Cryptocurrency – fraud or the future?

BitMEX general director Arthur Hayes yesterday discussed the prospects for the cryptocurrency industry with well-known economist and crypto skeptic Nuriel Rubini at the Asian Blockchain Summit.

The conversation was centered around the main topic: “Is a cryptocurrency a fraud or a future?” As expected, the participants in the discussion have two completely opposite views.

Roubini began with the fact that in the cryptocurrency ecosystem there are a lot of scammers and other criminal elements that are trying to deceive potential investors. “Bitcoin is not secure or decentralized. It also has problems with scaling, ”he added.

In response to this, Hayes noted that Bitcoin capitalization is now at $ 220 billion, so it is logical that this is a tasty morsel for “black” hackers who are looking for errors in the code, but at the same time, a successful attack has never been carried out. He advised to keep his capital not on centralized exchanges, but on his own wallets for greater security.

Regarding scaling, Hayes noted that such processes require a decade of hard work, citing credit cards and the traditional banking system as an example.

“Over the 10 years of its existence, Bitcoin has managed to achieve impressive progress,” Hayes added.

Roubini, in turn, said that the world does not need cryptocurrencies, because a revolution is already taking place in fintech space, and artificial intelligence, big data and the Internet of things are successfully coping with current problems. He gave examples of various payment initiatives, such as the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) in India and Alipay in China, which may well satisfy the need for digital payments.

“Shitkoinam is not the place,” he added.

Parrying this statement, Hayes said that consumers should always have an alternative, because payment systems like WeChat Pay allow Tencent and the Chinese authorities to control transactions.

BitMEX CEO agreed that at the moment cryptocurrencies do not have wide popularity and their owners are less than 1% of the world’s population, but “they are worth more than zero” and people appreciate the advantages they provide.

“If, after 50 years, Alibaba, Facebook and Google are monopolists in all possible areas, people will need an alternative that large companies cannot control. Bitcoin will no longer be a niche market, ”says Hayes.

Rubini, in turn, turned the conversation towards lack of privacy, scaling, decentralization and security of cryptocurrency.

“The cost of many cryptocurrencies last year fell by 95-99%, and even some of the top ten showed a similar decrease. Bitcoin fell 30% in one week, ”he said.

Heys replied that the cryptocurrency market is the only free market in this world. He believes that in 5 years the capitalization of all projects will be above a trillion dollars, “and this is still very little.”

Roubini repeated, saying that the cryptocurrency market is waiting for a complete collapse and collapse to zero, after which it will turn into a “museum of failed coins.”

However, opponents agreed that Libra from Facebook is not a cryptocurrency, but an economist added that it is a “symbol of the fall of a crypt.” Hayes, in turn, expressed his opinion, calling Libra a tool with which the general public will have the opportunity to learn more about the advantages and disadvantages of a new class of digital assets.

On Tuesday at the same conference, Hayes declared that Libra would destroy commercial and central banks.