A former Goldman Sachs head and top economic advisor to President Donald Trump believes that Bitcoin lacks some of the fundamental integrity of a real market and warned that cryptocurrencies could fail
Gary Cohn, a former leading economic advisor to President Trump and a former president of Goldman Sachs, shared his views on Bitcoin and the cryptocurrency market. In an interview with Bloomberg yesterday, Cohn told Emily Chang that he doesn’t think the Bitcoin boom would sustain and the cryptocurrency could likely fail.
Cohn stated that although Bitcoin is a strong developing asset class, it lacks some basics of market integrity. He added that the integrity of a market is knowing who owns an asset, who has it and knowing why it is being transferred.
The use of blockchain technology has made Bitcoin perhaps the most transparent financial asset in the world. However, Cohn doesn’t think so. The former economic advisor to Trump believes that today’s Bitcoin system has no transparency and says it is hard to trust a system that lacks an audit trail.
Cohn made these statements after he was asked how bullish he was on Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies and whether he believes they have what it takes to fundamentally transform the American economy. His replies show that he isn’t a firm believer in Bitcoin, and he admitted that he never was.
Like other leading figures in the business and finance world, Cohn maintains that he is bullish on blockchain technology. He stated that the technology is a highway for Bitcoin and has a lot of other applications in the global economy making blockchain a very useful tool.
Gary Cohn was the president and chief operating officer at Goldman Sachs for 26 years but left the investment bank in 2016 to become President Donald Trump’s chief economic advisor. Cohn led the effort to roll back taxes but resigned from the job in 2016 after losing a battle over tariffs within the White House.
Cohn’s criticism comes at a time when Bitcoin’s price set a new all-time high at $19,900 and is looking likely to surpass the $20,000 mark over the coming days and weeks. The crypto market is also seeing an influx of institutional investors, with companies such as MicroStrategy, Guggenheim, and Square investing hundreds of millions of dollars in Bitcoin and other digital currencies.