By
Steve Muchoki
April 23rd, 2024
Peter Thiel, the billionaire co-founder of PayPal and early Facebook investor, make some comments on Bitcoin in an interview on Fox Business Network’s Mornings.
Billionaire investor Peter Thiel believes bitcoin critics are “underestimating”. He treats the other cryptocurrencies with great skepticism, but at the same time he compares Bitcoin with gold and considers that the mining of bitcoins is more difficult than the gold mining.
Thiel stated:
“I’m skeptical of most of them [cryptocurrencies], I do think people are a little bit … underestimating bitcoin especially because … it’s like a reserve form of money, it’s like gold, and it’s just a store of value. You don’t need to use it to make payments. If bitcoin ends up being the cyber equivalent of gold it has a great potential left.”
Thiel emphazised that bitcoin can serve as a “reserve form of money”, so “You don’t need to use it to make payments”.
Thiel was one of the people who were in doubt about Bitcoin. In 2014, Peter had expressed that he was not optimistic bitcoin could achieve mainstream adoption until it was “used to make more legal transactions”. However, he embraced Bitcoin later on after watching the ecosystem grow.
If we talk about Thiel, it should be noted that relatively recently a secret Silicon Valley-based bitcoin startup called ’21 Inc’ has raised $116 million. The list of investors includes such big names as Andreessen Horowitz, Qualcomm, Paypal co-founders Peter Thiel and Max Levchin.
The price of Bitcoin is $5784 now. There are different versions of how bitcoin will develop, some believe that it is a bubble that will soon burst, and some hold opinions that this is a digital substitute for real money.
JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon called Bitcoin “a fraud” and said people who buy it are “stupid”.
Top strategist Tom Lee stated that all great businesses will be digital in the near future. In this regard, BitCoin will be of particular value, because it is a personal encrypted database. The gold market, which is 9 trillion, was important for the previous generation, now young people believe that the future is connected with BitCoin.
Lee said: “If it captures 5% of the gold market, it’s worth at least $25,000 per unit. It’s actually the most conservative collection of elements to get to the 5%. You could easily get to $100,000, $200,000 numbers.”
Concerning short-term BitCoin price targets, the Lee’s point of view is linked to the fact that Bitcoin exists and develops like social networks. “The more engagement there is, the greater the value rises. And in the short-term, we think bitcoin will reach at least $6,000 by mid-2018,” said strategist.
Mike Novograts, current head of Galaxy Investment Partners, has predicted that Bitcoin will jump to 10,000 in next six to ten months. “This is going to be the largest bubble of our lifetimes. Prices are going to get way ahead of where they should be,” he announced.
But, in contrast with a majority of frightened investors, who see just volatility, he sees opportunity: “You can make a whole lot of money on the way up, and we plan on it. In a lot of ways, this is a market like any other market.”
McAfee, mostly known for the development of first commercial antivirus software, stated that Bitcoin has all chances to reach $500,000 in the next three years. He tweeted:
Bitcoub’s low of $1,800+ yesterday simply could not be maintained. In the long term Bitcoin moves above $500,000 within three years. Bets?
— John McAfee (@officialmcafee) 17 июля 2017 г.
Entrepreneur Trace Mayer predicted Bitcoin Price Will Reach $27,395 in February 2018. At the time, Mayer first recommended bitcoin, the price per coin was just $0.25. He stated on his Twitter:
#Bitcoin is growing nicely. Currently, would be 15th largest component of #NASDAQ, 58th largest by market cap on #NYSE & top-40 currency. ?pic.twitter.com/Sn0TOHGopt
— Trace Mayer (@TraceMayer) 13 октября 2017 г.