€1M Bitcoin Retirement Plan Has Hit €200K: 'It's Not Too Late to Invest'

There are many motivations for buying Bitcoin (BTC): hedging against inflation, financial independence, and even the hope of owning a Lamborghini and enjoying life in the sun.

For "Mr. ERB", a blogger and Bitcoin enthusiast, it's all about early retirement. ERB has detailed his finances on his Early Retirement by Bitcoin blog and revealed his retirement plans to Cointelegraph.

He told Cointelegraph that he first “became interested in bitcoin in the summer of 2017,” when a colleague briefly mentioned the decentralized peer-to-peer currency.

However, for those who were new to Bitcoin in the early days, this scene is all too familiar: "The price was about 2,000 euros at the time, and I think it is too late to invest now."

ERB told Cointelegraph that he quickly discovered a Bitcoin podcast in which Trace Mayer predicted that the price of Bitcoin would reach $1 million.

With renewed interest in FIRE (financial independence, retire early: financial independence, early retirement), coupled with a new enthusiasm for Bitcoin, he changed his mind:

"That's when I realized that I was not late, but early. I thought that Bitcoin had a great possibility to allow me to retire early, so I bought Bitcoin for the first time in October 2017."

ERB's retirement plan favors Bitcoin over USD. Source: Early Retirement by Bitcoin

ERB plans to rely on Bitcoin to provide retirement funds. He has set a retirement goal of 1 million euros and buys 500 euros of BTC every month. His first contribution — or his first “stack sat” (Sat is short for satoshis, bitcoin’s smallest unit) — was in 2017. Five years later, he told Cointelegraph, "it was clearly a huge success."

Bitcoin price (green) versus retirement savings in euros (orange), and the amount of cash invested to date (dashed line). Source: Early Retirement by Bitcoin

“I don’t think I’d be able to achieve similar returns with any other strategy. Not to mention, Bitcoin’s strategy is extremely simple and doesn’t require active investment management. You just buy and hold and keep buying.”

“The Early Retirement by Bitcoin” blog details how his current ROI is over 450%. Compared to using the S&P 500 as an investment vehicle (44%), "This is 10 times, and it will be 100 times in the future."

ERB has accumulated valuable experience in his investment journey. He was to the point and wise when it came to how Bitcoin underpins his values:

“Before Bitcoin, my worldview was very narrow. Life was like school, work, retirement, death. Today, I think a little differently. The end goal (now) is perhaps more properly described as entrepreneurship and self-sovereignty .”

ERB shares helpful advice for those just getting started buying Bitcoin. He explained to Cointelegraph:

1. "Keep mining, keep buying bitcoin." Don't try to get rich overnight because "you can't."

2. "Give yourself five years" to really understand Bitcoin (one year more than Bitcoin's halving cycle), and really take the time to learn. Listen to the right podcast, read the right book, and find out if investing in bitcoin is a good idea.

3. "Don't try to keep advising everyone around you about bitcoin," especially early on in the bitcoin learning curve. ERB admitted that he may have done some “damage” to some relationships due to his overexcitement in the early stages of his Bitcoin education.

4. Finally, HODL. While it “felt really bad” when Bitcoin’s price dropped to $3,600 in March 2020, ERB explained, “In hindsight, that was the perfect time to buy.”

With the launch of the U.S. Bitcoin Spot ETF approaching, ERB is rapidly approaching its €250,000 milestone. As he speculates in his blog post, “Cut costs, stack sat.”