I sold my entire Bitcoin position. Not a trim, not taking a little profit off the table, the whole thing is gone.
I held Bitcoin for years, and I still think it has a place for a lot of people. So this is not a hit piece, and it is not me telling you to sell yours. It is an honest account of why it stopped fitting my strategy, and where I put the money instead.
The setup: nine months of watching it bleed
Since its all-time high near $126,000 in October 2025, Bitcoin has roughly halved. As I write this it sits around $62,000, close to a 50% drawdown in nine months.
I will not pretend the price is irrelevant. It is not the reason I sold, but if Bitcoin had run to a million dollars instead of halving, I would still be holding. What the drop did was make me stop and reassess, and once I looked properly, the reasons to step away were structural, not emotional. A considered response to a lower price is a very different thing from panic selling the bottom.
Reason 1: I want my money working for me
I have reached a stage where I want my money in things that pay me while I sleep. Property pays rent. Stocks pay dividends. Cash in the right account pays interest. Bitcoin pays nothing. It sits there and hopes to be worth more later.
You can earn a yield on crypto, but only by lending it out to someone else, and we have all seen how that story can end. Celsius, and platforms like it, are exactly why I am not comfortable reaching for yield on an asset like this.
Reason 2: The hedge that didn't hedge
Bitcoin was sold to a lot of us as digital gold, the thing that protects you when everything else wobbles. So I looked at how it actually behaved through this stretch of fear, measured from its October 2025 peak.
| Asset | Since Bitcoin's Oct 2025 peak |
|---|---|
| Bitcoin | About -50% |
| Gold | +6% |
| Silver | +30% |
| Nasdaq 100 | +19% |
| S&P 500 | +12% |
Real gold held its value. Silver ran. Even the stock indices, the supposedly risky ones, went up. The single thing that fell in half was the asset that was meant to be my hedge. Digital gold did not behave like gold when it actually mattered.
Reason 3: Not "how high," but "compared to what"
I stopped asking how high Bitcoin can go and started asking a more useful question: compared to what. Every euro sitting in Bitcoin is a euro not compounding somewhere else. Since October, the Nasdaq 100 is up around 19% while Bitcoin halved.
People love the story of Bitcoin as the easy road to a million. I would rather back businesses that actually build, earn, and grow. If you want the reasoning behind that shift, I wrote about why I sold my ETFs and bought individual stocks earlier this year.
Reason 4: Being your own bank is a job
"Not your keys, not your coins." Fair enough. But owning Bitcoin properly is a job, and both ways of doing it have a real downside.
Leave it on an exchange and you are trusting them to hold your keys, with no deposit insurance if they go under. Move it to your own wallet and the responsibility sits entirely with you. Lose the device or the seed phrase and it is gone forever, and now you are thinking about fire, theft, and how quiet you have kept about what you hold. Both options kept me up at night, and I decided I no longer wanted that particular job.
Reason 5: The security and privacy problem
This one does not get talked about enough. 2025 was the most violent year in crypto's history. Security firm CertiK counted 72 physical attacks on crypto holders over the year, up 75% from 2024, with more than $40 million taken by force. Europe was the worst-hit region.
These are "wrench attacks," where someone uses force or threats to make you hand over your keys, bypassing every bit of technical security you set up. I have a public profile and I have talked openly about holding crypto. A known face plus a known stack is not a combination I love.
And the privacy that was supposed to come with Bitcoin is largely gone anyway. There is KYC on every exchange, the travel rule on transfers, and a public ledger where every coin can be traced forever. It is not the anonymous money it was once sold as.
Reason 6: The cracks in the "unstoppable" story
The long-term case for Bitcoin is that it is unstoppable and inevitable. The more I look, the more small cracks I notice.
- A small group of core developers effectively controls the code. A contested change once split the network, and a rival version still runs a meaningful chunk of it.
- Miners are paid mostly by new supply, not fees. With most of the coins already mined, it is a fair question what funds network security once new supply dries up.
- The much-hyped US strategic reserve holds only seized coins, none bought. China banned it. Central banks are busy building their own digital currencies instead.
- It is 2009 technology in an AI world, still waiting on an agreed plan to harden it against future quantum computing.
None of these is fatal on its own. Together, they make the "inevitable" story a lot less certain than the headlines suggest.
Reason 7: Even the biggest holder started selling
The thing that made me pay real attention: the largest corporate holder of Bitcoin broke its own golden rule.
Strategy, formerly MicroStrategy, holds around 847,000 Bitcoin, close to 4% of every coin that will ever exist, at an average cost near $75,000. At today's price that position is roughly $11 billion underwater. For years the message was "never sell." In mid-2026 that changed: the company sold Bitcoin and put a framework in place to sell more, to cover the dividends on its preferred shares. When the loudest "never sell" voice in the room files to start selling, I pay attention.
The case that I'm wrong
I always try to argue against myself, so here is the honest counterpoint. I might be selling near the bottom. Sentiment is washed out, a lot of coins are underwater, and the average holder is not far from break-even, the kind of levels that have marked past lows. Some big holders are quietly buying while everyone else panics.
And that is fine. Me selling does not make the price fall, and nobody times these things perfectly. If it runs from here, good for everyone still holding. This was a strategy decision, not a prediction. I have written before about sitting through a brutal drawdown without panicking, and this is the same mindset, just pointed at a different asset.
Where the money went instead
I did not sell to sit in cash and sulk. The proceeds went into things that compound: the Nasdaq 100, a few individual tech leaders I have real conviction in, and cash reserves earning a solid interest rate while I wait for the next opportunity, most likely my next property. For the stock side I use Interactive Brokers, one of the three brokers I actually use and a strong option for anyone who wants access to global markets.
I am still a long-term investor. I am just not frozen in place. If you are thinking about how the pieces of a portfolio fit together, my notes on diversification cover how I think about it.
The honest numbers
To keep it transparent, because that is the whole point of this channel: my Bitcoin position peaked at over $200,000, with six figures of gains at the top. I did not sell at the peak, so I closed it for less than that. But I closed it in profit, in the green.
Less than the peak. Still green. And a lot less to keep me up at night. That trade, less stress for a fair price, was one I was happy to make.
Frequently Asked Questions
No. I closed the position in profit. It was worth more at the October 2025 peak, so I sold for less than the top, but the position was still in the green when I closed it.
Not exactly. I still think Bitcoin can have a place for a lot of people. Selling was about my own strategy and where I want my money working right now, not a prediction that Bitcoin is finished.
I am not ruling it out. If the setup changes or my thinking changes, I would consider it. For now I see better risk and reward for my money in other places.
Into the Nasdaq 100, a few individual tech leaders I have real conviction in, and cash reserves earning interest while I wait for my next opportunity, most likely my next property.
I cannot answer that for you, and this is not advice. We are all different. Someone about to retire and someone with decades ahead have very different needs. The right call depends on your own situation, time horizon, and conviction.
Disclaimer: This article is for educational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. When investing, your capital is at risk. You may get back less than you invested. Past performance is not a guarantee of future results. This article contains affiliate links, meaning I may earn a small commission if you sign up through them, at no additional cost to you.
