A recent report from The Street shows that the fund of well-known billionaire George Soros is starting to trade Bitcoin. Opinions on whether this is a good or bad sign for the king of cryptocurrencies are heavily divided.
Green light for cryptocurrency investing
Soros Fund Management investment director Dawn Fitzpatrick, gave the green light for investing in crypto assets at the end of June. One gets the impression that this decision had been hanging in the air for quite some time. As Bloomberg reports, Soros’ fund has already been keeping a close eye on the cryptocurrency market since 2018. In turn, Fitzpatrick herself clearly signaled in March this year that Soros is investing in companies working on blockchain technology or dealing with related infrastructure. One such company, for example, is the New York Digital Investment Group (NYDIG). Most of Soros’ interests are not fully disclosed. However, rumors from the U.S. trading floor indicate that he also owns a stake in MassMutual.
Fitzpatrick has also indicated in multiple interviews that now is a very important time for digital currencies, especially in the context of steadily weakening fiat currencies. In her opinion, one potential solution to this problem is Bitcoin, which is easy to store, also easy to dispose of, and the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, classifies it as a commodity, being a physical asset with a limited supply. According to the fund’s director, these are sufficient factors to consider BTC as an asset of interest in the investment context.
However, it is worth noting that Soros himself as recently as January 2021, during the World Economic Forum, indicated that both Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies cannot function in the space as money due to their high volatility.
Who is George Soros
George Soros is a Hungarian of Jewish descent. He survived the Holocaust in his native country and over time immigrated to the United Kingdom before finally settling in the United States. There he made his fortune, mainly on speculations on financial markets. He is regarded by many on the right as an enemy. Personally, he has repeatedly engaged in the struggle for democracy, human rights and all freedom movements. To this end, he established the Open Society Foundation in 1984. This is somehow a result of the horrors he witnessed during the Nazi and communist rule. As a financier, he became famous for, among other things, investing in junk stocks of small businesses on the verge of bankruptcy. He is also known for his successful speculation against the pound sterling in 1992. His ploy forced the Bank of England to withdraw the pound from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism.
Opinions divided
As you can see, George Soros is an idea man who seems to invest in projects that he believes have real market value and also represent freedom. To a natural degree, Bitcoin seems to embody these elements. However, Wall Street analysts have Soros’ track record against the aforementioned Bank of England in mind. Since the investment objective of his fund is not fully known, there are voices that Soros may focus on playing the decline of the cryptocurrency market. So will the idea win, or maybe Soros’ fund sees something that other market participants do not? Surely we will all find out soon.
