Text/31QU Yu Nakamoto

From debt to earning to debt

The first time I saw Lao Su was in a coffee shop in Wukesong Square.

I was over an hour late because of the "International Conference Forum". When I arrived full of apology, I found that Lao Su had already started to eat on his own, and there was a meal specially ordered for me beside him.

Old Su has a loyal face and wears a pair of glasses. As soon as I sit down, he looks me up and down.

Before I could speak, Old Su asked me: "Can you make the legend I wrote a little bit?"

"I entered the currency circle in 2011. From the perspective of time, Li Xiaolai and I are in the same group." Lao Su told me. "The only difference is that he succeeded, and I am still unknown in the currency circle."

Old Su was born in Jiangsu in 1982. That year, the spring breeze of reform and opening up had just blown across China.

"It may be because I was born in the reform and opening up, and I have been restless since I was a child." Lao Su said, "Although my parents still hope that I will be safe and stable."

Therefore, after graduating from an ordinary university in Jiangsu, his parents hoped that Lao Su could become a civil servant, get married and have children.

"I don't like it." The restless factor in Lao Su's heart "attacked" for the first time. He was not satisfied with his parents' orders, so he chose to run away from home and came to Beijing alone. "At that time, I told them not to keep looking for me. Looking for a job in Beijing."

Recalling this, Lao Su smiled slyly, "Actually, I rented a house in Beijing and was preparing for the postgraduate entrance examination."

Afterwards, Lao Su was admitted to a master's and doctoral degree, and entered a research institute that was "secret to the unit"; got married, bought a house with a loan, and occasionally speculated in stocks. In the eyes of the outside world, Lao Su's path is quite "safe".

"Looking at it now, if I put all the money for buying a house into the currency circle at that time, maybe it would not be what it is now." Lao Su recalled the history of buying a house in 2009, with regrets.

But in fact, after a short period of downturn, housing prices in Beijing began to soar in 2009, with an average housing price of 15,000 to 16,000; and in 2009, Bitcoin was still a new toy in the small circle of geeks.

Lao Su really came into contact with Bitcoin in 2011, "I was lucky, and I caught up with the launch of Litecoin when I first entered the currency circle."

Lao Su took out 5,000 yuan from the stock market and put it into Litecoin: "After 2009, the stock market was very depressed. At that time, I didn't know where to put the money. I invested in Litecoin as if I was sick and rushed to the doctor."

The next day, he found that Litecoin was up 50%. "It's horrible." Lao Su felt that the stock market and the currency circle were completely incomparable, and the generous returns stirred Lao Su's restless heart.

He first cleared all the stocks, and bought some counterfeit coins, large and small, in the currency circle at that time; after discovering that "you can make money by buying anything", Lao Su's brain became hot, and he mortgaged his house to speculate in coins.

secondary title

From Research Institute Engineer to Professional Broker

Old Su, who failed in his investment, looked ashamed. After that, Lao Su honestly went to work to earn money to pay off his debts, and never touched cryptocurrencies again.

The time has come to 2017. This year, cryptocurrencies ushered in the craziest era in history. Bitcoin flew directly from $900 to $20,000. All kinds of hundred times coins and thousand times coins emerge in endlessly.

At the same time, the currency circle has also created batches of people who have become rich overnight.

"At that time, I just passed my 35th birthday, and I will be 40 in five years. I don't want to be mediocre." Lao Su saw it in his eyes and was very entangled in his heart, "I want to fight again while I am still young. .”

Unable to resist the temptation of getting rich, Lao Su once again entered the currency circle. But unlike in 2014, Lao Su did not choose to go all out this time. "I have a child. Although I want to fight, I have concerns."

"There is no big profit, and no small profit." In this unprecedented bull market, Lao Su repeatedly operated, but in the end he still did not become the group of people who became rich overnight.

During the bull market period, Lao Su paid attention to the market trend of the currency circle day and night, watching it at work and after get off work. 20 hours out of 24 hours a day are in the market.

"But basically the money earned in the first half of the year will be spit out in the second half of the year." Lao Su said, "No matter how big the market is, it is not as big as the situation."

In two years, Lao Su didn't make much money: "In the past few years, I basically didn't make much money from investment, and the mortgage was basically paid off by salary and stocks."

Just when Lao Su was a little discouraged, one day suddenly, a project approached him, and he wanted Lao Su to help them promote it for a fee.

"Because when I was in contact with various projects, I accidentally added a lot of WeChat groups. Until now, I have more than 4,000 WeChat friends in the currency circle and hundreds of WeChat groups in the currency circle." Unexpectedly, this Become Lao Su's biggest "resource".

With the first, there will be the second, and more and more projects have found Lao Su.

There is another village where the willows are dark and the flowers are bright.

"When I found out that I could get decent profits by doing this, I suddenly made up my mind to do my best in the currency circle." Lao Su told 31QU, "I don't want to speculate in currencies, I just do channels."

But when working as a broker, Lao Su also discovered the "tricks" in the currency circle.

"The further you go, the more you find that some project parties are really over the top." Lao Su said. "In the market, 8 out of 10 project parties are exchanges. Basically, these exchanges have approached me and asked me to help them match some projects. But in my opinion, most of the exchanges are There is no need to exist."

"What's more, I was approached by a project on the Matcha Exchange, (they) gave me a lot of tokens, and then asked me to help attract more people in, and share them in proportion after cutting. These are all theirs Exact words."

But Lao Su did not agree, "I am a doctoral engineer. I think I see more clearly than other players in the currency circle. There are some things that I cannot do."

secondary title

The Road to Shouting Orders for Underage Streamers

The group of "brokers" has all kinds of legendary people.

Unlike Lao Su born in the 1980s, Xiaohu (pseudonym) from Guangdong is born after 2000. But the same as Lao Su, Xiaohu has been immersed in the currency circle for a long time.

I came into contact with Xiaohu in a WeChat group. At that time, he was working hard to promote a project, so he was warned by the group administrator.

At that time, I saw Xiaohu's WeChat name followed by a string of Huya Live, so I found him.

"Brother, what do you want to know from me? Can you wait until 9:30 p.m. if you want to chat with me? I'm still in class." This was the first sentence Xiaohu said to me.

"Brother, can you be late for another half an hour? I'm washing up, and the water and lights in this XX school will be cut off in a while."

"Brother, I'm fine."

When Xiaohu found a place with a good signal, we finally connected the voice, "If you have any questions, feel free to ask, I can stay up late, when I used to be an anchor, I often didn't go to sleep until three or four in the morning. "

Before getting in touch with the currency circle, Xiaohu once worked as a game anchor in Huya for a period of time.

"At that time, I broadcast everything, such as console games, mobile games, and eating chicken. I would not refuse anyone. Now, if you look at my live broadcast room, there are still more than 100,000 people."

But the live broadcast does not make money, and the trade union takes most of it away. "It happened that someone was discussing some things about the blockchain in a WeChat group I joined by chance before. Out of curiosity, I entered the circle."

Xiaohu found his first job related to blockchain, which was to help promote a project.

Since Xiaohu has a certain popularity in the live broadcast circle and happens to be in the blockchain group, a person named "Langyu" studio approached him, hoping to let him help promote and spread.

"At that time, they asked me to post some links on platforms such as telegram groups, post bars, and WeChat groups, and asked me to pull people in. But I didn't know what cutting leeks was until later. I learned this from Lang Yu."

"I did as I did, and after I finished, that person gave me 80 yuan and kicked me out of the group." Xiaohu was very annoyed, "They made at least a billion dollars from that promotion."

Later, that person became a city partner of an exchange.

Although Xiaohu did not have a good impression of his first blockchain job, he saw an opportunity to get rich overnight during the promotion process.

"At that time, the blockchain was full of gold." So Xiaohu devoted himself to the blockchain regardless of his own life.

"My second job related to the blockchain was to help a public chain maintain the market in 2018, manage telegram groups, WeChat groups, and QQ groups." Xiaohu said, "At that time, the CEO of this public chain sent me a I bought a bunch of their coins, and the price was around 6 yuan at that time. I can also get a lot of coins every month, and the income is not bad.”

The good times didn’t last long. On January 17, 2018, after experiencing a short period of brilliance, the price of the public chain currency fell from the highest level of 7 yuan. In June of that year, it had shrunk to less than 1 yuan. Later, the currency price fell below 10 cents and went straight to zero.

"This is the angel investor above the CEO who is smashing the market. Everyone can't protect it, even Jesus can't protect it." Xiaohu told 31QU, "The price of the currency has fallen, and my income has also decreased."

But he thinks it will rise again. "So I didn't choose to leave." Xiaohu said.

"After June last year, I joined a certain blockchain information platform. Before that, a wallet also approached me and asked me to do full-time market maintenance for them, and gave me 7,000 a month."

"They asked me to go to Beijing, but I didn't want to leave my parents, so I didn't agree. At that time, the CEO of this wallet told me that I could do a part-time job for 3,000 yuan a month."

In addition to the basic salary, Xiaohu can also get an additional commission every time he helps the platform convert a user.

"Basically, if I pull in 1,000 yuan, I can earn 30 yuan." Calculated in this way, "Basically, in a group of 300 people, I can transform more than a dozen people, and these dozen people can bring in 30,000 to 50 yuan. Ten thousand yuan. In this way, I can get more than 1,000 yuan a month." Xiaohu said.

The commission plus basic salary is almost 4,000 yuan, which is quite impressive for a 17-year-old student.

But what happened later made Xiaohu and the platform go against each other.

Xiaohu, who needed to subsidize his family, took on a little private work outside, that is, helping other projects to attract groups. "With a few hundred people, I can get a 200 yuan red envelope."

This incident was found out by a user in the same group as Xiaohu, who directly "revealed" Xiaohu to the Wallet CEO.

Wallet CEO threatened Xiaohu, asking him to stop accepting live promotions without permission, but Xiaohu said: "The group is my own, and it didn't delay the work given to me by the platform, why should I stop?" Xiaohu did not give in. "I think we are a cooperative relationship, but (they) regard me as an employee." Xiaohu told 31QU.

The two parties finally broke up unhappy.

In this way, the cooperation with the currency circle several times before and after did not end well. But Xiaohu was still in high spirits. "Don't worry, I'm working on a new project now, and the project party will come to me continuously."

secondary title

How do "brokers" see the currency circle

"Although we are not well-known figures in this circle, we are an indispensable part of the survival and development of the currency circle." Lao Su said.

When I asked their views on their respective blockchains and currency circles. Old Su rolled his eyes and said: "In fact, after staying in this circle for a long time, you will find that there is nothing new under the sun. What is happening in the currency circle has already happened in the stock market."

Lao Su described to me the trend chart of the stock market cycle, and he said that this chart is no different when applied to the currency market.

"First there will be a big rise, then there will be a big fall, then there will be a small spring recovery, and finally there will be a long-term slow decline."

However, the cycle of the stock market is about 8 years, while the cycle of the currency circle is only three to four years. "The currency circle is more impetuous than the stock market."

Previously, the stock god Buffett had been advocating value investing, and Lao Su said that he had the same idea as Buffett.

"What's more, in the currency circle, don't pay too much attention to technology, but should look at what contribution a project can bring to society. Because today's awesome technology will be discontinued tomorrow, DAG is a good example."

Lao Su said that "value investment" and "social contribution", these two points are the bottom line for him to walk in the currency circle in the future.

In Lao Su's view, "value investing" is to see whether a project can operate normally without blockchain technology.

"Many projects now use blockchain as a gimmick, but they don't need to use blockchain at all."

And "social contribution" refers to how much value a project contributes to society.

"Don't listen to what they can bring to society once they are done, but look at what contributions they have made to society. These two points are my bottom line."

Constantly optimize your own currency circle relationship network and build your own reputation in the currency circle WeChat group.

"I plan to work on the blockchain for the rest of my life after resigning. I want to make enough money for my son. So what I have to do now is to allow myself to have more autonomy in the future currency circle."

Xiaohu is 17 years old and is currently studying IT technology at school. But Xiaohu said that more and more projects are coming to him, and he spends too much time in WeChat groups every day, whether he is in or out of class.

But Xiaohu is very confident, "My skills will definitely be fine when I go to Tencent and Ali after graduation."

However, Xiaohu's parents do not approve of what Xiaohu is doing now. They feel that there is only a thin line between Xiaohu and MLM.

"But I want to do blockchain more, because it makes money quickly." Although Xiaohu has not yet made a lot of money in the blockchain.

"Besides, I now have 1,600 groups. With just this, I can easily find a job with a monthly salary of 20,000 in Beijing." Xiaohu is not worried about the future, "Everything will wait until I graduate next year."

In Xiaohu's view, he has only one year to wait for success.