Warren Buffett and His Expansive Explanation against Bitcoin

[serjent05]

In a Berkshire Hathaway Annual Shareholder Meeting last Saturday,  Warren Buffett gives his most expansive explanation for why he doesn’t believe in bitcoin.[1]
In this video  he tackles and compares Bitcoin to other asset and give emphasis on the returns.  

Here is the interesting part of his speech on that video:

“Whether it goes up or down in the next year, or five or 10 years, I don’t know. But the one thing I’m pretty sure of is that it doesn’t produce anything,” Buffett said. “It’s got a magic to it and people have attached magics to lots of things.”

“If you said… for a 1% interest in all the farmland in the United States, pay our group $25 billion, I’ll write you a check this afternoon,” Buffett said. ”[For] $25 billion I now own 1% of the farmland. [If] you offer me 1% of all the apartment houses in the country and you want another $25 billion, I’ll write you a check, it’s very simple. Now if you told me you own all of the bitcoin in the world and you offered it to me for $25 I wouldn’t take it because what would I do with it? I’d have to sell it back to you one way or another. It isn’t going to do anything. The apartments are going to produce rent and the farms are going to produce food.

“Assets, to have value, have to deliver something to somebody. And there’s only one currency that’s accepted. You can come up with all kinds of things — we can put up Berkshire coins... but in the end, this is money,” he said, holding up a $20 bill. “And there’s no reason in the world why the United States government… is going to let Berkshire money replace theirs.”

Hearing his explanation, I just came to think that even though Buffet is seeing the importance of Bitcoin, without knowing how it works and why it gets its value, he tends to reject it.  It is obvious how he repels the idea that Bitcoin had already been used as legal tender across the globe despite many governments not legalizing it as one.  He is also down mining other countries saying that the only currency is $US (4:40 timeline of the video).  I wonder if he is not born an American, would he say the same thing?


In the latter part of the article[1] is kinda interesting

“In my life, I try and avoid things that are stupid and evil and make me look bad in comparison to somebody else – and bitcoin does all three,” Munger said.

Actually, I read this as :

In my life, I try and avoid things that make me look stupid and evil and  bad in comparison to somebody else – and bitcoin does all three,”


[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/30/warren-buffett-gives-his-most-expansive-explanation-for-why-he-doesnt-believe-in-bitcoin.html

[_act_]

I have just broswed Warren Buffett's age, he was born on August 30, 1930. That is 91 years old.

In his days, he used fiat and he was successful. Old people can be fixed to what make them successful, telling upcoming people the old fashion way when there are new means.

All I can say is that Warren Buffett is old and got fixated to fiat and old ways.

What I actually know is that I can buy $1000 worth of bitcoin, invest it for some months or years which can turn the $1000 to $2000 or more which is the reason some people are buying bitcoin.

[Z-tight]

Warren Buffett is entitled to his opinions, but i just feel he is missing the point that Bitcoin is more of a currency that anything else, from reading the whitepaper i understood that Bitcoin is first of all a currency and every other thing on top is extra, and that is where he gets it wrong when he asks "what can it produce"? I can also ask what can the U.S. dollar produce, it is a medium of exchange, it can be used for buying and selling or as a reserve currency, but what does it produce. Bitcoin too, just that Bitcoin is a different kind of currency and for many reasons like being decentralized is yet to be mainstream, but it is still a currency.

Then as an asset what it produces is returns, returns for users who want to make a conjecture on the future price, more people will be lucky to make that return in the long term and the reason why they will is easy, Bitcoin gets scarce as the years roll on, and the demand will continue to snowball, a scarce asset with a large demand will result in a high price for that asset.

[lionheart78]

What I actually know is that I can buy $1000 worth of bitcoin, invest it for some months or years which can turn the $1000 to $2000 or more which is the reason some people are buying bitcoin.

And what I actually know is that I can order an item online and pay for them in Bitcoin.  This alone can debunk's Buffett idea that Bitcoin has no value.  Sometimes a simple approach is way more than an indepth discussion that makes things more complicated.

Now if you told me you own all of the bitcoin in the world and you offered it to me for $25 I wouldn’t take it because what would I do with it? I’d have to sell it back to you one way or another. It isn’t going to do anything. The apartments are going to produce rent and the farms are going to produce food.

As if someone will sell him 1 BTC @$25 atm.  But that aside, Buffet tackles trading here, the buy and sell stuff.  Does he imagine that if no one buys his items, and no one rented his apartment won't yield him anything?  We are discussing demand here and at the current time, Bitcoin has demand that also debunked his statement and will continue to debunk his belief.

[palle11]

No doubt buffet has been one of the leading critics of bitcoin far back in time. He has called bitcoin a bubble and of course the magic statement is not new. Buffet don't believe making money has to be by staying on the computer and trading or hodling bitcoin long time for profit and this is why he is making such statement. I was thinking he has perhaps changed this way of thinking of bitcoin after bitcoin has survived all the critics and moving into adoption.

[arwin100]

What can you expect for old folks? They are skeptical about changes especially on things which they are gaining to. Although he's really a great investor as he gain huge success for being a risk taker but I think he really don't understand bitcoin well. I guess its good not to think more deeper on those guys who doesn't believe on bitcoin and stay focus to those people who open on new possibilities since there are rich guys are now opening their doors on bitcoins and crypto.

[o48o]

In a Berkshire Hathaway Annual Shareholder Meeting last Saturday,  Warren Buffett gives his most expansive explanation for why he doesn’t believe in bitcoin...

It baffless me why people are listening to old geezer when it comes to new technology. Obvously it will seem like evil ponzi to him, as he doesn't understand what has been invented. Most people didn't see the internet coming when first browsers came. It was too difficult to use without a proper infrastructure in place.

Just because Buffet made his own money, doesn't mean he understand what blockchain is solving.

[Pomogator]

What can you expect for old folks? They are skeptical about changes especially on things which they are gaining to. Although he's really a great investor as he gain huge success for being a risk taker but I think he really don't understand bitcoin well. I guess its good not to think more deeper on those guys who doesn't believe on bitcoin and stay focus to those people who open on new possibilities since there are rich guys are now opening their doors on bitcoins and crypto.

Of course, his age has already passed. He became very successful in his time through fiat and risky stock trading, he thinks the old way. Now the time has really come when you need to manage to earn your money on things that are given an artificial value, otherwise you will have to be content with insignificant amounts in shares.

[Flexystar]

That’s terrific. What magic his talking about? Well I am no technical person but I know one thing for sure, we transact, bitcoin gets mined and confirmed on blockchain and embedded forever to gain the data integrity concerns solved. That’s what it is making. Whole lot of electricity goes into it, gets the transactions converted into data/information which is verified publicly.

It’s no magic, it’s technological advancement and it will continue to evolve forever.  I think oldie is just good at cash bucks in his pockets rather than virtual coins. 

[Fortify]

n a Berkshire Hathaway Annual Shareholder Meeting last Saturday,  Warren Buffett gives his most expansive explanation for why he doesn’t believe in bitcoin.[1]
In this video  he tackles and compares Bitcoin to other asset and give emphasis on the returns.  

Hearing his explanation, I just came to think that even though Buffet is seeing the importance of Bitcoin, without knowing how it works and why it gets its value, he tends to reject it.  It is obvious how he repels the idea that Bitcoin had already been used as legal tender across the globe despite many governments not legalizing it as one.  He is also down mining other countries saying that the only currency is $US (4:40 timeline of the video).  I wonder if he is not born an American, would he say the same thing?


In the latter part of the article[1] is kinda interesting

“In my life, I try and avoid things that are stupid and evil and make me look bad in comparison to somebody else – and bitcoin does all three,” Munger said.

Actually, I read this as :

In my life, I try and avoid things that make me look stupid and evil and  bad in comparison to somebody else – and bitcoin does all three,”


[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/30/warren-buffett-gives-his-most-expansive-explanation-for-why-he-doesnt-believe-in-bitcoin.html

I generally like Warren Buffett but he has made plenty of mistakes in the past which he freely admits. The explanation he gives of it being unproductive is one view but people do exactly the same with holding gold. There is a degree of arrogance involved, but he misses how useful it is to transfer money around the world without involving banks - which are sometimes expensive, difficult for people to access and prone to collapse in some countries.

[mindrust]

Warren Buffett is entitled to his opinions, but i just feel he is missing the point that Bitcoin is more of a currency that anything else, from reading the whitepaper i understood that Bitcoin is first of all a currency and every other thing on top is extra, and that is where he gets it wrong when he asks "what can it produce"? I can also ask what can the U.S. dollar produce, it is a medium of exchange, it can be used for buying and selling or as a reserve currency, but what does it produce. Bitcoin too, just that Bitcoin is a different kind of currency and for many reasons like being decentralized is yet to be mainstream, but it is still a currency.

Then as an asset what it produces is returns, returns for users who want to make a conjecture on the future price, more people will be lucky to make that return in the long term and the reason why they will is easy, Bitcoin gets scarce as the years roll on, and the demand will continue to snowball, a scarce asset with a large demand will result in a high price for that asset.

I don’t think there are many people that understand bitcoin. Maybe I too don’t. I’ll still give it a try. Bitcoin isn’t trying to replace the Dollar. It is carrying the dollar. There is a whole world of difference. If it was the otherwise, then we would price things in bitcoins. But no, we still do price things in USD. The whole world do this. Not just the US.

[Don Pedro Dinero]

I have just broswed Warren Buffett's age, he was born on August 30, 1930. That is 91 years old.

In his days, he used fiat and he was successful. Old people can be fixed to what make them successful, telling upcoming people the old fashion way when there are new means.

All I can say is that Warren Buffett is old and got fixated to fiat and old ways.

I agree. First of all, he's been a billionaire for a long time, and he doesn't need bitcoin at all. Besides, he doesn't understand technology very well. It took him many years to buy Apple and he missed out on much of the rise in tech. So it is not surprising what he thinks of bitcoin.

We should ask him if he thinks the same about gold, because the same argument he uses against bitcoin can be used with gold. Or works of art such as the Mona Lisa. There are objects that are valuable and that rise in value over time because they are appreciated.

In the case of bitcoin, it is appreciated by those of us who know it and more and more because no one can censure it.

[davis196]

Warren Buffet's arguments make sense,but Bitcoin isn't a stock or a piece of real estate.
Bitcoin is supposed to compete against FIAT currencies,not against stocks,bonds,farmlands and real estate.
Unfortunately,the volatile nature of BTC and the massive price growth in the last few years made a lot of people think that Bitcoin is some kind of magical financial asset,which would bring them 100x profits.
This is simply wrong.Bitcoin was created with the sole purpose of being an alternative to the US dollar and the fiat currencies around the world.Unfortunately,this main purpose shifted to "making more money and getting more profits".

[Kakmakr]

Warren Buffett are one of those people who sees Bitcoin as a "Commodity" or some investment option that he has to compare to other investment options ...and that is where he is wrong. Bitcoin is a "Currency" ......with a Forex option to trade it, if you want to use it as an investment option.

Now.. compare Bitcoin to other currencies and Forex trading and see what the difference is. You cannot receive "rental income" from a $20 bill... can you? It depreciate in value or buying power.... so much so, that the US Dollar has lost more than 80% of it's buying power over several years. (Did that happen to Bitcoin, since 2009???)

I guess Munger's last statement is true for Buffett too ==> “In my life, I try and avoid things that are stupid and evil and make me look bad in comparison to somebody else – and bitcoin does all three,” Munger said.  <=== Why does it make him look stupid..... well the answer is simple... He knows nothing about it...but he still pretend to look smart and then says stupid things about it. 

[mindrust]

Warren Buffett are one of those people who sees Bitcoin as a "Commodity" or some investment option that he has to compare to other investment options ...and that is where he is wrong. Bitcoin is a "Currency" ......with a Forex option to trade it, if you want to use it as an investment option.

Now.. compare Bitcoin to other currencies and Forex trading and see what the difference is. You cannot receive "rental income" from a $20 bill... can you? It depreciate in value or buying power.... so much so, that the US Dollar has lost more than 80% of it's buying power over several years. (Did that happen to Bitcoin, since 2009???)

I guess Munger's last statement is true for Buffett too ==> “In my life, I try and avoid things that are stupid and evil and make me look bad in comparison to somebody else – and bitcoin does all three,” Munger said.  <=== Why does it make him look stupid..... well the answer is simple... He knows nothing about it...but he still pretend to look smart and then says stupid things about it. 

You should re-read your post. He said btc is stupid. He didn’t say it makes him look stupid. He said it makes him look bad. Your post reads like you forgot what you were writing at the end of your post and reached a different conclusion than you should have.

[Bttzed03]

~

“Whether it goes up or down in the next year, or five or 10 years, I don’t know. But the one thing I’m pretty sure of is that it doesn’t produce anything,” Buffett said. “It’s got a magic to it and people have attached magics to lots of things.”

“If you said… for a 1% interest in all the farmland in the United States, pay our group $25 billion, I’ll write you a check this afternoon,” Buffett said. ”[For] $25 billion I now own 1% of the farmland. [If] you offer me 1% of all the apartment houses in the country and you want another $25 billion, I’ll write you a check, it’s very simple. Now if you told me you own all of the bitcoin in the world and you offered it to me for $25 I wouldn’t take it because what would I do with it? I’d have to sell it back to you one way or another. It isn’t going to do anything. The apartments are going to produce rent and the farms are going to produce food.

“Assets, to have value, have to deliver something to somebody. And there’s only one currency that’s accepted. You can come up with all kinds of things — we can put up Berkshire coins... but in the end, this is money,” he said, holding up a $20 bill. “And there’s no reason in the world why the United States government… is going to let Berkshire money replace theirs.”

He's a smart man but I don't know why he had to compare bitcoin (currency) to these types of assets. The better comparison would have been a mining farm and I'm sure he's heard of it. If he can have all the mining farms in the United States that solves 1, 2, or 10 blocks per month, would that change his view? He probably would.

[Bitstar_coin]

Now I understand what Buffett problem is regarding btc, he compares btc to apartment and farmland that produce returns base on physical usage but fails to understand that btc also produce such returns but in digital form. Btc help support in the current ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine, he can not ignore that part, and several other benefits for using btc, obviously he doesn't understand btc that's why he makes this type of statement.

[Smartprofit]

Bitcoin is a value transfer protocol in the virtual space.  It is difficult for Warren Buffett to grasp this fact. 

He is 91 years old.  This is a man of the 20th century.  Now is the 21st century.  In the 20th century, there was no virtual space and total digitalization of society.  In the 20th century, there was no need for Bitcoin, but now there is.  In the 20th century, the US dollar was the world's global reserve currency.  Now the world is geopolitically fragmented. 

The world needs a single global reserve digital currency.  This is Bitcoin.

[Lucius]

I no longer pay attention to what the WB or some of its associates say about Bitcoin because they have long presented their opinion, which has not changed to this day. What has changed from 2014 to today, why do some journalists persistently provoke WB with questions about Bitcoin? 8 years later we still have the same story, the same man and the same reactions, it’s one incredibly irritating déjà vu...

“Stay away from it. It’s a mirage, basically,”

WB does what it knows best, and while markets are in the red he buys in the tens of billions - because he knows that the best time to invest is when there is blood on the streets (I am referring to a statement by Baron Rothschild).

Buffett told shareholders Saturday that right after he wrote to them in his annual letter on Feb. 26 that he was having trouble finding anything to buy at attractive prices, Berkshire spent more than $40 billion on stocks over the next three weeks, including one day in early March when he spent $4.6 billion at the peak

[crwth]

Thanks for sharing this. So he doesn't want to get into the modern era or space that will power the future. Everything invented now would be helpful and be great with our technology. He is probably too old school to understand it and has a closed mind with adapting. He should grasp that BTC has a finite amount, so it's beneficial.

Maybe he should do something about it, though? Like, just try trading it or something like how he does it? Or is it a long-term plan to sway the market and buy more or something?

I wonder if he is not born an American, would he say the same thing?

I don't think race is relevant to what he would say or do. It's him that is like that and no other reason for it. So I don't know why race is related to it, though.