn't even be able to afford a meal.

A 6-fold increase sounds impressive, but if you do the math, you are still far from breaking even. This is the trick of the manipulators – using visual traps to lure us, the unwilling ones. After that, I developed a strange illness; whenever I see cryptocurrencies soaring or plummeting, my hands shake.

But it is precisely this fear that forced me to understand: in a market that could go to zero at any moment, the most important thing is not how to make 100 times, but how not to lose 99%. While others study how to make a fortune, I started to study how to survive. It sounds simple, but this shift completely rewrote my investment logic.

This "survival instinct" has led me to observe another extreme of the crypto market. While high-risk coins are performing roller coasters, some projects are quietly building safety barriers. Take the stablecoin sector for example; the approach is completely different - rather than playing with exciting volatility, it focuses on maximizing stability. Using methods that may seem clumsy, such as over-collateralization and real-time transparent auditing, to create a relatively safe haven in a volatile market.

I calculated a comparison: if the eight thousand yuan back then hadn't been invested in high-risk coins, and instead had been allocated to stablecoin assets, although the returns wouldn't be as enticing as a spectacular surge, at least it would maintain sleep quality. Now I understand that in the world of crypto assets, stability itself is a form of profit.