Bill Gates says crypto and NFTs are a sham

As cryptocurrencies across the board have continued to drop in value, many people are questioning whether it’s still a viable investment option. On the bright side, we don’t have to worry whether Bill Gates is a crypto aficionado. At a tech conference early this week, the Microsoft co-founder said that these newer digital investment vehicles are “100% based on greater fool theory.” Greater fool theory is a financial theory that claims one can make money selling overpriced assets as long as there’s an even more foolish person to buy them. Later on in the conference Gates criticized Bored Apes NFTs, joking about how “expensive digital images of monkeys” will “improve the world immensely”.

This statement comes at a time where cryptocurrencies as a whole have been failing. Bitcoin hit its peak price per coin in November 2021 at $69,000/1 BTC. Since then, the value has been free falling, closing at $21,117 as of Wednesday night.

The future of crypto is shaky as novel investors are losing faith in the concept and crypto start-ups are starting to lay off employees, or even shut down operations completely. "I do think people get bought into these manias, who may not have as much money to spare," said Gates. "So I'm not bullish on bitcoin."