The general manager of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) has savaged bitcoin as a “combination of a bubble, a Ponzi scheme and an environmental disaster.”
In a lecture given in Frankfurt, Germany, Carstens said there were cracks appearing in the “house of bitcoin” as too many copycat currencies had forked off the technology, including bitcoin gold and bitcoin cash. The banker argued this replication could only lead to debasement of cryptocurrencies to the point where they held no economic value at all.
Carstens then called into question bitcoin’s efficiency and legality.
“While perhaps intended as an alternative payment system with no government involvement, it has become a combination of a bubble, a Ponzi scheme and an environmental disaster,” he said. “The volatility of bitcoin renders it a poor means of payment and a crazy way to store value.”
Carstens said the current fascination with cryptocurrencies seemed to have more to do with “speculative mania” and that their only true function appeared to relate to illegal activities.
Eulogy made by Augustin Carstens
