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In response to the economic collapse triggered by the coronavirus pandemic, Congress passed the CARES Act to provide direct stimulus payments to Americans. The first payment was issued in April 2020 and amounted to $1,200 per qualifying taxpayer.
While most Americans used this money to get them through a rough time, spending it on necessities such as food and rent, others were able to take that money and invest it. The depths of the pandemic, and the subsequent crawl back to recovery, coincided with a boom in the prices of many cryptocurrencies. Although buying crypto with your stimulus payment likely would not have been the advice of your financial advisor, here is what you would have earned had you made that lucky choice starting back in April 2020.
Learn: How Does Cryptocurrency Work – and Is It Safe?
More: Where Does Cryptocurrency Come From?
Bitcoin (BTC)
Price as of Dec. 17, 2021: $46,232.92
Current approximate value of stimulus investment: $7,176
As the original and best-known cryptocurrency, Bitcoin may have been your first choice as a crypto investment had you made that decision in April 2020. At the time, the crypto was trading at about $6,623. That amounts to about a 598% return on your investment in 20 months, pretty staggering compared to the S&P 500’s return of about 66% over that same time period.
If you managed to pull out at Bitcoin’s all-time high of $68,990.90, set in November 2021, you could have turned your $1,200 into about $11,292, for a return closer to 950%.
Ethereum (ETH)
Price as of Dec. 17: $3,888.25
Current approximate value of stimulus investment: $27,036
Ethereum is the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, with a total value of $461 billion, roughly half that of Bitcoin. However, some pundits envision Ethereum taking the crown away from Bitcoin, due in part to the energy-efficient “Ethereum 2.0” launching in 2022.
In any event, putting your stimulus money into Ethereum back in April 2020 would have been a prescient move, as the crypto significantly outperformed market leader Bitcoin over that time period. Ethereum traded at $172.58 at the time the first stimulus checks went out, returning about 2,153% since.
Ethereum (ETH): What It Is, What It’s Worth and Should You Be Investing?
Dogecoin (DOGE)
Price as of Dec. 17: $0.17
Current approximate value of stimulus investment: $102,000
Dogecoin is the poster child for the speculative frenzy that dominates the cryptocurrency market. The coin itself was created as a joke in 2013, capitalizing on a popular meme at the time involving the logo of a Shiba Inu dog.
However, the coin essentially did nothing until online message boards began lighting up, touting the coin as “the next GameStop.” GameStop was at the forefront of …….
Source: https://www.gobankingrates.com/investing/crypto/how-much-invested-stimulus-money-in-crypto/
