Top Bitcoin Investor Looks Forward (w/ Barry Silbert & Raoul Pal)

Barry Silbert is the founder & CEO of Digital Currency Group, a company that has helped build the foundation of the digital currency and blockchain technology industry. DCG has been so successful to date that its investment trust is worth as much today as the whole asset class five years ago. But what comes next? In this interview, Raoul Pal tries to get to the bottom of how viable cryptocurrencies are over the long-term. In addition to talking about cryptocurrencies’ viability and volatility, Silbert addresses the need for crypto to serve as a speculative vehicle, policing fraud and illegality. He also speaks to the utility of blockchain outside of the currency realm. Silbert then discusses his views on bitcoin versus gold, and on the generational divide driving changes in the thinking about stores of wealth. Filmed on June 4, 2019 in New York and published on Real Vision on June 17, 2019.

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Top Bitcoin Investor Looks Forward (w/ Barry Silbert)


Transcript:
For the full transcript visit:
RAOUL PAL: Exactly, three months prior. And so, where was Bitcoin then?
BARRY SILBERT: 350 or so.
RAOUL PAL: And where's it today?
BARRY SILBERT: About 8000. So, I got to re-watch the interview. And I guess we'll do a victory lap right
now and say I was probably pretty, right.
RAOUL PAL: Yeah, I think you can say that. And that's with a huge spike up and a huge drop as well.
And it's still being very right. Once to get you back, just to pick your brains to find out where we are. We're
on this journey and it's a long journey. We think we know where we're going. But we don't really know.
So, let's start with where you think the journey is going. And then we'll back up to where we are now. And
the stuff that you're looking at.
BARRY SILBERT: Right. Well, so I think let's go back to the for the past, I guess, four and a half years.
So, in 2014, I would imagine the asset class was probably only worth a couple of billion dollars. Today,
Bitcoin is worth about 125 billion. I would imagine that there were only a handful of exchangesRAOUL PAL: In fact, your investment trust is worth- now?
BARRY SILBERT: 2 billion.
RAOUL PAL: The same, different times.
BARRY SILBERT: Indeed. Yeah, that's true. And, yeah, good to be a first mover, I guess. Yeah, so there
were probably only a handful of exchanges that you could trade off of, there was no institutional involvement
in this space. When Bitcoin was discussed on popular media, it was always described as tulip bubble Ponzi
scheme. So, still quite a bit of that, I guess. And then, yeah, you fast forwardRAOUL PAL: And it was also the criminal element, it was always going to say, it's the currency of
criminals.
BARRY SILBERT: Silk Road, probably, yeah, Silk Road probably existed at that point. And there was this
perception that Bitcoin was only used by criminals. And so, fast forward to today, it's different. I think the
asset class, look, the asset class is here to stay. The asset class, as defined as digital assets, which would
include both digital currencies and these token investments. So, the asset class is here to stay.
I think it's now being looked at as potentially an important part of a diversified portfolio. There are thousands
of digital currencies and tokens that are out there, most of them we'll talk more about- you don't want to
touch, but there's thousands of ways to play the asset class. And the infrastructure, the infrastructure
comparing it then versus today, you've custody solutions now like institutional grade custody solutions, you
have trading software, you have data and analytics, you have fantastic media editorial coverage.

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