How to Understand "Timing" in Investment

Readers often emphasize in the comments that the advantage of the investment market is to be "early."

It seems that participating now is too "late," and is there any way to be "early"?

So what does "early" mean, and how can we define "early"?

If "early" means trying to guess the next trend ahead of the market and find the next opportunity to get rich in order to position oneself in advance, then I cannot do that, and in my experience, there has not been a single project that I participated in that was that "early."

Take the three examples I heavily invested in mentioned in yesterday's article:

Bitcoin was launched in 2009, and I did not participate at that time.

Ethereum was launched in 2015, and I did not participate at that time.

CryptoPunks was launched in 2017; I looked at it at the end of that year or the beginning of 2018, but I just brushed past it and did not participate at all.

When Bored Ape was publicly released, it was 0.08 Ethereum; I also looked at it but similarly brushed past it and did not participate.

However, all these missed "early" opportunities did not affect my later participation, nor did they affect my growth alongside them and profiting from their growth.

Investment is not about looking at the past. If you look at the past, you will always find someone who was "early" than you, and you will always feel "late."

If you participated in Bitcoin in 2011, you would find someone who participated in 2009; if you participated in Bitcoin in 2013, you would find someone who participated in 2011; if you participated in Bitcoin in 2015, you would find someone who participated in 2013…

If you think you missed the opportunity just because you feel "late," then you will miss out on participation from 2011 all the way to 2031.

Even if you were lucky enough to participate in Bitcoin in 2009, could you really seize the opportunity?

Otherwise, how could someone use 10,000 Bitcoins to buy pizza in 2010?

Famous Chinese players who participated in Bitcoin early, you can search online, how many are still in the market? How many are still holding Bitcoin? How many truly profited from Bitcoin?

They must have participated early, right? Their opportunities must have been good, right?

Why did many of them, despite participating early and seizing such good opportunities, end up with nothing?

The fundamental reason has nothing to do with "early or late," but rather that they did not have the ability to seize the opportunity.

Without the ability to seize opportunities, it is meaningless to participate at any time.

In this case, instead of complaining about not having the luck to "discover" projects early, it is better to look for reasons within oneself, to learn more and improve.

In this regard, Duan Yongping has a profound saying. He commented on buying NetEase like this (the gist is):

If buying NetEase at 1 dollar was luck, then being able to hold NetEase and let it rise 100 times is definitely not luck.

This statement is "not very humble," but it is very profound.

When NetEase fell to 1 dollar, basically everyone in China's tech circle knew: a company that had a hard time getting listed on NASDAQ was about to be delisted, which was really embarrassing.

This opportunity must have been early, right?

But how many people dared to buy at that time?

Even if they bought it, how many could hold it until it rose 100 times before selling?

If an investor can truly understand NetEase, during this process, it doesn't matter if they buy at 1 dollar, 5 dollars, 10 dollars, or 50 dollars; they can all profit. There are countless opportunities that seemed "late" at the time but look very early in hindsight.

History is just a reference; the ultimate focus and judgment in investment must be the future. If you always look at history, then anything now is "late"; if you look at the future, then we can completely discover our own opportunities, and participating now is early.

So if we must define what "early" means in investment, it is to compare with the future.

For example, at that moment, investors assess and study the value of a project ten years later. If investors can judge that a project's price ten years later will be much higher than today, then participating today is early.

This Saturday (May 10) at 7:30 PM, we will hold an online discussion. Everyone can leave their questions under the link below.

https://x.com/Dao_Views/status/1919577184945004559