Looking at the stories in the chat group, a newbie deposits 10,000 USDT and turns around to be left with just a pair of underwear—it's almost a routine plot. My backend inbox is piled high with messages, all crying about blood and tears accounts, but upon closer inspection, most people haven't actually lost because of the unpredictability of the market; they simply dug their own graves.

As a seasoned veteran who has been in this circle for nearly 5 years and only truly understood after experiencing three liquidation events, I’ve decided to lay out all the landmines I’ve stepped on over the years. These pitfalls, hitting just one, can’t be saved even if industry big Vs are shouting buy signals every day.

**Pitfall One: Treating leverage as a shortcut to wealth, which turns into a countdown to liquidation**

Newbies love to be dazzled by leverage multiples. They often think: the higher the multiple, the more aggressive the profit, and they feel they’ll be driving luxury cars and living in villas soon. They start stacking 50x, 100x leverage, as if money will fly into their pockets in the next second.

But the truth? Under 100x leverage, just a 1% market move in the opposite direction can wipe out your principal instantly—faster than your food getting cold. I’ve been stupid enough to do this myself—going all-in on a coin with 20x leverage, sipping milk tea while staring at the K-line chart. When a small spike hit, my account turned red immediately, and that loss took me three months’ worth of salary to recover.

Now, my principle has changed—leverage should always be kept between 3x and 5x. Even if a 20% black swan event hits, your account still has enough breathing room to adjust strategies without being kicked out by the market. This is crucial: leverage is fundamentally a risk management tool, not a gambler’s chip.

**Pitfall Two: Giving up on stop-loss, which is equivalent to sentencing your account to death**

"Hold on a bit longer, it’ll rebound" or "I’ve already lost 50%, I can’t bear to cut now"—these kinds of words have made my ears calloused. Every time I hear them, I know another trading account is saying goodbye to this world.

Last year, someone I communicated with refused to listen. After going long on a mainstream coin and getting caught, they stubbornly refused to cut losses. From an initial 20% profit, they held on, and in the end, lost all their margin. When they came to me, their message was trembling, punctuation marks practically crying.

My own iron rule is: the moment you open a position, a stop-loss order must be set simultaneously. No matter how reluctant, once that line is crossed, you must cut it—no luck involved. This isn’t cowardice; it’s using mathematical probability and risk management to play the game. To put it bluntly, those who can ruthlessly cut losses tend to keep their accounts alive longer.

Risk management may sound boring, but it’s the real ticket to survival in this market. Those dreaming of overnight riches every day usually end up buried under the combo of "leverage dreams" and "refusing to stop-loss." Truly long-term profitable players are often the "unspectacular" conservative types.