After the suspect statements and acting of JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon about Bitcoin and that it is a “fraud” now the head of one of the biggest banks stated, bitcoin is “more than just a fad.” The comments were in total contrast to JPMorgans CEO statements who seemd to have not even a bit of the fundamental understanding of the blockchain technology cryptocurrencies are based on.
CEO of Morgan Stanley James Gorman took a different position from Dimon when it comes to the relationship between governments and digital currencies. Gorman mentioned that the privacy features of cryptocurrencies are compelling. The comments came up during a Wall Street Journal event today. He does not think digital currencies should be illegal and says there is “a sort of government risk factor to it.” Read more on the full Bloomberg interview.
Stanley in his own words:
“The concept of anonymous currency is a very interesting concept – interesting for the privacy protections it gives people, interesting because what it says to the central banking system about controlling that.”
After this clear statement it is almost a surprise that Gorman isn’t invested in cryptocurrencies (at least for the public), but he stated he knows a number of people who invested in a stake in the market.
Gorman said: “I’ve talked to a lot of people who have, It’s obviously highly speculative but it’s not something that’s inherently bad. It’s a natural consequence of the whole blockchain technology.”
The CEO himself mentioned the question of future regulatory developments around the cryptocurrencies as they are still in a wild west world and he was wondering by when regulators would jump into the game to “control monetary flows for money laundering and privacy and capital outflows and all the other reasons.”
Listen to the full Interview on wsj.com
