Investing.com – As the market rebounds from the start of 2023, albeit modestly, many famous names are speaking out about the outlook for Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies in general in the new year and beyond.
In an interview with the French weekly L’Express, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, author of the 2010 New York Times bestseller The Black Swan and one of the few economists who predicted the 2008 financial crisis, added its building block.
In particular, he pointed out that the future of Bitcoin rests on the fact that future generations will continue to be interested in it, unlike other assets like whose value is more tangible.
One of the problems with , he explained, is that “we are unsure of the interests, mindsets and preferences of future generations. Technology comes and goes, gold remains, at least physically. neglected for a brief period, bitcoin would necessarily collapse”.
The economist also justified the success of cryptocurrencies in recent years by the flexible monetary policy of central banks, an era that came to an abrupt end in 2022 with the rise in central bank rates.
“Lower rates create asset bubbles without necessarily helping the economy,” he explained, adding that “capital no longer costs anything, risk-free returns become too low, even negative, pushing people to speculation” and that “we are losing the sense of what a long-term investment is”, and concluding: “This is the end of real finance”.
This situation has, according to him, created a favorable ground for the appearance of “malignant tumors like bitcoin”.
Recall that Taleb’s opinion on cryptocurrencies should be taken into account in light of the fact that he has in the past supported Bitcoin, when crypto was still unknown to the general public.
He indeed explained that he judged that Bernanke, the boss of the Fed at the time of the 2008 crisis, did not see the structural risks of the system before the crisis broke out, then reacting excessively.
“Instead of correcting the debt and mitigating the hidden risks, he covered them with a monetary policy that was only supposed to be transitory”, and “”I mistakenly thought that bitcoin would be a bulwark against the distortions of this monetary policy”, he explained.
Finally, Taleb also judged that “the universe of cryptocurrencies attracts manipulators and scammers.”