The Chairman and CEO of the US largest bank JPMorgan Chase – Jamie Dimon – five months after calling bitcoin a “fraud” decided to take it back. In a conversation with The Globe and Mail, JPMorgan’s Chief Executive, famous for being direct when making comments, back then questioned the BTC’s vitality.
Dimon claimed that bitcoin was not capable of functioning anymore.
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“You can't have a business where people can invent a currency out of thin air and think that people who are buying it are really smart," also said Dimon.
Besides, he compared BTC craze to the bulbs of tulip, the hype over which in the Netherlands led to the economic bubble in the 1600s.
Not long after that the disputes, stirred over Dimon's words, fueled more zest in alternative currencies. In the meantime, one month after JPMorgan’s CEO’s comments, bitcoin soared up by 30%.
On the other hand, Marianne Lake, the Chief Financial Officer, at that time sounded more moderate about bitcoin. She emphasized that JPMorgan was unprejudiced towards the dormant use of crypto coins in the future but in case they are regulated duly.
Notwithstanding Domin’s scorning remarks, some exchanges and banks gladly accepted bitcoin, fomenting its skyrocketing in the mid-December, when one BTC unit was worth $20,000. For example, among those exchanges were such giants as Cboe Global Markets Inc and CME Group Inc as they opened themselves to bitcoin-based futures trading. Furthermore, Square Inc presented on its application an option, which allows purchasing and vending BTC.
Dimon Regretting Own Comments
On Tuesday, January 9, Dimon finally accepted being wrong blaming bitcoin for being a “scam”. He, just like Lake, admitted that bitcoin’s core – blockchain – is more than tangible. By the way, such a view has also been expressed by other representatives of the sphere, in particular, by John Gerspach at Citigroup Inc CFO.
“The blockchain is real. You can have crypto yen and dollars and stuff like that. ICO's you have to look at individually”, accepted Dimon.
JPMorgan’s CEO added that BTC is precisely what does not allow countries’ authorities to sleep well because of its fast-forwarding growth. However, said Dimon, he has distinct views, hence he is not interested in BTC.
Interestingly, Dimon’s recent comments were subsequent to bitcoin's January 8 slight crash. That day the currency experienced a drop to $14,363 per unit after being traded at $16,000-$17,000 between January 6-7, according to the CoinMarketCap.
At the end of 2017, after going through a severe correction on December 22, reaching the low of $12,000, bitcoin appeared to be in stagnation. The early 2018 period gave some positive signs of recovery. However, the coin started sweepingly going down after January 7. At the moment of writing bitcoin is being traded at about $13,700, experiencing another drop as it lost in price 9% within the past 24 hours.
