Even when one coin is limping, there's no contest here

Up 75% during the past 12 months, Shiba Inu is a meme coin that's making real money for some of its investors. There's no way that trend will ever change, right, so it's obviously a better purchase than Ethereum?

Don't be so sure, because the percentage gain figure doesn't tell much of the story here. If you bought Shiba Inu in early March 2024, right when its price was surging, you'd have lost more than half of your money within five months. If you are like most investors, you would have then sold your tokens at a loss, thereby missing the coin's recovery to its current price level -- where you'd still be deeply underwater. Worse, once again if you are like most investors, you'd be tempted to buy back in when the price starts to surge in the near future, only to see the value fall out from under it once again, in all probability.

More important than its short-term price action, the most difficult thing about investing in Shiba Inu is that there isn't really an investment thesis for why the coin should go up (or down) over time. While it's true that it's correlated to the price of Ethereum, that isn't a reason to buy Shiba Inu in and of itself, as many other assets share similar correlations, especially if they're coins hosted on Ethereum's network, as Shiba Inu is.

It's hard to imagine why someone would invest in this coin, except in hopes that it someday goes to the moon. But without a real catalyst in store that's specific to the coin and not cryptocurrency as a whole, there simply isn't much reason to invest in this crypto, except out of a misplaced fear of missing out (FOMO).

Turn this story on its head. Rather than being afraid of missing out on big gains with Shiba Inu, be afraid of taking on the significant risks that it entails as a meme coin. Within that framework, Ethereum is (again) obviously the better place to invest $2,000, as there's a vastly lower chance of ending up with $1,000 or less just a few months after your purchase.

Should you invest $1,000 in Ethereum right now?
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