Winklevoss is a big name in the crypto world. The twins, who were Facebook co-founders, have been advocating for cryptocurrency for many years now, and have built up a considerable bitcoin holding, as well as founding the Gemini crypto exchange.
In the last couple of weeks, bitcoin has risen above $10,000 and dipped below it, but overall this year its value has climbed by 200%, giving hope to the crypto bulls, who were left out in the cold during the bear market of 2018.
Enter the Winklevoss twins, who have now warned Wall St banks that they have been “asleep at the wheel” when it comes to bitcoin and cryptocurrencies generally.
“Unlike the internet, which you couldn’t buy a piece of, you can actually buy a piece of this new internet of money,” Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss told CNN. They added, “It’s still a retail-driven market, from day one. And a lot of people have done really well. Wall Street has been asleep at the wheel.”
As Billy Bambrough at Forbes comments: “Bitcoin’s epic 2017 bull run, which saw the bitcoin price soar from under $1,000 per bitcoin at the beginning of the year to almost $20,000 in December, was largely thought to be due to Wall Street and that institutional investment could be poised to flow into bitcoin and crypto.”
However, the institutional investment didn’t materialise and the price of bitcoin crashed. The Winklevoss twins took a different approach, “We had to invest because we were afraid of missing out, we couldn’t miss out on this future.”
It appears they are now lobbying the Wall St banks to become more involved with the aim of seeing that institutional investment emerge this year, even if it didn’t appear in 2017.
Bambrough suggests that in some ways keeping the banks outside the market has helped bitcoin retail investors, and he cites teen bitcoin millionaire Eric Finman as an example. Finman recently announced that he is backing Metal, which launched in 2017, but has been revamped as a “all-in-one digital banking platform for cryptocurrency” — despite slumping 98% in value since its all-time high. Finman’s support comes as Metal Pay relaunches to compete with more directly with the likes of Venmo and PayPal, payment platforms that want users to store and send cash on their apps.
Meanwhile, Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss said they are open to partnering with Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg on the social media giant’s Libra cryptocurrency project after it was revealed they have been in talks about joining the Libra Association.
The banks may appear to be losing out in this emerging market; it may even make banks a thing of the past. But there is a way to go before we’ll see that, even if these institutions are slumbering giants.