Cathie Wood, the CEO of asset management firm Ark Invest, has declared that she will stick with her crypto investments, praising Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) as decentralized blockchains that have given her confidence in the space. Speaking with CNBC on Monday this week, Wood praised Bitcoin in particular for being the most decentralized and transparent blockchain in the crypto space. She also made comparisons with the disgraced FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried, and said there are obvious reasons why he preferred other blockchains over Bitcoin.
“Sam Bankman-Fried didn’t like bitcoin. Why didn’t he like it? Because it’s completely decentralized, transparent, he couldn’t control it,” Wood said in the interview. She added that the firms that went under during the crypto market downturn last year, including FTX, crypto lender Celsius, and hedge fund Three Arrows Capital (3AC) were all “completely opaque and centralized.”
The decentralized blockchains themselves, on the other hand, remained resilient, Wood explained: “The blockchains, whether you talk about Bitcoin or Ethereum and many others, they didn’t skip a beat. Transactions did not stop. And I think that has given us a lot of confidence that actually they are on the right track.”
Wood further elaborated on her thesis for the crypto space and how it is disrupting traditional finance and making an impact on broader society. According to the investor, there are “three revolutions” that are being fuelled by the rise of crypto.
“There’s the money revolution, which is mostly bitcoin, or bitcoin and ether. There is the financial services revolution, which is Ethereum. And there’s this notion of digital property rights… that’s Web3,” she said on CNBC’s Squawk on the Street.
Cryptocurrencies have been gaining traction in the financial world, and the crypto space is now bigger than ever. The decentralized nature of blockchains such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, and the fact that they are more secure and transparent than traditional financial systems, has been a major draw for investors.
The money revolution, as Wood calls it, is the most obvious one. Bitcoin has been the most popular cryptocurrency since its launch in 2009, and its market capitalization currently stands at over $1 trillion. Ethereum, on the other hand, is the second largest cryptocurrency and has a market capitalization of over $200 billion.
The financial services revolution, which is Ethereum, is another important part of the crypto space. Ethereum is a blockchain-based platform that enables developers to create decentralized applications (dApps). It also enables users to use smart contracts, which are digital agreements that are enforced by code.
The third revolution is Web3, which is a term used to describe the decentralized web. Web3 is a new way of using the internet, where users have full control over their data and can interact with each other without having to rely on third-party services.
The crypto space is growing rapidly, and Cathie Wood’s confidence in the space is a testament to the potential of the technology. Blockchain and cryptocurrencies have the potential to revolutionize the way we manage our finances, and Wood’s faith in the technology is encouraging. With her support, the crypto space is likely to continue to grow and evolve in the coming years.