Transcript of the interview with John McAfee, founder of McAfee Inc., on August 19th, 2017 on Russia Today
RT: BitCoin broke another record. Thursday the crypto currency topped $4,500 in trading. It has doubled in price in the last month alone. That's huge! And since the concept of crypto currency is still so new, many people see growth like this and want to compare it to a fiat currency, wondering when the bubble might burst. Cyber security expert john McAfee says: »This type of thinking is a mistake«. He joins me now. John, why do you think the word 'bubble' cannot be applied to BitCoin?
McAfee: Well, first and foremost, BitCoin is not a fiat currency. It costs over $1,000 to create a BitCoin today in electricity and computing costs. Second the value of BitCoin is linked to the number of users and the number of transactions. It is not a speculative investment, even though it is being used as such by many people. As the BitCoin network grows, the value of BitCoin grows. As people move into BitCoin for payments and receipts, they stop using US-Dollars, Euros, Chinese yuan, which in the long term devalues these currencies, so what you're seeing is more of a currency devaluation than a bubble in BitCoin. As more people use it, it has more intrinsic value. And again: The cost of producing a BitCoin increases with the value of the BitCoin. So, this is nothing that we are pulling out of thin air, this is something that is created with massive amounts of electricity and computing power.
RT: Someone who disagrees with you on the term of 'bubble' when it comes to BitCoin is Mark Cuban[1]. Back in June he tweeted:
I think it's in a bubble. I just don't know when or how much it corrects. When everyone is bragging about how easy they are making $=bubble
Now, when he tweeted that, BitCoin dipped in price. How can one person's random twitter thread have that effect on the price, and what does that say about BitCoin's stability?
McAfee: It says nothing about BitCoin's stability. After it dropped $500, it's now worth $4,400, so this fluctuations are meaningless. They are created by speculators, people who do not understand the fundamental technology of the Blockchain. Those who do, understand that in the long term those fluctuations will make no difference. The more people who use BitCoin, the more valuable it will become. This is the only metric we can use.
RT: Now, BitCoin and Blockchain go hand in hand, but Blockchain's ability to track financial transactions in a way that is incorruptible gives it infinite amount of uses outside of the original purpose of using it for BitCoin. Do you see Blockchains overtaking certain aspects of the financial system as we know it now?
McAfee: It will take over all aspects. People think that BitCoin or the Blockchain is owned by someone, by a company or by a consortium. No. This is strictly a mathematical formula that nobody owns, that we are all participating in. And we use the Blockchain for everything from fixing supply chain problems in corporations to verifying the autenthicity of the sender and receiver in a financial transaction. It is the most powerful technology that the world has seen, I believe, since the invention of agriculture.
RT: Now, John, we showed our viewers BitCoin's rise just in the past month, and we can show it to them again if it's still up there. But on July 17th, one month ago, you tweeted that
BitCoin's low of $1,800 yesterday simply could not be maintained. In the long term BitCoin moves above $500,000 within three years. Bets?
So I ask you, John: Do you stand by your statement?
McAfee: Keep in mind: As BitCoin grows, and grows in value, other currencies, national currencies are going to decline. The advantage of using BitCoin are huge. If I do a wire transfer, it'll take me 24 hours. If I do a BitCoin transfer, it takes me 30 seconds. It is instantaneous. I know people who do not use any other currency now, other than BitCoin. They buy their houses, their cars, everything, using BitCoin by connecting to other users who sell the things that they need. As more and more people use this, what will happen to national currencies? They will obviously devalue. They have to. So, that $500,000 includes a massive devaluation in the US-Dollar, which absolutely has to come, if BitCoin continues to grow at its current rate.
RT: Well, it's certainly a community effort and the BitCoin community, and for other crypto currencies, it's only growing. John McAfee, founder of McAfee Inc., thank you so much for your thoughts today.
The original interview:
Interview on RT published on August 19th 2017
[1] Mark Cuban is an American businessman, investor, author, actor, and philanthropist. He is the owner of the NBA's Dallas Mavericks,[4] co-owner of 2929 Entertainment and chairman of the AXS TV. Source: WikiPedia