Amy Harris / Invision / AP / Shutterstock.com
With Bitcoin reaching 70% in 2021, it’s no wonder some previously crypto-skeptic billionaires are coming around about their stance on the asset.
Explore: 8 Best Cryptocurrencies To Invest In for 2022
2021 Wealth Recap: Who Are the Billionaires That Added $402B to Their Fortunes
By comparison, the S&P 500 index surged 28%, and gold dropped by 7% in the same period, marking the third consecutive year that Bitcoin has outperformed the two.
Thomas Peterffy, chairman of the world’s largest electronic broker Interactive Brokers — whose wealth stands at $24.8 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index — recently told Bloomberg that it’s prudent to have 2% to 3% of one’s personal wealth in cryptocurrencies, just in case fiat currency goes to “hell.”
Pefferty came a long way since 2017, when he took out a full-page ad in the Wall Street Journal in 2017 warning of the dangers that bitcoin futures posed to capital markets. In an open letter to the WSJ in November 2017, Pefferty wrote that “cryptocurrencies do not have a mature, regulated and tested underlying market. The products and their markets have existed for fewer than 10 years and bear little if any relationship to any economic circumstance or reality in the real world. Margining such a product in a reasonable manner is impossible. While the buyer (the long side) of a cryptocurrency futures contract or call option could be required to put up 100% of the value to ensure safety, determining the margin requirement for the seller (the short side) is impossible.”
On Jan.1, he told Bloomberg, however, that he owns cryptos and that his firm recently offered customers the ability to trade Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash, after…
