Today we’re doing something a little different, talking with one of our readers, someone who has come out ahead through crypto investing — though not without some stomach churning reversals along the way.

Why it matters: Crypto is often spoken of as a democratizing opportunity, yet regular people seldom see the stories of non-professionals placing bets in the space. Here is one.

Details: Canadian marketing technologist Darragh Grove-White is ahead, but not without taking some painful hits.

“I made a lot of mistakes, for sure. I’ve had crypto exchanges take my money,” he tells Axios.

He was among many Canadians who lost their luck when Gerald Cotten, the founder of QuadrigaCX, died (?). in India.

State of play: Grove White is one of the lucky ones. By his account, since the Quadriga loss he’s turned around. Although there have been some wild fluctuations in that number, he’s now up about 11x over his principal.

Axios has verified the success of his portfolio.

Scoreboard: He invested in more than 180 coins. His first three purchases were bitcoin, Monero (a privacy cryptocurrency — that trade is still down), and Verge, which has shady affiliations.

“I have had a few that have done really well and even fewer that I knew would do really well,” he said.

The biggest loss was a token that was the right idea (blockchain finance), but the wrong company at the wrong time. His greatest win was his lucky guess as to which solution to Ethereum’s speed issues would be most popular with users.

Context: While he only got into crypto in 2018 (a bear market year), he had some advantages. He is a lot more technical than the average person, given his day job.

That has worked to his advantage. He explained, “I’m just super curiosity.” It’s not enough to just read charts in crypto. A person needs to get in to understand it, he contends.

Be smart: Having been in for four years, he sees new arrivals come in waves. You can spot the new investors on Twitter and Discord — they are always looking to make a quick buck.

“This most recent cohort of noobs, their on-ramp was the Wall Street Bets experience,” he said. “A lot of the n00bs go for meme coins. They invest like it’s a bit of a joke.”

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