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Month Eighteen – UP 469%
For the second straight month, the 2020 Top Ten Portfolio finished 100% in negative territory. Combined with last month, May and June represent the first two back to back red months since the 2020 Top Ten Experiment began. This after reaching a portfolio high in April.
Overall, the 2020 Top Ten Portfolio is still doing quite well 1.5 years into its lifespan. It continues to be the best performing of the four Top Ten Crypto Index Fund Experiments by a good margin, 100% of the 2020 cryptos are in positive territory, most have at least triple digit price growth and two cryptos in four digit growth territory (BNB and ETH).
This group of cryptos also highlights the benefits of an index fund strategy: the +469% return of the 2020 Top Ten Portfolio has outperformed eight of the individual component cryptos contained within the Index. Only by guessing right and throwing all your eggs into Ethereum and/or Binance Coin would you have performed better than spreading out the risk.
June Movement Report, Ranking, and Dropouts
A surprising amount of upward movement this month, given the all-red 2020 Portfolio performance:
Ups:
- BSV – up 3 places (#34–>#31)
- Bitcoin Cash – up one place (#13–>#12)
- Binance Coin – up 1 place (#5–>#4)
Downs:
- EOS – down 4 places (#23–>#27)
- Tezos – up three places (#38–>#35)
Top Ten dropouts since January 2020: after eighteen months, half of the cryptos that started in the Top Ten have dropped out: EOS, BSV, Tezos, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash have been replaced by Cardano, Polkadot, UNI, Doge, and USDC.
EOS is out of the Top Twenty and XTZ and BSV are both out of the Top Thirty.
June Winners and Losers
June Winners – for the second month in a row, stablecoin Tether. Second place is Bitcoin, even though it dropped -9% in June.
June Losers – EOS’ price was hammered this month, losing -38% and taking the L for June. Second worst performer was XRP, down -35%l.
Tally of Monthly Winners and Losers
After eighteen months, here’s a snapshot of the 2020 Top Ten Experiment’s monthly winners and losers:
With four monthly victories each, ETH and Tether are tied for the lead. Tether still has the most monthly losses, a good sign for the 2020 Top Ten Portfolio.
Overall Update – BNB and ETH far ahead, 100% of cryptos in positive territory, 70% have at least triple digit gains.
The 2020 Top Ten continue to lead the other Top Ten Crypto Experiments. 70% of the cryptos in this group are up at least triple digits and Ethereum and Binance Coin are up quadruple digits.
The initial $100 investment into first place Binance Coin is currently worth $2,004, an increase of +1,944%. Not bad for a 1.5 year investment.
In second is Ethereum, also with quadruple digit gains, up +1,537%.
Besides USDT, the worst performer in the 2020 group is BSV, up +48% since January 2020.
Total Market Cap for the Entire Cryptocurrency Sector:
The total market cap fell $265 billion in June. A tough month for crypto no doubt, but the bleeding seems to be slowing: it lost less than half of what evaporated in May. As a sector, crypto is up +626% over the eighteen month lifespan of the 2020 Top Ten Experiment.
If you were able to capture the entire crypto market since January 2020 (+626%), you’d be doing a bit better than the Experiment’s Top Ten approach (+469%) and much better than the S&P (+34%) over the same time period.
The Top Ten index fund strategy has done pretty well up to this point in the experiment: it has outperformed eight of the ten individual cryptos held within the index. Only by guessing correctly on ETH or BNB would you have beaten the Top Ten approach.
Bitcoin Dominance:
BitDom reversed course this month, bouncing a bit back up to 45.3%. As the table above shows, this is still very near the bottom: out of eighteen months, Bitcoin Domination was only lower last month.
Overall return on $1,000 investment since January 1st, 2020:
A second straight monthly drop brings the current value of the 2020 Top Ten Portfolio to $5,688 (+469%) from the initial $1k investment. For some context, this portfolio was worth $10,5236 just two months ago).
The 2020 Portfolio remains the best performing of the four Experiments.
Below is a month by month ROI of the 2020 Top Ten Experiment, to give you a sense of perspective and provide an overview as we go along:
+469% brings the 2020 Top Ten Portfolio back to where it was in early March.
The portfolio has yet to experience a red month, although a little over a year ago in March 2020 it came close, returning a COVID induced low of +7%.
Combining the 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 Top Ten Crypto Portfolios
So, where do we stand if we combine four years of the Top Ten Crypto Index Fund Experiments?
- 2018 Top Ten Experiment: down -1% (total value $989)
- 2019 Top Ten Experiment: up +341% (total value $4,414)
- 2020 Top Ten Experiment: up +469% (total value $5,688)
- 2021 Top Ten Experiment: up +184% (total value $2,840)
Taking the four portfolios together, here’s the bottom bottom bottom bottom line:
After a $4,000 investment in the 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 Top Ten Cryptocurrencies, the combined portfolios are worth $13,931 ($989 + $4,414 + $5,688 + $2,840).
That’s up +248% on the combined portfolio. Two straight down months for the combined portfolios, which is back to February returns.
Lost in the numbers? Here’s a table to help visualize the progress of the combined portfolios:
That’s a +248% gain by investing $1k on whichever cryptos happened to be in the Top Ten on January 1st for four straight years.
Comparison to S&P 500
I’m also tracking the S&P 500 as part of my experiment to have a comparison point with traditional markets. The S&P kept chugging along in June, reaching another all time high, something we’ve seen over and over this year. It has now returned +34% since January 1st, 2020. Not bad at all.
That same $1k I put into crypto in January 2020 would be worth $1340 had it been redirected to the S&P 500 instead.
Crypto over the same time period? The 2020 Top Ten Crypto Portfolio is returning +469%. The initial $1k investment in crypto is now worth $5,688.
That’s a difference of $4,348 on a $1k investment!
But that’s just 2020. What about in the longer term? What if I invested in the S&P 500 the same way I did during the first four years of the Top Ten Crypto Index Fund Experiments since January 1st, 2018? What I like to call the world’s slowest dollar cost averaging method? Here are the figures:
- $1000 investment in S&P 500 on January 1st, 2018 = $1620 today
- $1000 investment in S&P 500 on January 1st, 2019 = $1720 today
- $1000 investment in S&P 500 on January 1st, 2020 = $1340 today
- $1000 investment in S&P 500 on January 1st, 2021 = $1150 today
So, taken together, here’s the bottom bottom bottom bottom line for a similar approach with the S&P:
After four $1,000 investments into an S&P 500 index fund in January 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021, my portfolio would be worth $5,830 ($1,620 + $1,720 + $1,340 + $1,150)
That is up +46% since January 2018 compared to a +248% gain of the combined Top Ten Crypto Experiment Portfolios, a difference of 202% in favor of crypto.
To help provide perspective, here’s a quick look at the combined four year ROI for crypto vs. the S&P up to this point.
Even after a couple of red months, that’s nine straight monthly wins for crypto.
Conclusion:
Despite two back to back down months in crypto, it has performed much better than traditional markets in recent years if you zoom out a bit. At this point in the Experiments, crypto would need to absolutely tank for traditional markets to catch up. Could this happen tomorrow? Sure, this is crypto, anything can happen. It will be interesting to see which way this crab market breaks in the coming months.
For those who have supported the Experiments over the years, thank you. For those just getting into crypto, I hope these monthly reports can somehow help with perspective as you embark on your crypto adventures. Buckle up, think long term, don’t invest what you can’t afford to lose, and most importantly, try to enjoy the ride!Feel free to reach out with any questions and stay tuned for progress reports. Keep an eye out for my parallel projects tracking the Top Ten cryptos as of January 1st, 2018 (the OG Experiment), January 1st, 2019, and most recently, January 1st, 2021.
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