Just the usual media outlet reporting about rich people.
Make sure you click on the link though. Clicks=more articles about cryptocurrency. I started doing this on CNBC and they became the leader in mainstream cryptonews despite all of their articles being anti-btc to begin.
"The asset itself is creating nothing," said Buffett, comparing bitcoin to "productive" assets such as gold or a farm.
wait.. gold is a productive asset now? This is contrary to economics literature.
Gold and bitcoin are very similar. They don't produce anything. Golds history is longer so is safer, but nonetheless, it's just something we've all agreed to use as a store of value.
I would be very interested in what Buffett thinks gold produces as it sits there. He's a smart guy, so I'm going to assume he misspoke.
Good point.. but that doesn't make it a productive asset. A productive asset is something that produces an output--ie: something that generates an income for the owner of the asset. If I own a farm, the farm produces crops that can be sold.
That's not what he meant. Gold's value as a material is pennies on the dollar for gold as an investment. When people talk about 'value' of gold, they're referring to its use as a 'store of value'.
I don't think Buffett was comparing bitcoin to gold. He doesn't like gold investments for the same reason - it's not productive. He's talked about that a lot in the past.
Heat isn't wasted if you live somewhere you need to heat your house anyway. Many people turn energy -> heat without any 'useful' byproduct in between. Imagine if instead they got free bitcoin or cancer research or server hosting in the middle - there's actually a company that is already working on that - putting servers in people's houses to heat them.
But anyway, it also produces a unique currency system with many benefits.
>“(Gold) gets dug out of the ground in Africa, or someplace. Then we melt it down, dig another hole, bury it again and pay people to stand around guarding it. It has no utility. Anyone watching from Mars would be scratching their head.”
If it's not in quotes, keep in mind it may have been misrepresented. Not even kidding. Sometimes the part in quotes is inaccurate too. This is Newsweek we're taking about - a living argument against ad support automatically leading to quality if there ever was one. I keep hoping someone will go into some depth on this topic, but nope.
The quoted text is incorrect/misleading and it's not even in that particular embedded clip. What he said was:
"When you buy non-productive assets all you're counting is whether the next person is going to pay you more because they're even more excited about another next person coming along. But the asset itself is creating nothing. One of the interesting things for example is gold ... and it doesn't produce anything"
He compared Bitcoin to Gold directly as they are both non-productive assets. He then goes on to explain how a farm is a productive asset.
I don't really know what about it conveys clickbait. Gates and Buffett have gone on the record numerous times saying that they bet Bitcoin will fail long term. That said, HN does love to hate on Bitcoin. I find there's something cathartic about these weekly Bitcoin bashing threads.
I read the article and watched the included video. The headline does seem to suggest Buffet said something he did not say. The use of double quotes is confusing and potentially misleading.
I haven’t had my coffee yet but I don’t think Buffet himself even says the word “gold” in the included video.
"It is clear from those words that Buffett sees crypto assets like a baseball trading card or some other form of collectible. And if that were true of Bitcoin, Ethereum, EOS, Zcash, or many other popular crypto assets, I would agree with him.
But what these crypto tokens are is entirely something else. They are the fuel that powers a new form of technology infrastructure that is being built on top of the foundational internet protocols."
> They are the fuel that powers a new form of technology infrastructure
And what value is that new infrastructure actually delivering? People keep talking about blockchain this and that but I've not seen any compelling use case yet. Maybe this is just shortsightedness on my part but every time I hear a proposal for a thing to build on the back of cryptocurrency, it always sounds like a very suboptimal solution.
All these were great visionaries in their time, but now probably long-in-the-tooth. I feel like there are countless examples of new paradigms that the old guard felt would never work out.
Despite the hype and the early days, cryptocurrencies have a very similar usage pattern as credit cards. I would argue that credit cards and the way we use them are pretty much digital currency. That being said, there is a huge amount of improvements needed and the over-hype is just a turn-off for most.
As an "Asset Class" - which this article makes principle - cryptocurrency is absolute insanity.
But having a trustless, semi-distributed, potentially anonymous, and global currency that we can send to anybody in the world via the internet in a few seconds - or even via an offline mesh network - is an incredible, exciting innovation.
And the sad thing is that point is of course not lost on Gates who - buried far under the lead - "touted its ability to push out third-party intermediaries, such as banks, while also keeping a secure and permanent record of transactions between two parties."
> But having a trustless, semi-distributed, potentially anonymous, and global currency that we can send to anybody in the world via the internet in a few seconds - or even via an offline mesh network - is an incredible, exciting innovation.
The Star Trek replicator is also an incredible, exciting innovation. It is also as real as a cryptocurrency that does what you describe.
35 comments
[ 0.24 ms ] story [ 57.3 ms ] threadArticle date is 5/7/18 AT 11:53 AM ?
Just the usual media outlet reporting about rich people.
Make sure you click on the link though. Clicks=more articles about cryptocurrency. I started doing this on CNBC and they became the leader in mainstream cryptonews despite all of their articles being anti-btc to begin.
I'm sure your personal clicks on bitcoin articles are what made CNBC focus on cryptocurrency news more. :\",
wait.. gold is a productive asset now? This is contrary to economics literature.
Gold and bitcoin are very similar. They don't produce anything. Golds history is longer so is safer, but nonetheless, it's just something we've all agreed to use as a store of value.
I would be very interested in what Buffett thinks gold produces as it sits there. He's a smart guy, so I'm going to assume he misspoke.
> "The asset itself is creating nothing," said Buffett, comparing bitcoin to "productive" assets such as gold or a farm.
That actually wasn't the quote, the remark about gold and farm was made by the article's author.
Edit: here[1] is the actual quote and video
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17197491
http://www.businessinsider.com/warren-buffett-compares-stock...
But anyway, it also produces a unique currency system with many benefits.
-Warren Buffet
"When you buy non-productive assets all you're counting is whether the next person is going to pay you more because they're even more excited about another next person coming along. But the asset itself is creating nothing. One of the interesting things for example is gold ... and it doesn't produce anything"
He compared Bitcoin to Gold directly as they are both non-productive assets. He then goes on to explain how a farm is a productive asset.
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtITDtZPYEw
I haven’t had my coffee yet but I don’t think Buffet himself even says the word “gold” in the included video.
https://avc.com/2018/05/is-buying-crypto-assets-investing/
"It is clear from those words that Buffett sees crypto assets like a baseball trading card or some other form of collectible. And if that were true of Bitcoin, Ethereum, EOS, Zcash, or many other popular crypto assets, I would agree with him.
But what these crypto tokens are is entirely something else. They are the fuel that powers a new form of technology infrastructure that is being built on top of the foundational internet protocols."
And what value is that new infrastructure actually delivering? People keep talking about blockchain this and that but I've not seen any compelling use case yet. Maybe this is just shortsightedness on my part but every time I hear a proposal for a thing to build on the back of cryptocurrency, it always sounds like a very suboptimal solution.
Despite the hype and the early days, cryptocurrencies have a very similar usage pattern as credit cards. I would argue that credit cards and the way we use them are pretty much digital currency. That being said, there is a huge amount of improvements needed and the over-hype is just a turn-off for most.
As an "Asset Class" - which this article makes principle - cryptocurrency is absolute insanity.
But having a trustless, semi-distributed, potentially anonymous, and global currency that we can send to anybody in the world via the internet in a few seconds - or even via an offline mesh network - is an incredible, exciting innovation.
And the sad thing is that point is of course not lost on Gates who - buried far under the lead - "touted its ability to push out third-party intermediaries, such as banks, while also keeping a secure and permanent record of transactions between two parties."
The Star Trek replicator is also an incredible, exciting innovation. It is also as real as a cryptocurrency that does what you describe.