Berkshire Hathaway’s Munger: Crypto is a ‘Delusion’

Berkshire Hathaway Vice Chairman Charlie Munger has restated his contempt for the cryptocurrency industry in the wake of FTX’s collapse.

“It’s partly fraud and partly delusion,” the 98-year-old billionaire told CNBC Tuesday (Nov. 15). “That’s a bad combination. I don’t like either fraud or delusion. And the delusion may be more extreme than the fraud.”

It’s not the first time Munger and his business partner Warren Buffett have expressed their distaste for cryptocurrency, specifically bitcoin, the sector’s flagship token.

At the Berkshire Hathaway shareholders meeting in April, Buffett — who has called bitcoin “rat poison squared,” said that if he was offered 1% of all the farmland in the U.S. for $25 billion — with the assumption that that land is worth about $2.7 trillion — “I’ll write you a check right now,” because “the farms are going to produce food.”

But Buffett said he wouldn’t pay $25 for all the bitcoin in existence “because what would I do with it? I have to sell it back to you one way or another.”

Munger was even blunter: “In my life, I try and avoid things that are stupid, evil, and make me look bad in comparison to someone else. Bitcoin does all three.”

Munger’s comments came as the cryptocurrency industry continues to feel shockwaves from the collapse and bankruptcy last week of FTX, which has as many as a million creditors to answer to and is now facing regulatory investigations around the world.

As PYMNTS noted this week in our interview with BitPay CEO Stephen Pair, the wild gyrations of bitcoin and other digital coins could stem forced selling, as FTX and others have had to raise funds to cover withdrawals and margin calls and raise capital.

“A lot of people — investors in particular — are going to be a lot more cautious and a lot more skittish about making investments in this space,” Pair predicted.

Of FTX, he said: “I don’t think there’s going to be any bailout coming here.”