Buffett says he wouldn't buy all of the Bitcoin in the world for $25
During a recent meeting, investor Warren Buffett revealed he has no interest in Bitcoin.
It was at the recent Berkshire Hathaway shareholders meeting that CEO Warren Buffett was asked about his stance on Bitcoin. While Buffett has made himself a clear opposer of the cryptocurrency in the past, inquiring minds were curious as to whether or not that opinion had changed as of recent. However, Buffett reaffirmed his position on the matter, going as far to say that he wouldn’t buy all of the Bitcoin in the world for $25 dollars if given the opportunity.
During the recent Berkshire Hathaway shareholders meeting, Warren Buffett spoke to the merit of Bitcoin after he was questioned about it by an attendee.“If the people in this room owned all the farmland in the United States, and you offered me a 1 percent interest in it [for $25 billion] I’d write you a check this afternoon.” He went on to give a similar hypothetical for apartment housing. “Now if you told me you owned all of the Bitcoin in the world and you offered it to me for $25 I wouldn’t take it, because what would I do with it? I’ll have to sell it back to you one way or another. It isn’t going to do anything.”
Buffett’s makes it very clear where he stands on Bitcoin. His point also echoes some of the key criticisms held by naysayers of not just Bitcoin but cryptocurrency as a whole. Similar arguments could likely be made towards NFTs and blockchain technology as well.
It’s fascinating for such an influential investor to hold such an opinion towards Bitcoin, despite the sharp increase in value it’s seen in recent years as well as the boosted public interest in crypto trading. As for the things his company is actually investing in, Berkshire Hathaway recently raised its stake in Activision Blizzard from 2 to 9.5 percent.
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replyDonovan Erskine posted a new article, Buffett says he wouldn't buy all of the Bitcoin in the world for $25
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I'm not a huge bitcoin fan either- but I'd buy it all for $25.
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Well I would immediately sell it to them.
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I don't think so. Can you explain why?
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Owning all the bitcoins doesn't mean no one uses it.
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Anyone who would be using it, would be using it. Surely there exists a price that you could offer to buy all the bitcoin in the world. When you finish that last transaction and finally own all the bitcoin, all the people and businesses that currently use bitcoin don't suddenly vanish.
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Why would they continue to use it or accept it if one person controlled essentially the entirety of its existence? There’s only value in something when we all agree it has value. As soon as one person bought all the receipts the world would say “fuck this” and move on. Especially in its current state of not having any government backing, insurance, or regulation.
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Why would the world do that? If it can be used, I could still buy it.
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That's correct.
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Why can't you use it?
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If I own all of something no one else can use it unless I want them to. In this theoretical example I own all bitcoin or US dollars or whatever. You trying to use it as currency doesn’t work unless I want you to. I choose to simply hold it all.
This isn’t a difficult concept to understand.-
Yes, so if I own all the bitcoin and choose to sell it, you're saying no one would buy?
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If people want it, doesn't that make it not worthless?
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Why would anybody want it at that point?
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Why would they? Let's try a thought experiment. If I create a brand new cryptocurrencty and offer to sell you $10,000 worth of it and no one else has any of it, are you buying? If so, please DM me.
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How so? If you bought all the toilet paper in the world, people would still want to wipe their buttholes.
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If you owned all the bitcoin, I don't see why that would stop everyone in the world from still wanting bitcoin. There would still be people wanting to buy bitcoin.
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That's a big possibility. I'm just thinking how if someone had all the bitcoin and wanted to sell them, I could still see a lot of people wanting to buy.
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I mean, when bitcoin started, one person had all the bitcoin, or is that not true?
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At some point in the past, one person had all the bitcoins currently mined, correct?
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When it very first started one person probably had all the bitcoin for one instant but the reason Bitcoin and any other cryptocurrency have become popular is that anyone could “mine” their own coins. So yeah, for a fleeting moment one person held all the cards but then thousands of others also got their own piece of the pie. Bitcoin is a finite resource so at some point there will be no more mining and one person could hold all the cards. If they did, what incentive would anyone else have to continue acknowledging that it has any sort of value?
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When bitcoin started, it was also worthless. It only gained value as more people bought in.
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People have to shell out money now to get in. It's a pyramid scheme.
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buffet could say ok nevermind you guys can have your bitcoin and technology back. people would buy it back at some worth
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Bitcoin ain’t cocaine, brother!
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Twitter this at Elon as a dare see if he fucks around and finds out, accidentally saves the environment.
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I don’t think that has anything to do with anything.
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It’s not really silly at all from his point of view and the types of things he invests in.
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That hasn't stopped Buffett from being as rapacious as any other billionaire, that is how one becomes a billionaire in the first place.
The man who was already known as one of the wealthiest people on the planet has tripled his net worth in the last decade. He is shit talking Bitcoin because he doesn't believe in it as an investment vehicle, that's it. Desperation doesn't factor into anything at all because "making number go up" is all that matters to him.
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In the Slashdot discussion on this it was pointed out that Buffett has a history of preferring tangible assets versus just, I guess, nontangibles. So Bitcoin fails that test even if it was a good idea.
Not that he's wrong and not that it's insignificant, but it's mostly on-brand for him. He even trots out the farmland example in his comment.
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