On Tuesday (June 16), Kraken Co-Founder and CEO Jesse Powell talked about Bitcoin during a wide-ranging interview with Bloomberg Television’s flagship markets program “What’d You Miss?”, which on this occasion was hosted by Caroline Hyde, Romaine Bostick, and Taylor Riggs.
In this article, we look at the answers to the most interesting questions that the Kraken CEO dealt with in this interview.
Is Bitcoin a Good Store of Value?
“Bitcoin has 10 years of history behind it… People are flocking to it as a safe haven because of that finite predictable supply, you know, we’re not going to mine an asteroid for Bitcoin anytime soon. No one can print Bitcoin.
“So, it’s very predictable, and people are flocking to it for that reason.”
Where Is Bitcoin Going?
“I think long-term you’re going to see Bitcoin surpass gold in terms of store of value, and as far as the use case, you know, just like gold, you don’t need to have physical Bitcoin, you don’t need to transfer it on the blockchain.
“You have these layer 2 solutions, you know, just like with cash, you have PayPal, you have Venmo, not everyone is moving cash around in physical form and not everyone will move Bitcoin around on the blockchain.
“So I think it becomes much easier over time as we build out these tools for the ecosystem for people to use Bitcoin and interact with Bitcoin.
“And pretty soon, all of the technology behind Bitcoin will just disappear, and it’ll be just like the U.S. dollar, where no one really understands how it works, but everyone uses it.”
Who Are the Buyers Pushing Up the Demand for Bitcoin?
“In the past three months, we’re seeing a massive influx of new accounts from all personas. So, we’re seeing hedge funds, we’re seeing wealth managers, we’re seeing retail investors, we’re seeing day traders. Everyone is signing up for it.
“I mean, I think we all know a lot of people have a lot of free time at home these days. People are taking the stimulus checks and rolling it into Bitcoin or the stock market.
“So, there’s been a massive new number of sign-ups. I think people are very worried about the traditional markets and what’s happening with the U.S. dollar, and they’re looking for a safe haven asset.”
What Regulations and Infrastructure Does Bitcoin Need to Stop Market Manipulation?
“Institutions are getting comfortable with it. It’s sort of a herd thing. They look to each other to see what they’re doing. They want to be able to have someone else to point to when things go wrong. They don’t want to be the only ones sticking their neck out. So, they very much move as a herd.
“As far as the volatility of it, you know, just look at the traditional markets these days — it’s all over the place.
“I mean, Bitcoin is the only thing you can look at over the last 10 years and see that it’s up a million percent.
“If you put any amount of money in Bitcoin five years ago, or you know, five years behind any point in time, you’re up massively. You know, Bitcoin, in the last few months, has returned more than the entire S&P 500.
“And when you’re talking about manipulation, if you look at the Fed buying junk bonds from failed United States corporations, it’s a joke — the market is manipulated.
“You know, they’re printing trillions of dollars to pump up the value of publicly traded stocks. You know, you can’t price anything in dollars anymore. The inflation is going to be out of control very soon here.
“Personally, I would be buying Bitcoin as a hedge against that inflation.”
