I'm not a fan of crypto currency.
It's really not a currency. It's not readily accepted meaning you can't pay your rent/mortgage or buy groceries with it. Some of the specific currencies aren't very liquid, so they could be trapped. This has become an issue with the Estate & Trust side since people who own crypto have died and their estate has no way of accessing the crypto to get it over to the beneficiaries.
One other looming issue is regulation. As much as we hate the banks for taking pennies at every turn they do provide countries with meaningful oversight of where money is flowing and preventing criminals from taking illegally earned money and 'washing' it. Currently there aren't any rules with crypto and when it comes there will be a massive exodus of people looking to pull their money out, which will cause a 'crash'.
Finally, I see it as a highly speculative investment without any of the investor protections that typically come with that world. If you wanted to go onto a direct brokerage and invest in risky stuff you still have to go through a client questionnaire outlining that you know it's an investment and can lose your money. With crypto there's none of that. The volatility is nuts! On March 16th a unit of Bitcoin was $5,024. Not it's 26,345! That's a 525% return, which looks great, but we have to understand it can easily come down as fast. If you look back at the history back in Dec 15th of 2017 that same Bitcoin was worth $19,650. Almost a year after that (Dec. 8th, 2018) it was $3,400. That's an 83% drop and many people ran into the 'currency' with the same level of excitement that's happening now.
My personal thoughts on crypto is that they are a highly speculative, illiquid investment which should only be a small part of your portfolio. I'd add if you weren't already invested you probably missed the upswing AND if you participated in the upswing I'd sell while you are ahead.
I've seem many people erode their life savings with these types of 'investments'.
