Nassim Nicholas Taleb, the author of “The Black Swan” and a probability researcher and former quantitative trader, previously spoke highly of bitcoin. Now, he has criticized it as essentially worthless, CNBC reported.
Taleb said in a recent paper that bitcoin has failed to satisfy the qualifications to be seen as a currency without government, a hedge against inflation or as a safe haven investment, explaining “few assets in financial history have been more fragile,” according to CNBC.
He wrote that because bitcoin needs some amount of interest to maintain it, bitcoin is worth “exactly zero” compared with gold and other precious metals, which need no maintenance and don’t degrade over time.
In other news, a man who used the dark web to steal $500,000 and buy cryptocurrency has been sentenced to three years in prison, Business Insider reported.
Aaron Laws, 33, of Atlanta, Georgia, is called a “prolific identity thief” in the report, having stolen peoples’ information from credit cards. He made use of digital wallets and burner phones, and he had recruited accomplices and made use of bitcoin to evade the law and carry out his goals, the report stated.
With the stolen money, Laws bought “luxury goods” that could be sold for cash or bitcoin, according to the report. He bought a diamond-encrusted Bitcoin pendant and a Rolex that cost over $34,000.
Meanwhile, Fidelity Digital Assets is planning to bolster its staff by 70 percent, with the increased demand for cryptocurrency keeping the company going, Bitcoin.com reported. The company has also seen a rise in demand for Ethereum.
The new hires will focus on building new products to go into more areas of crypto assets beyond bitcoin, said President Tom Jessop, according to the report.
Jessop also said per the report that the company is trading digital currencies more often, and he said crypto trading differs from traditional markets in that it’s a 24/7 environment. He added that there’s still much demand for crypto, including from corporations and retirement agencies that previously haven’t dabbled in it.
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