Tracking 2022 Top Ten Cryptocurrencies – Month Seventeen

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Month Seventeen – Down -70%

The 2022 Top Ten Crypto Index Fund Portfolio is BTC, ETH, BNB, Solana, ADA, USDC/UST, XRP, LUNA/LUNC, DOT, AVAX.  

May highlights for the 2022 Top Ten Portfolio:

• XRP and ETH finish the month in postive territory, the other eight severely in the red.
• XRP passes BNB to claim first place, down -40% and -41% respectively.
• The 2022 Top Ten Portfolio is the worst performing of the six Top Ten experiments, -70% as a whole.

May Ranking and Dropouts

Here’s a look at the movement in ranking seventeen months into the 2022 Top Ten Index Fund Experiment:

AVAX, DOT, and LUNC have dropped out, replaced by Litecoin, DOGE, and MATIC.  

May Winners and Losers

May Winners –  XRP (+9%) easily won in May, followed by ETH (+1%).

May Losers – Terra coins UST and LUNC performed horribly this month, down -34% and -22% respectively.

Overall Update: XRP overtakes BNB for the lead. All cryptos well in negative territory. LUNC worst performing in the 2022 Portfolio and worst performing crypto of all the Top Ten Experiments.

XRP (-40%) overtook BNB (-41%) this month to claim first position. Not far behind is BTC, down -43%.

Ever since LUNC’s (then known as LUNA) crash in May of 2022, it has remained hopelessly at the bottom, worth a fraction of a cent.  The initial $100 invested in Luna seventeen months ago is worth $0.0001 today – the worst performance of any coin in any of the six Top Ten Experiments, by far.  It’s hard to remember/believe that LUNA was the highest performing Top Ten Crypto of the first quarter of the 2022. 

At -70%, the 2022 Top Ten Portfolio is the worst performing of the six Top Ten experiments.

Overall return on $1,000 investment since January 1st, 2022:

Overall, the 2022 Top Ten Portfolio is down -70%.  The initial $1000 investment on New Year’s Day 2022 is now worth $299. 

Here’s a visual summary of the progress so far:

As you can see, there hasn’t been a positive overall ROI month yet, although the 2022 Top Ten Portfolio flirted with the break even point in March 2022. The value has remained in the -66% to -80% range since May 2022.  

A note on USDC/UST

In retrospect this was not my best idea: I was a bit bored of simply holding a stablecoin in the Top Ten as I’ve been doing since 2019 and thought I’d showcase some of the possibilities available in crypto to build on stablecoin holdings.  My plan was to start nice and easy with trusted CeFi platforms, taking advantage of sign up bonuses, then move to more advanced DeFi strategies.  As fate would have it, I decided to showcase the TerraLuna chain converting my USDC to UST then staking with Anchor.

It was all going pretty well until May 2022. Then the LUNA implosion happened. My UST is now worth $0.001, down -100%.

It’s a good reminder that anything can and does happen in crypto and we should all continue to be careful. I’m thankful that the lesson only cost me $100:  I know a lot of other people got hit much, much harder.

Bitcoin Dominance:

BitDom ended May at 46.1%. For context, that’s exactly the same percentage as one year ago, in May of 2022. Chart below:

For those just getting into crypto, it’s worth paying attention to the Bitcoin dominance figure, as it can signal appetite for altcoins vs. BTC.

Combining the 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023 Top Ten Crypto Portfolios 

So, where do we stand if we combine five years of the Top Ten Crypto Index Fund Experiments?

• 2018 Top Ten Experiment: down -37% (total value $628)
• 2019 Top Ten Experiment: up +229% (total value $3,286)
• 2020 Top Ten Experiment: up +379% (total value $4,788) (best performing portfolio)
• 2021 Top Ten Experiment: up +87% (total value $1,870)
• 2022 Top Ten Experiment: down -70% (total value $299) (worst performing portfolio)
• 2023 Top Ten Experiment: up +32% (total value $1,317)

Taking the six portfolios together, here’s the bottom bottom bottom bottom bottom bottom line: 

After a $6,000 total investment in the 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023 Top Ten Cryptocurrencies, the combined portfolios are worth $12,188. 

That’s up +103% on the combined portfolios.  The peak  for the combined Top Ten Index Fund Experiment Portfolios was November 2021’s all time high of +533%.  Here’s the combined monthly ROI since I started tracking the metric in January 2020 for those who do better with visuals:

In summary: That’s a +103% gain by investing $1k on whichever cryptos happened to be in the Top Ten on January 1st (including stablecoins) for five 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 to traditional markets. 

The S&P 500 is down -11% since January 2022, so the initial $1k investment into crypto on New Year’s Day would be worth $890 had it been redirected to the S&P.  

Taking the same invest-$1,000-on-January-1st-of-each-year approach with the S&P 500 that I’ve been documenting through the Top Ten Crypto Experiments, the yields are the following:

• $1000 investment in S&P 500 on January 1st, 2018 = $1,580 today
• $1000 investment in S&P 500 on January 1st, 2019 = $1,680 today
• $1000 investment in S&P 500 on January 1st, 2020 = $1,310 today
• $1000 investment in S&P 500 on January 1st, 2021 = $1,120 today
• $1000 investment in S&P 500 on January 1st, 2022 = $890 today
• $1000 investment in S&P 500 on January 1st, 2023 = $1,100 today

Taken together, here’s the bottom bottom bottom bottom bottom bottom line for a similar approach with the S&P: 

After six $1,000 investments into an S&P 500 index fund in January 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023 my portfolio would be worth $7,680.

That is up +28% since January 2018 compared to a +103% gain of the combined Top Ten Crypto Experiment Portfolios.  

The visual below shows a comparison on ROI between a Top Ten Crypto approach and the S&P as per the rules of the Top Ten Experiments: 

Conclusion:

As the last section demonstrates, if you can stomach crypto’s volatility (a big if) over the past few years, you’ll find better overall returns in crypto vs. traditional markets – at least at this point in the Experiment.

To the long time followers of the Top Ten Experiments, thank you for sticking around so long. For those just getting into crypto, I hope these reports will help prepare you for the highs and lows that await on your crypto adventures.  Buckle up, go with the flow, think long term, and truly don’t invest what you can’t afford to lose.  Most importantly, try to enjoy the ride. 
A reporting note: I’ll focus on 2023 Top Ten Portfolio reports + one other portfolio on a rotating basis this year, so expect two reports per month.  May’s extended report covers the 2022 Top Ten Portfolio, which you are reading now.  You can check out the latest 2018 Top Ten, 2019 Top Ten, 2020 Top Ten, and 2021 Top Ten reports as well.

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