I invested $50 in Bitcoin in 2022, and it's been a ride. Here's how much I have now

Welcome to 2025. It’s Jan. 1, and this is my first article of the year. As I have in every first article since 2022, I’ll be talking about Bitcoin. Specifically, I’ll discuss how much money I gained or lost on my vast Bitcoin holdings over the previous 12 months.

To put this into perspective, let me define what I mean by “vast.” On Jan. 1, 2022, after a celebratory New Year’s Eve filled with whatever was playing on BritBox that evening, I decided to take the plunge. I decided to invest my entire PayPal account balance into Bitcoin.

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PayPal, you see, had just announced that it would become a Bitcoin wallet provider. That meant all I had to do was give up even more personal identifying information than I normally do to PayPal, along with my PayPal balance, and I would become the proud owner of what was then slightly more than 0.001 of a Bitcoin.

My start with Bitcoin

During the process of setting up my Bitcoin investment on that cold and cloudy morning, I regained some degree of self-control and perspective. Rather than putting my entire PayPal balance of $64 into Bitcoin, I decided to invest a more sane $50 (plus the $1.15 in fees PayPal demands for its always-so-helpful participation in any transaction).

That self-control came in clutch when, after just a week, my holdings dropped almost 14%.

My ride off the cliff that was Bitcoin wasn’t over — not by a long shot. Two weeks later, my holdings dropped by another 14%, bringing the total to 28% below what they were at the beginning of that month.

By that point, I felt it was my responsibility to tell the world that this fake currency was clearly a bad idea and that investing in it was bonkers.

I decided my best course of action was to stop looking at it, and I left my account to plummet earthward until the six-month anniversary of my original purchase. Then I decided to take a look.

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Bad idea. My investment was down 60% from its original position. Can you imagine how bad this would have felt if I’d invested thousands or tens of thousands of dollars?

There was no sign of a rebound. The only thing Bitcoin was giving me was a subject to write about and justification for complaining and mocking.

I waited. And mocked. And complained.

January 2023

And then, on Jan. 1, 2023, the annual tradition of reporting to you about my Bitcoin investment became formalized. I lost less in the second half of 2022, but by January 2023, I was still down a whopping 66%.

Yeah, by this point, I was glad I hadn’t jumped on the whole Bitcoin bandwagon back in the day. I chose not to look at the value again until New Year’s Day of 2024.

January 2024

Amazingly, the value of my holdings from the previous July had almost doubled. Sadly, it was still underwater.

All of that brings us to today. While I didn’t look at my investment throughout 2024, I’ve been very aware of the news.

New Year’s Day 2025

First, there was the Bitcoin halving process. A scarcity algorithm is built into Bitcoin. Every time a new 210,000 blocks are mined in the blockchain, Bitcoin’s reward to miners is reduced.

This happens roughly every four years. On April 19, 2024, the block reward was reduced from 6.25 bitcoins to 3.125 bitcoins. The idea is that this reduces the incentive for mining, thereby putting less currency into the market and increasing overall value.

But the big event, the one that caused Bitcoin to surge in value, was the election. The overall value for a single Bitcoin was in the $60K range all through 2024, even after the halving event. It was at $69,494 on Nov. 1.

On Nov. 6, it jumped to $75K. By Dec. 1, it was at $97K.

According to Reuters, incoming President Trump is very bullish on cryptocurrency. Since the value of the coin is based entirely on the value traders put into it, Reuters believes the incoming president’s pro-crypto stance fueled the rise in currency prices overall, and Bitcoin’s in particular.

My Bitcoin holdings, as of about 5 p.m. today, Jan. 1, 2025, are up to almost $100 (it’s at $99.92). That’s almost double what I invested. Remember that though I invested $50, PayPal took $1.15 in fees. So my profits are up 95% instead of just about 100% because of those fees.

Is Bitcoin a good investment?

So, does this mean I’m now bullish on Bitcoin? No more than any other investment that can crater and skyrocket according to the whims of the market, no.

Look, I’m not qualified to make investment recommendations. But I’m still convinced that cryptocurrency is nuts. All cryptocurrency is, is an agreement among a bunch of people to assign an arbitrary value to an algorithm. That seems like crazy talk.

On the other hand, that’s our entire economy, isn’t it? We assign money a value and agree upon it, whether it’s dollars or even gold. Stocks have value because of how a bunch of people behave when buying and selling them. Even algorithms have value. Microsoft, for example, has been making bank for years off of Office revenue, and all Office really is, fundamentally, is a collection of algorithms.

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I’ll tell you this: I’m not going to be increasing my stake in Bitcoin. I’m not putting any more than my original $50 (plus fees) into the cryptocurrency. I’m just not into that kind of gambling. But I live in the same society and economy that all of you do, so I’ll be spending every workday doing my best to make dollars — which land in an account electronically.

I’ll then push some other buttons on screen to order groceries via Instacart or products via Amazon. So, yeah, while dollars are backed by the gold reserves of the US Treasury (conspiracy theories not withstanding), my personal experience of real dollars isn’t all that much different in practice than that of Bitcoin.

Will Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies replace the dollar? It’s possible. The world is just wacky enough to do it. Think about it this way: Before the 1950s, we didn’t really use credit cards. Now they’re necessary for just about every non-face-to-face transaction and most face-to-face transactions, as well. So, will crypto go mainstream? Check back with me each New Year’s Day.

This is my first article for 2025, and I want to thank you for visiting ZDNET and coming along for this glorious ride. Here’s to a great 2025 for everyone!

What do you think? Have you invested in Bitcoin or other crypto? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

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