It doesn’t matter if you are into cryptocurrency and bitcoin or anything else because the fact is if you are successful, you are going to have haters. In fact, how many outspoken haters you have usually correlates to how successful you have become. This is true as the crypto industry came under fire once again over the weekend from the outspoken hedge fund billionaire, Ken Griffin.
Some people just don’t know when and how to control their hate. In terms of the cryptocurrency and bitcoin industry, we constantly have to fend off attacks from so-called financial gurus who believe they have a copyright on truth and option, which is a feeling that emanates from Griffin’s recent comments where he has blasted digital assets once again.
Cryptocurrency and bitcoin come under fire
At the recent CNBC Delivering Alpha Conference, hedge fund billionaire and Citadel CEO, Ken Griffin, launched into another scathing attack on cryptocurrency and bitcoin. This is not the first time old Ken has blasted our industry, and his recent remarks have been turning a few heads.
My grandmother used to say that “if you don’t have anything good to say, don’t say anything.” This is not a philosophy that the hedge fund investment firm head honcho Griffin adopts.
When bitcoin initially surpassed the USD 1,000 mark last December, Griffin said that crypto coin fever was a bubble that would eventually end and said crypto was basically a fraud. At the time, the head of the Citadel investment firm admitted that blockchain technology could end up having a profound effect on the future of the planet, but was also very disrespectful and skeptical about blockchain.
Over time, Griffin’s opinions on crypto and bitcoin have remained pretty much the same, and with these new rants, have obviously heightened. Griffin was interviewed by business journalist Andrew Ross Sorkin over the past few days at the Pierre Hotel’s ballroom in NYC and was teasingly asked if he now had a crypto portfolio, to which he replied: “I don’t have a single portfolio manager who has told me we should buy crypto. Not a single portfolio manager.”
The hedge fund billionaire can’t help but be outspoken, but he did confess that he has considered making markets in crypto with his company. In the end, he decided against it because cryptocurrencies are not products he believes in.
“You have to have US dollars to pay your taxes. You don’t have a choice,” said Griffin when talking to Sorkin about why cryptocurrency and bitcoin cannot succeed because monetary needs are already fulfilled with fiat currencies. He went on to say whether we like it or not, we are still forced to pay our taxes with national currencies, and that will not change any time soon.
The Citadel CEO has strong views on cryptocurrency and bitcoin and thinks they are “a solution in search of a problem”. He also went on to blast our industry by saying, “there is no need for cryptocurrencies.”
Although he might have a point about people not needing crypto because they have fiat, his criticisms, as always from these major investments firms, sound like he is a bit afraid that cryptocurrency and bitcoin will swallow up traditional markets in the future and leave old Ken in the dark ages.