Kevin O’Leary, the billionaire investor and star of Shark Tank, has revealed that he is still investing in crypto despite the FTX debacle and the subsequent market crash.
Bitcoin is O’Leary’s Best Performing Asset This Year
In a comment to Business Insider, O’Leary stated that Bitcoin has been his best-performing asset so far this year, followed by other altcoins, including Matic (Polygon).
Bitcoin has risen more than 70% since the beginning of the year (YTD), outperforming major stock indices and commodities.
BTC is currently trading around $27,900 and has increased by more than 25% over the past month.
Matic, the native token of Polygon, the popular layer 2 solution for Ethereum, has also increased by over 40% since the beginning of the year. It is currently trading at $1.15, up about 2% in the last day.
FTX Collapse
The surge in crypto asset prices this year comes after BTC lost nearly 65% in 2022 following the highly publicized collapses of crypto projects and hedge funds, including FTX, which was once the third-largest exchange in the market.
O’Leary was one of many celebrities who aggressively promoted FTX online.
When O’Leary began promoting FTX, he stated that FTX’s compliance systems had convinced him to invest in the exchange.
He recently revealed that he had been paid around $15 million to promote the now-defunct exchange. However, after taxes, agent fees, a $1 million capital investment in FTX, and the use of $10 million to buy crypto now inaccessible on FTX, O’Leary has claimed he doesn’t have much of that money left.
FTX investors have filed a class-action lawsuit against Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder and former CEO of the exchange, as well as several celebrities who promoted the platform. The celebrities involved include Kevin O’Leary, the Golden State Warriors, Shaquille O’Neal, Udonis Haslem, David Ortiz, Naomi Osaka, and others.
O’Leary Transfers His Crypto Assets to Canada
O’Leary has also revealed that he has moved all his crypto assets to the regulated Canadian crypto exchange WonderFi.
His decision comes as WonderFi, Coinsquare, and CoinSmart recently announced their merger to create Canada’s largest regulated platform for trading crypto assets with over 1.65 million registered users.
According to O’Leary, the growing regulatory pressure on Binance and Coinbase is an indication that policymakers are cracking down on crypto companies following the FTX fiasco.
“In talking to senators after [the hearings], I realized how frustrated they were,” O’Leary told Insider.
“They told regulators ‘go get them,’ and all of a sudden, we have a mountain of enforcement measures.”
Regulators Cracking Down on Crypto Companies
Just last week, the SEC sent a “Wells notice” to Coinbase, threatening the exchange with legal action regarding certain of its listed digital assets, Coinbase Earn, Coinbase Prime, and Coinbase Wallet.
Subsequently, the CFTC announced that it was suing Binance and founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao on allegations that the exchange knowingly offered unregistered crypto derivatives in the US in violation of the law.
In an interview with Kitco News earlier this year, the billionaire stated that all non-regulated crypto companies and exchanges will eventually disappear and that a regulated market will eventually emerge.
He stated that crypto is not bad in itself, but rather all the “rogue players and unregulated exchanges” and useless tokens that are to be blamed for its bad reputation.
O’Leary is not alone in his views, as many in the industry have been calling for more regulation to weed out the bad actors and bring legitimacy to the space.
In conclusion, despite the FTX debacle and subsequent market crash, O’Leary is still investing in crypto and sees the growing regulatory pressure on the industry as a positive development.
He believes that a regulated market will eventually emerge, which will help to weed out the rogue players and make crypto a more legitimate asset class.
While some may view his involvement in the FTX scandal as a stain on his reputation, O’Leary’s continued investment in the space is a sign of his belief in the long-term potential of crypto.
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