Amazingly enough, Bitcoin, known for its price volatility, has been ranging about the $3,800 price point within tight boundaries for all of 2019. Yes, it has dipped a bit and made a run over $4,200, but for this crypto heavyweight, settling into a tight trading range is, for want of a better word, peculiar. As Bitcoin hovers, all manner of opinions regarding its long-tern viability have surfaced in social media and the financial press. For Bitcoin haters like Warren Buffett, Jamie Dimon, and the rest of their Wall Street “posse”, the belief is simple – “Things will end badly.” Another set of investment gurus, however, is finding that a vast majority of their brethren believe in the inevitability of Bitcoin.
As some have already explained, the issue gets down to what is called the “store of value story” that can only gain credence as governments continue to borrow and inflate their respective money supplies:
Bitcoin’s scarcity leads to people wanting to hold it. This leads to price appreciation, which leads to others wanting to hold it. Bitcoin is the only asset on earth whose supply cannot be increased due to increased demand, making it the only asset where your holdings are not diluted. This is the store of value story, and over time the store of value story grows silently bit by bit.
Waren Buffett has never understood Bitcoin or why anyone would invest in it, but then Mr. Buffett has never professed to understand Gold, another commodity that, yes, many other investors have grown to cherish over the years as a store of value and hedge against inflation. Inevitability will always be linked to public awareness in the long run, and even though cryptocurrencies have barely been with us for a mere decade, one recent UK survey produced surprising results. 93% of those canvassed were aware of Bitcoin, although a single-digit amount actually confessed to understanding the medium. A full 20% of the survey group, however, saw Bitcoin as a long-term inevitability.
One investment insider is a good bit more optimistic. Chris Burniske, a partner with Placeholder Ventures and former head of ARK Invest’s crypto branch, recently took to Twitter to inform the world of his general findings. In his position, he comes in contact with a vast variety of investors and investment management types that freely share their thoughts on the crypto ecosphere. From his recent interactions, he has concluded:
So yes, the tech is still early and we have a long ways to go. But the way in which the ideas are lingering in peoples’ minds is a great long-term indicator for crypto.
Travis Kling, a Wall Street hotshot at TD Ameritrade and soon to be chief investment officer at Ikigai Investments, is also positive about the long-term prospects of BTC. His take on the current undercurrents: “Bitcoin will surpass everyone’s expectations and grow into a globally accepted financial framework that is decentralized, cheap, time-effective and immune to unnecessary external pressure.” He cited government ineptitude and its dependence on debt and such programs as quantitative easing as only improving upon the long-term equation for Bitcoin’s eventual ascendance.
Lastly, Anthony Pompliano, a partner with Morgan Creek Digital, has been a Bitcoin enthusiast for years and sees an even larger role for cryptos in the future. He believes that at some point, and it may take quite a bit of time, but he sees every commodity as having a digital token form. His tweets were succinct:
Every stock, bond, currency, and commodity will be tokenized. Owning equity in infrastructure companies is ideal. Bitcoin to the moon. That’s my thesis. Never changed.