Despite the Biden win, despite the lovely weather, despite humorous side stories like the Four Seasons Total Landscaping presser and the revelation that Trump Jr. GF Kim Guilfoyle offered lap dances to donors, there's still plenty of grim news to go around. There's the growing number of COVID cases, Trump's continuing attempts to destroy the country, sunset at 4:30. So it's such a relief to find offsetting news that gives us a few additional things to celebrate.
Thus, the announcement that the Winklevoss twins have re-achieved billionaire status "thanks to a surge in the price of Bitcoin."
You may recall that the Winklevi - Tyler and Cameron - had bit roles in "The Social Network," the film about Mark Zuckerberg and the creation of Facebook. The Winklevoss twins, Harvard classmates of Zuck, claimed that he stole their idea. They took their complaint to then Harvard President Larry Summers - the scene in which they make their case to Summers is peak Ivy League douchery - and the rest is history.
Zuckerberg - no slouch himself when in comes to d-baggery - settled $65M on the boys, and they used some of the settlement to invest in Bitcoin. And then threw themselves into cryptocurrency fulltime/big time. Their fortunes have fallen and risen and fallen along with the crypto market, but, once again, they find themselves billionaires. Not Zuckerberg level billionaires, but billionaires nonetheless.
Bitcoin has more than doubled this year to $15,433, partly driven by fears that massive central bank easing and fiscal stimulus will debase currencies. Each of the twins is worth about $1 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. They also own other cryptocurrencies including Ether. (Source: Bloomberg)The twins are betting that the share value of Bitcoin will climb to $50K, which will make them even richer. Of course, if this scenario plays out, it will be because of inflation, which will make all the rest of us poorer. But billionaires need to billionaire, and we all know that the only value that matters is how much a person is worth financially. So there's that to provide us with some measure of comfort and joy as this the winter of our discontent sets in. At least Tyler and Cameron aren't out there actively destroying democracy.
Everyone's not a big fan of cryptocurrencies. They remain "risky and volatile." Warren Buffet "famously referred to Bitcoin as “rat poison squared” several years ago, and hasn’t changed that view, arguing that cryptocurrencies have no value."
"Rat poison squared." I like that. Guess they don't call Buffet the Sage of Omaha for nothing.
But so much of the financial world runs on things that have no concrete, tangible value, but are just instruments used to gamble. And I wouldn't bet against cryptocurrencies gaining in importance in an ever-more-globalized economy where nation states have less and less power, their currencies less and less meaning. (Hopefully not in my lifetime.)
Anyway, thought you'd be buoyed to learn that, at least for the moment, the Winklevos bros are rich. Not richer than Croesus. Not richer than Mark Zuckerberg. (He's up over $100B.) But plenty rich enough. And likely richer than our soon to be departing president. Which is certainly, in my book, a wonderful bit of news.
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