⸺ Obituary · December 22, 2021 ⸺
“Why Bitcoin Is Worse Than A Madoff-Style Ponzi Scheme”
— Financial Times, Robert McCauley
“In a crash, the holders of bitcoin will collectively have lost what they have paid the miners for their bitcoin. This sum may be not far from the sum originally invested with Madoff, after accounting for inflation. But bitcoin holders will have no one to pursue to recover this sum: it will simply have gone up in smoke, a social loss. The holders of bitcoin would then only wish it had been a Ponzi scheme.”
Price at death
$48,621
Today
$73,594
Resurrection
×1.5
On 2021-12-22, Robert McCauley (Professor, University of Oxford) declared Bitcoin dead via Financial Times. Bitcoin was trading at ~$48,621 at the time. The call joins the growing canon of premature obituaries.
The declaration was catalogued on December 22, 2021, when one Bitcoin traded for approximately $48,621. Since then, Bitcoin has appreciated by 51% relative to the price on the day Financial Times pronounced it finished.