In a surprising interview, billionaire, old-time Bitcoin (BTC) supporter and PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel questioned Bitcoin’s value proposition. Despite holding a “small position,” Thiel warns of a “volatile, bumpy ride” moving forward, with no expected “dramatic” price increases.
The interview was conducted for CNBC during the Aspen Ideas Festival and aired on June 28. In a two-minute clip, Peter Thiel starts questioning whether Bitcoin accomplishes its foundational vision, which is what interested him.
Notably, Thiel mentioned the cypherpunk, crypto-anarchist, libertarian, and “anti-centralized government” ideals as a core for Bitcoin’s value proposition. However, he immediately raised the question of whether BTC really works the way it was supposed to.
“Does it [BTC] really work that way? Or has that thread somehow got lost? So, when people in the FBI tell me that they much rather have criminals using Bitcoin than hundred-dollar bills, it suggests that, maybe, it’s not quite working the way it was supposed to.”
– Peter Thiel, for CNBC
Peter Thiel forecasts a ‘bumpy ride’ for Bitcoin price
When talking about his investment position on Bitcoin, the successful investor and billionaire Peter Thiel showed a neutral bias.
Interestingly, he confirmed that he still holds a small position in BTC and has not bought as much as he wanted to in the past. Nevertheless, Thiel doubts the price can increase much from this point and warned of a “volatile, bumpy ride.”
“I’m not sure it [BTC] is gonna go up that dramatically from here. We got the ETF addition, and I don’t know who else buys it quickly from here. I still have a small position, it probably can still go up some but it will be a volatile, bumpy ride.”
– Peter Thiel, for CNBC
The PayPal founder doubled down on questioning Bitcoin’s foundational values, which negatively impacts his current perception.
“I have a dual reason [for the forecast]. One is this sort of ideological, decentralized future of the computing world that I really do believe in. I really believe it would be better, and it [Bitcoin] seemed like the perfect vehicle for that for such a long time, and I’m just much less convinced that.”
– Peter Thiel, for CNBC
In closing, Thiel finished by saying he worries that Bitcoin could have been co-opted by traditional finance forces.
Controversy rises in the Bitcoin community after this interview
This recent interview has raised controversy in the Bitcoin community, especially on X (formerly Twitter). In particular, the Bitcoin-only reporting account Pledditor has called out a “weird effort by clickbait Bitcoin Twitter accounts to misrepresent Peter Thiel’s CNBC interview.”
As of this writing, BTC trades at $60,000 in a key support level from a four-month price range low. Moreover, Bitcoin miners have been capitulating both with an accelerated selling pace and also with a drastic drop in the network’s hashrate that looms over the cryptocurrency‘s security, as reported by Finbold.
Conversely, technical analysts and Bitcoin traders continue to foreshadow a massive bull rally for BTC in the next few months.
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