On Thursday, James Gorman, CEO of Morgan Stanley, an American multinational investment management and financial services company, in a conference organized by a media house in New York, spilled his thoughts on crypto.
The CEO told the media house that he doesn’t view crypto as a “fad” (a short-lived trend having wide enthusiasm), and according to him, it is here to stay.
However, he said that he cannot put an intrinsic value on the new asset class and doesn’t prefer investing in assets with extensive outcomes. The CEO’s statements here acknowledge the presence of crypto but also highlight the sector’s unpredictability.
Earlier in September this year, Gorman had briefed the media house with a similar stance, saying that he counts crypto to be a speculative asset “by definition” and does not view it as a new form of a store of value. He also revealed that he hadn’t made any crypto investment yet and was glad to have not bought Bitcoin at $60,000.
The CEO had compared the crypto hype to the dot-com bubble in the late 90s and said that he believes many investors get persuaded by the trend or the boost. The dot-com bubble, also referred to as the Internet bubble, refers to the period between 1995 and 2000 when investors pumped money into Internet-based startups hoping that these fledgling companies would soon profit.
The 2000 stock market crash was a direct result of the bursting of the dot-com bubble. It popped when most of the technology startups that raised money and went public folded when capital went dry.
However, Morgan Stanley has shown indirect trust in Bitcoin by investing millions of dollars in the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust. The firm also set up a cryptocurrency-based research team in September last year. A few days ago, it published a report comparing Bitcoin’s performance to that of Tesla. As per the report, Bitcoin and Tesla have been trading virtually in lockstep, i.e., following the same trend over the past year.
At the time of writing, Bitcoin is trading at $16,958.60, a 0.12% drop from the previous and over a 3.28% surge over the past 5 days.