Around 1% of cryptocurrency traders will eventually acquire an “extreme” addiction to trading cryptocurrencies. Due to this, rehabs in Switzerland, Spain, and other countries recently began offering treatment for an ‘addiction to crypto trading.’
What is crypto addiction?
Even if not everyone succumbs to the lure of cryptocurrency trading, it’s easy to understand how the combination of rapid price swings, a 24-hour market, more than 21,000 different tokens to gamble on, and a vibrant online community may be enticing.
Some cryptocurrency investors and traders may engage in risky activities that lead to addiction, even if this is not the case for most individuals who participate in this market.
The compulsive need and passion to trade cryptocurrencies, notwithstanding severe effects on personal and professional activities such as financial loss, disruption of relationships, job challenges, mental health concerns, etc., characterizes crypto-addiction.
When trading becomes an individual’s primary focus, they have an irresistible need to trade and participate in crypto-related activities despite the negative consequences. This kind of pathological trading is associated with a gradual decline in behavioral inhibition, tolerance, and withdrawal.
Withdrawal symptoms, while not trading, might include melancholy, anxiety, irritability, mood changes, and sleeplessness, among many others. Tolerance manifests when more financial risk is required to create the same exhilaration and pleasure.
Crypto rehabs across the world
Diamond Rehabilitation, a wellness facility in Thailand that began operations in 2019, is one of the establishments in Asia that has launched services devoted to rehabilitating and treating bitcoin addiction. As part of its all-encompassing, multi-stage strategy to assist addicts in overcoming their dependency, the organization claims that it treats addiction via a combination of several rehab programs.
The addiction rehabilitation center at Castle Craig Hospital in Scotland has treated high-adrenaline crypto traders since 2018. The facility has seen over one hundred patients come in with issues related to cryptocurrencies.
Meanwhile, in Spain, the center called The Balance was founded by Swiss doctors. It is located on the Spanish island of Mallorca, with additional rehabs in London and Zurich. The high-profile treatment can cost as much as $75,000. According to a BBC report, one clinic’s client lost $200,000 on crypto trading weekly.
In Switzerland, crypto rehabs could cost as much as $90,000 per week, per a Bloomberg report. The patients are granted a view of Lake Zurich and the Alps.
Signs of crypto addiction
New York-based Aaron and Lin Sternlicht, who run Family Addiction Specialist, said that people who get addicted to cryptocurrency trading come to rely more on it as a source of happiness and fulfillment.
Among the warning signs, he lists dishonesty, debt, trouble relaxing or falling asleep, constantly checking cryptocurrency prices, and trading at the cost of relationships, jobs, and education.
Stop-loss limits, orders with instructions to cancel a position when it reaches a particular price, protect investors against excessive losses and are helpful for cryptocurrency junkies who need help setting boundaries.
