Billionaire Carl Icahn recently spoke with Bloomberg Television on May 26, 2021 in an extended interview, covering a range of topics from meme stocks to cryptocurrencies. Icahn currently holds no cryptocurrencies. When questioned about what it would take for him to become an investor in crypto, Icahn replied "a natural manifestation of inflation" and "looking for other stores of value outside the dollar." Icahn stated that the two big ones are Bitcoin and Ethereum, deeming the former to be "a store of value." He stated that he's looking at the space as a whole, looking to get in "with Icahn Enterprises in a relatively big way." Overall, Icahn sounded intrigued by crypto as a whole, noting the technological importance of Ethereum. He also called the criticism of cryptocurrency "wrong-headed" by asking "what's the value of the dollar?" and saying the only thing you can do for sure with the dollar is "pay your taxes."
On the morning of June 7, 2021, former President Donald Trump spoke with Fox Business via telephone interview. "Bitcoin," Trump started, "seems like a scam." He continued: "I don't like because it's another currency competing against the dollar...I want the dollar to be the currency of the world." Clearly, not a fan.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk seems to change his tune on cryptocurrency, depending on what he feels like tweeting on a given day. In February 2021, Tesla bought $1.5 billion in Bitcoin and had plans to accept it as a payment for their vehicles. Those plans were pulled three months later, when Musk announced via Twitter on May 12 that the Bitcoin payments would cease -- citing concern about "rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels for bitcoin mining."
After a late night tweet that seemed to read "CumRocket to the moon," Musk took on a more serious tone, tweeting "Goods & services are the real economy, any form of money is simply the accounting thereof." All of his tweets since the "CumRocket tweet" have been Model S Plaid and SpaceX updates and a few memes. Not a single tweet about crypto since June 5th.
Bitcoin remains in a downtrend and appears to be very close to a technical death-cross. The short-term trend is bearish, but if your time horizon is years then this appears to be just a blip on the radar.
If you're like Cathie Wood, you must be loving this dip. Wood, who leads Ark Investment Management as CEO, believes that Bitcoin will go to $500k. She addressed Musk's concerns about the energy used in Bitcoin mining and stated that "We believe the adoption of solar is going to accelerate dramatically - because there is another profit center associated with it - Bitcoin mining."
According to a release dated 6/8/21, crypto exchange Coinbase says that its institutional holdings have grown from $45 billion to $122 billion, a whopping 170% - per Hedge Fund Sales Head at Coinbase, Drew Robinson:
Over time we have seen a variety of factors pulling institutional investors into the space; these range from hedging against inflation, diversification of corporate balance sheets and the desire for broader engagement in the digital economy, including areas such as payments, payroll and cross border payments. Client demand is also playing a significant role.
Inflation, regulation, capitulation, ransoms. No matter where the story heads, one thing remains clear to me - cryptocurrency is here to stay and is an asset class of its own. The "worthless digital coin" argument simply doesn't hold any weight any more.
