Latest news with #bitcoin
Times
3 hours ago
- Business
- Times
I could have made 185% on bitcoin. But I'm still happy I sold
It's quite rare in life that you get to witness what might have been. You will never know if you would have been promoted at the company that you left, how a relationship might have worked out if you had stuck with it, or whether studying for that master's degree would have improved your career trajectory. In the world of investing, though, you can see exactly how things would have turned out. It's easy to track the movements of the share price of a company or fund after you sell up — and either curse yourself for the rash decision or praise yourself for your investing know-how. As the price of bitcoin hit a new record high, this week has been one of those moments for me. I bought £500 worth of bitcoin back in September 2021. I had always been against cryptocurrencies, but was strong-armed into it by my husband (then my fiancé) who had convinced me that we should dabble in this new, exciting way to make money. His argument at the time was simple but effective: 'But what if the value just keeps going up?' I later sold at a slight loss, having decided to reinstate my membership of the Cryptocurrency Is For Fools Club. Since then, I have happily ignored all the fanfare that has surrounded bitcoin and other digital currencies such as President Trump's $TRUMP coin. But this week, which has been dubbed 'crypto week' by Republicans in the US, it has been impossible to block out the noise. The price of bitcoin, the world's largest cryptocurrency, exceeded $122,000 (about £90,000) for the first time on Monday. The record high is predominantly down to a series of debates by US lawmakers about the regulation of digital assets such as bitcoin, which would lend them greater legitimacy and could boost their use. This comes amid Trump's desire to make America the 'crypto capital of the world'. Spurred on by the possibility that cryptocurrencies may be endorsed by the US government, the price of bitcoin has jumped 13 per cent in the past month. This, plus a hefty rise in its price since Trump was elected, means that my bitcoin holding would be worth £1,425 today — a return of 185 per cent. Since I bought bitcoin the S&P 500, the US's main stock market, has returned 40 per cent, and the FTSE 100, the UK equivalent, has returned 27 per cent. My stocks and shares portfolio is up about 26 per cent. While these figures made me choke on my breakfast, and momentarily rethink my stance on cryptocurrencies, I'm still happy that I sold up. There are four main reasons for this. First, I don't properly understand bitcoin or cryptocurrencies. I have my head around the basics (it's digital money that is not issued by a central bank, and there are a finite number of coins recorded on a central database, known as a blockchain) — but I don't have a grasp on how they, or the market, function — at least not to the same level as I do the stock market. • Are your savings too tied to US stocks? As Warren Buffett once said: 'Risk comes from not knowing what you're doing.' He avoided chasing any digital currency or new technology that he didn't understand, and if that strategy is good enough for the Oracle of Omaha, it's good enough for me. Then there's the fact that cryptocurrencies are highly volatile and speculative assets. Jason Hollands from the wealth manager Evelyn Partners said that unlike buying shares in a company, where you can seek to understand its strategy, assess its profits, dividends and outlook, it's anyone's guess as to what the fair value of bitcoin should be. 'It has no physical assets standing behind it, nor a yield attached,' he said. 'The price is ultimately down to what the next person is prepared to pay for it, and demand and supply can ebb and flow dramatically.' Cryptocurrency supporters will often point out that the stock market is not too different. Sentiment about a company or sector can drive share prices, and even moderately bad omens for a firm's future earnings can see a sharp sell-off, particularly in growth stocks whose share prices are often based on future potential earnings, such as many US-based technology stocks. • Your complete guide to crypto and bitcoin But as Laith Khalaf from the investment platform AJ Bell said: 'If the essay question is whether the global stock market will be higher in ten years' time than it is today, we can with a high degree of confidence say that it will be, based on historic performance. 'Over the next decade bitcoin may well continue to rise, but there is also a chance that it will lose all its value.' Cryptocurrency is often used to finance some murky activities, and although mention of this has died down, it is still a factor in my choosing not to buy it. The Centre for Financial Crime and Security Studies, a research company, found evidence of criminal activity within the mining process for cryptocurrency (where computers are used to solve complex mathematical problems and are rewarded with new coins) and that some criminal networks were using mining facilities to launder funds. It said there was also evidence of cryptoassets being used for the funding of nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons. And then there is the question of what comes next. The momentous rise in bitcoin's price since it first looked like Trump could win the US election (it has roughly doubled in value since September) is proof that how investors feel about it can change at pace. If the US's pro-crypto policies are watered down, or Trump simply changes his mind, everything could change again. If I had bought my bitcoin in November 2021, I could been sitting on a loss of about 70 per cent a year later. As the past teaches us, a crypto sell-off can be brutal.
The Guardian
12 hours ago
- The Guardian
National Crime Agency officer jailed for stealing £4.4m worth of seized bitcoin
A National Crime Agency (NCA) officer has been jailed for stealing £4.4m worth of bitcoin seized during a joint operation with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), after the criminal he was investigating told the police it was missing. Paul Chowles thought he had got away with the crime for five years, prosecutors said, after laundering the money on the dark web and spending £613,000, mostly on day-to-day expenses. The 42-year-old had been working as an investigator on the case of Thomas White from Liverpool, who ran an online black market for illegal drugs, known as Silk Road 2.0, launched a month after a website of the same name was shut down in 2013 by the FBI. It was White, while under investigation, who noticed someone had taken 50 bitcoin of the 97 he had, and told police it had to be someone inside the NCA because they had the private keys for his cryptocurrency wallet. Merseyside police, which had responsibility for managing White in the local area following his release on licence in early 2022, discussed the theft with the NCA, in meetings that Chowles attended. During the investigation, officers discovered Chowles had stolen the money between 6 and 7 May 2017, two years after the White investigation was over, and in the following five years had been spending it in supermarkets and hardware stores and on fuel and meals, with investigators uncovering hundreds of debit card transactions. It was initially worth about £60,000 at the time of the theft but skyrocketed in value during the time he was spending it. Police recovered an iPhone that linked Chowles to an account used to transfer bitcoin as well as relevant browser search history relating to a cryptocurrency exchange service. Several notebooks were also discovered in Chowles's office that contained usernames, passwords and statements relating to White's cryptocurrency accounts. Alex Johnson, specialist prosecutor with the Crown Prosecution Service's special crime division, said the defendant had been 'regarded as someone who was competent, technically minded and very aware of the dark web and cryptocurrencies'. He added: 'Once he had stolen the cryptocurrency, Paul Chowles sought to muddy the waters and cover his tracks by transferring the bitcoin into mixing services to help hide the trail of money. Sign up to First Edition Our morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion 'He made a large amount of money through his criminality, and it is only right that he is punished for his corrupt actions. DCI John Black, from Merseyside police's intelligence bureau, which carried out the investigation with help from the NCA, said: '[Chowles] took advantage of his position on this investigation to line his own pockets while devising a plan that he believed would cover his tracks. He was wrong.' Chowles, from Bristol, was sentenced to five and a half years at Liverpool crown court, after pleading guilty to theft, transferring criminal property and concealing criminal property at an earlier hearing.
Yahoo
13 hours ago
- Business
- Yahoo
It's Time to Promote the Correct Crypto Allocation
Let's be honest. Last month, I released a white paper explaining that conservative investors should allocate 10% to crypto, moderate clients should invest 25% and aggressive investors should place 40% of their portfolios into crypto. Bitcoin has outperformed every other asset class for 12 of the past 15 years, and it's highly likely that it will continue to do so for years to come. Institutions are investing like never before. Congress and the administration now fully support crypto, and we're beginning to get the regulatory clarity we've wanted. The SEC and FINRA's prohibitions that blocked brokerage firms from trading or custodying crypto have been rescinded. The OCC and the Fed have revoked similar prohibitions against banks, and the Department of Labor has rescinded its objection that prevented 401(k) plans from offering bitcoin as an investment option. Despite the growth and performance of bitcoin, I keep seeing suggestions that people ought to allocate only 1 or 2 percent to crypto. In my opinion, that is no longer enough. Crypto is no longer speculative. It is no longer niche. It now deserves to be treated as a core allocation. Consider this hypothetical illustration, comparing a traditional 60/40 portfolio of stocks/bonds to portfolios that hold 10 percent, 25 percent or 40 percent in bitcoin. Let's assume we invest $100 for five years, earning 7 percent annually in the 60/40 allocation. Let's also look at two extreme outcomes: bitcoin either becomes worthless, or it rises in five years to $1 million (roughly a 10x increase from today). As you see in the chart below, the $100 invested in the 60/40 portfolio rises to $140 after five years. Not bad. But the portfolio with a 25 percent bitcoin allocation could be worth more than 250 percent more. Even if bitcoin were to become worthless (and you held it all the way to zero), your portfolio would still be profitable – with a value above your original investment. Seems to me that the risk/reward ratio strongly favors a significant crypto allocation – and certainly one that's far higher than a measly 1 or 2 percent. Potential Range of Portfolio Returns Based on Bitcoin Allocation Bitcoin's price appreciation isn't speculation – it's just supply and demand. In Q1 2025, public companies purchased 95,000 bitcoins – more than double the new supply. And that's from just one category of buyers – it ignores additional demand from retail investors, financial advisors, family offices, hedge funds, institutional investors and sovereign wealth funds. This massive imbalance between supply and demand is driving bitcoin's price to all-time highs. I predict that bitcoin will reach $500,000 by 2030 – a 5x increase as of this writing. The adoption curve has tremendous room to run – supporting the thesis that there is substantial upside yet to come in bitcoin's price. Read the white paper for more. Sign in to access your portfolio
The Guardian
13 hours ago
- The Guardian
National Crime Agency officer jailed for stealing £4.4m worth of seized bitcoin
A National Crime Agency (NCA) officer has been jailed for stealing £4.4m worth of bitcoin seized during a joint operation with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), after the criminal he was investigating told the police it was missing. Paul Chowles thought he had got away with the crime for five years, prosecutors said, after laundering the money on the dark web and spending £613,000, mostly on day-to-day expenses. The 42-year-old had been working as an investigator on the case of Thomas White from Liverpool, who ran an online black market for illegal drugs, known as Silk Road 2.0, launched a month after a website of the same name was shut down in 2013 by the FBI. It was White, while under investigation, who noticed someone had taken 50 bitcoin of the 97 he had, and told police it had to be someone inside the NCA because they had the private keys for his cryptocurrency wallet. Merseyside police, which had responsibility for managing White in the local area following his release on licence in early 2022, discussed the theft with the NCA, in meetings that Chowles attended. During the investigation, officers discovered Chowles had stolen the money between 6 and 7 May 2017, two years after the White investigation was over, and in the following five years had been spending it in supermarkets and hardware stores and on fuel and meals, with investigators uncovering hundreds of debit card transactions. It was initially worth about £60,000 at the time of the theft but skyrocketed in value during the time he was spending it. Police recovered an iPhone that linked Chowles to an account used to transfer bitcoin as well as relevant browser search history relating to a cryptocurrency exchange service. Several notebooks were also discovered in Chowles's office that contained usernames, passwords and statements relating to White's cryptocurrency accounts. Alex Johnson, specialist prosecutor with the Crown Prosecution Service's special crime division, said the defendant had been 'regarded as someone who was competent, technically minded and very aware of the dark web and cryptocurrencies'. He added: 'Once he had stolen the cryptocurrency, Paul Chowles sought to muddy the waters and cover his tracks by transferring the bitcoin into mixing services to help hide the trail of money. Sign up to First Edition Our morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion 'He made a large amount of money through his criminality, and it is only right that he is punished for his corrupt actions. DCI John Black, from Merseyside police's intelligence bureau, which carried out the investigation with help from the NCA, said: '[Chowles] took advantage of his position on this investigation to line his own pockets while devising a plan that he believed would cover his tracks. He was wrong.' Chowles, from Bristol, was sentenced to five and a half years at Liverpool crown court, after pleading guilty to theft, transferring criminal property and concealing criminal property at an earlier hearing.
Daily Mail
15 hours ago
- Daily Mail
Detective at National Crime Agency who stole bitcoin worth £60k during probe into Silk Road is jailed - with haul now worth £4.4MILLION
A former top National Crime Agency detective who stole bitcoin digital currency while investigating a major drug dealer on the dark web was today jailed for five and a half years. Paul Chowles, 42, secretly took the cryptocurrency from the operator of the underground Internet marketplace following his arrest, in May 2017. Using 'sophisticated' techniques he learned on the job, the 'extremely calculating' officer managed to launder and hide the 50 bitcoin, then worth around £60,000, in online accounts for almost five years. Liverpool Crown Court heard that, over that time the value of the bitcoin increased enormously to £4.3million. But Chowles was relatively frugal with his spending - using the cash to make routine, day-to-day purchases at supermarkets and shops, such as Screw Fix and Asda, paying for meals out in restaurants and pubs or for his children's nursery fees - so as not to arouse suspicion. Overall, he spent around 20 bitcoin, the equivalent of around £110,000, via hundreds of debit card payments and transactions. However, prosecutors believe he benefited financially to the value of more than £600,000 from his criminality and was saving millions more as a 'nest egg' for his retirement. Chowles was eventually caught when the drug dealer was released from prison and complained to police that his valuable bitcoin was missing. Officers followed the complicated digital money trail and eventually discovered the highly skilled former officer was responsible. Jailing Chowles, who pleaded guilty to theft and transferring and concealing criminal property, Judge David Aubrey KC told him he had abused his 'privileged' position at the NCA, which demanded 'utter trust, integrity and honesty.' 'You had knowledge of cryptocurrency, which was a great asset to your agency, provided you used it in the pursuit of justice,' the judge said. 'Alas you did not. 'Instead you weaved a sophisticated, intricate and dishonest web, a web of deceit and guile. 'The public expects people like you, in the position you were in, to act with integrity and honesty and in accordance with the law. 'You were in a position of power and you abused that privilege. You were there to serve the public but you did not. You were serving yourself for your own ends.' The prison sentence marks a dramatic fall from grace for Chowles, a divorced father-of-three young children, with no previous convictions, who has now lost his £33,000-a-year job and his liberty. He was formally dismissed from the NCA earlier this month. Craig Hassall KC, prosecuting, told Liverpool Crown Court that, in 2017, Chowles was a senior officer with the NCA – Britain's equivalent of the FBI - in charge of investigating Thomas White, a university dropout described as the 'guiding mind' behind a clandestine website known as Silk Road 2.0. The marketplaces allowed users to buy and sell drugs and other illegal items on the dark web, using bitcoin for their transactions. After White, who was jailed for five years and four months in April 2019, was arrested Chowles led the analysis and extraction of relevant data and cryptocurrency from his computers and other electronic devices. Over two days, in May 2017, he stole and moved 50 bitcoin from one of White's online wallets. He was then able to use his expertise to break it down into smaller amounts and move it through a system on the dark web, known as the bitcoin 'fog,' which effectively 'washed' or laundered the dirty money, before sending it back. He then transferred it into different legitimate private accounts, in an attempt to hide the money trail. The bitcoin fog was eventually shut down by the FBI but this is believed to be the first prosecution linked to it in the UK. Although financial investigators at the NCA looked into White's claims that the money had disappeared at the time, the NCA team - which included Chowles - concluded that White must have found a way to move it himself before he was jailed. It was only when Merseyside police became involved, after White was released, and attempts launched to recover his assets, via proceeds of crime investigations, that he continued to insist the money was still missing, and officers began to suspect foul play. White insisted someone from within the NCA had to have stolen the bitcoin because they had the private keys for his cryptocurrency wallet. Chowles, of Bristol, was arrested in May 2022 and his devices seized. Police recovered an iPhone, which linked to an account he had used to transfer the bitcoin. It also revealed he had searched online for a cryptocurrency exchange service. Several notebooks were also discovered in his office which contained usernames, passwords, and statements relating to White's cryptocurrency accounts. Will Parkhill, defending Chowles, said: 'He did not do the right thing. It was dishonest and dishonest not once, but on a number of occasions. 'It seems at the time he was suffering from anxiety and depression. It seems at the time he was dealing with undiagnosed autism. 'He feels shame and remorse. Mr Chowles destroyed his life and it had serious impact on other people.' Following the hearing, Alex Johnson, specialist prosecutor with the Crown Prosecution Service's Special Crime Division, said: 'Within the NCA, Paul Chowles was regarded as someone who was competent, technically minded and very aware of the dark web and cryptocurrencies. 'He took advantage of his position working on this investigation by lining his own pockets while devising a plan that he believed would ensure that suspicion would never fall upon him. 'Once he had stolen the cryptocurrency, Paul Chowles sought to muddy the waters and cover his tracks by transferring the Bitcoin into mixing services to help hide the trail of money. 'He made a large amount of money through his criminality, and it is only right that he is punished for his corrupt actions. 'The CPS will not hesitate to bring charges against those who abuse their position in power for financial gain.' Chowles offending began during his investigation into White, a self-taught computer expert, who first began using the original Silk Road marketplace in 2013 to buy a prescription drugs for a sleeping disorder. He then started selling items, including drug-testing kits and the illegal party drug MDMA, before later progressing to offering security advice and creating backups of vendor pages and forums in case the site was taken down. When, in October 2013, the FBI had shut down the Silk Road and arrested it's founder Ross Ulbricht, White collaborated with another American to set up a new version of the marketplace, Silk Road 2.0. He took on Ulbricht's moniker of Dread Pirate Roberts, taken from the identities of multiple fearsome pirate characters in the novel and film The Princess Bride, and began running the site from his student accommodation, in Liverpool. But White was eventually arrested and jailed for running the site, in April 2019. At the time, Chowles – with fellow NCA detective colleague Garry Tancock – gave a statement as lead officers in the investigation. But by then, and unbeknown to his NCA colleagues, Chowles had already helped himself to White's online bitcoin stash. Among the cryptocurrency he stole was bitcoin taken from a wallet White had named the 'Dread Pirate Roberts Retirement Fund.' Mr Johnson added: 'Of the 50 Bitcoin stolen Paul Chowles spent approximately 20 of them and still had hold of 30 which he might well have gone on to spend had he not been apprehended. 'He stole it from a Bitcoin wallet called the Dread Pirate Roberts Retirement Fund. Perhaps he considered this to be the Paul Chowles retirement fund.' He added: 'One of the curious aspects of this case is that Chowles was able to go on and spend more money than he stole in the first instance because of the explosion in the value of the bitcoin during the time that it was in his possession.' Detective Chief Inspector John Black, from Merseyside Police's Force Intelligence Bureau, said: 'It will be extremely disappointing to everyone that someone involved in law enforcement could involve themselves in the very criminality they are tasked with investigating and preventing. 'This case should illustrate in the starkest terms that nobody is above the law. When it became clear that one of the NCA's own officers had stolen Bitcoin, our officers conducted extensive enquiries to unearth a trail of evidence that Chowles had attempted to hide. This was supported fully by the NCA. 'He took advantage of his position on this investigation to line his own pockets while devising a plan that he believed would cover his tracks. He was wrong.'
