BlackRock CEO Larry Fink says he's likely in the same camp as Jamie Dimon in seeing bitcoin as worthless, though there are opportunities in blockchain
- BlackRock CEO Larry Fink said Wednesday he's likely in line with Jamie Dimon's view that bitcoin is worthless.
- Fink was interviewed on CNBC a day after JPMorgan's chief said he still wasn't on board with bitcoin.
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink said Wednesday he's likely aligned with JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon's view that bitcoin has no value, but the head of the world's largest asset manager does see value in the idea of a digitized currency and blockchain.
"I'm probably more on the Jamie Dimon camp," Fink said in a CNBC interview, answering a question referring to Dimon's comment Monday that he believes bitcoin is "worthless," and that he still isn't buying into the hype surrounding the world's most-traded cryptocurrency.
"I'm not a student of bitcoin and where it's going to go so I can't tell you whether it's going to $80,000 or zero. But I do believe there is a huge role for a digitized currency and I believe that's going to help consumers worldwide," said Fink. Bitcoin during Wednesday's choppy session was up 0.3% to trade around $56,360 and recently recaptured the valuation mark of more than $1 trillion.
Despite Dimon's bitcoin skepticism, his bank conducts business with clients that want access to the world's most-traded cryptocurrency.
"We're studying blockchain and the whole concept of crypto and we believe that will play a very large role," said Fink in responding to a question about whether he has shifted in his view in offering crypto products and access to BlackRock's investors.
"I see huge opportunities in a digitized crypto-blockchain-related currency and that's where I think it's going and that's going to create some big winners and some big losers," he said.
A filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission dated July 31 showed the BlackRock Global Allocation Fund made $369,137 from bitcoin futures.
BlackRock's chief investment officer of global fixed income Rick Reider in February told CNBC the firm had "started to dabble" in cryptocurrencies.