there's no widely adopted index fund in the crypto world. to get exposure to a variety of ideas, one inevitably buys some that don't work and yes, some where the project runners commit fraud.
> People who are unable to discern scam from not scam get scammed.
This is a common refrain, along with Do Your Own Research (DYOR). As if scams are that obvious.
However, my additional point was that I have successful crypto friends, that actively and knowingly invest in shitcoins and justify it as “money they can afford to lose”.
Also, just to be clear - are cryptocoins an investment, a store of value, a currency, or equity-equivalent in a company? Because the goal always seems to be buying enough of every coin to maximise speculative windfalls. That is /strictly/ not the goal of a traditional index fund.
i can't speak to your friends' behavior, but you can buy tokens and do well without putting money behind the do kwons of the world.
I’d go one step further to posit that most crypto traders are not even day traders, so much less experienced.