He’s been so successful that he picked up the nickname as the “Oracle of Omaha” for his ability to know which companies to put his money in to get the best returns. He does this through his firm Berkshire Hathaway and owns more than 60 companies.
Buffett’s current net worth is around $84.6 billion and he is still growing it through his wise investments in the right stocks. Buffett’s opinion on investing and global markets carry a lot of weight so his negative remarks against Bitcoin has not helped the volatile cryptocurrency.
Buffett recently went on record to say that investing in bitcoin is similar to gambling as you are not sure what you are going to get in return. The billionaire investor was recently asked about his views on putting money in cryptocurrency before the 2018 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Shareholders Meeting, which is a much-anticipated event for many mainstream investors.
In a statement, Buffett said
You aren’t investing when you do that. You’re speculating. There’s nothing wrong with it. If you wanna gamble somebody else will come along and pay more money tomorrow, that’s one kind of game. That is not investing
Buffett wasn’t the only Berkshire Hathaway executive who took a crack at bitcoin. His Vice Chairman at Berkshire Hathaway, Charlie Munger was a lot more critical in his opinion about Bitcoin, saying that he detested Bitcoin the moment it was raised and compared it to a noxious poison.
Buffett is just as skeptical about Bitcoin’s future, but was more restrained in his statements, and mentioned that there are two kinds of items that people buy which they think are investment. He said one item will always be an investment while the other is not. Bitcoin falls into the category of not being a real investment.
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Don’t Invest In What You Don’t Understand
Buffett has done well for himself and Berkshire Hathaway over the years based on one gold principle ‘don’t invest in what you don’t understand’. Cryptocurrencies like bitcoin continue to be a mystery with market fluctuations happening just about every day. So Buffett’s advice does make a lot of sense and it will be interesting to see how cryptocurrency market responds.