Billionaire investor Orlando Bravo says he's very bullish about bitcoin - and asks 'How could you not love crypto?'

• Private equity billionaire Orlando Bravo says he owns bitcoin and is very bullish.
• "Crypto is just a great system. It's frictionless. It's decentralized," he told CNBC.
• He said institutions are only just getting on board, meaning there's great potential.

Billionaire private equity investor Orlando Bravo has revealed that he owns bitcoin and is very bullish about its prospects, saying institutions are only just starting to get on board.

"How could you not love crypto?" Bravo asked in an interview at CNBC's Delivering Alpha conference.

Bravo founded private equity firm Thoma Bravo and has a net worth of $6.3 billion, according to Forbes. The magazine called him "Wall Street's hottest dealmaker."

His firm invested in Sam Bankman-Fried's crypto exchange FTX, and Bravo on Wednesday revealed that he personally owns bitcoin.

"Crypto is just a great system. It's frictionless. It's decentralized. And young people want their own financial system. So it is here to stay," he said.

"For me, it's pretty simple. More people are going to use it in the future than today, and it's going to be more established. Institutions are just beginning to go there, and once that happens, I think it will increase significantly over the years. I'm very bullish," Bravo said.

Read more: As bitcoin steadies after the shock of China's crypto ban, 5 experts break down what retail investors need to know

Cryptocurrencies have boomed over the last year, with bitcoin rising around 300% in price. Analysts have said huge amounts of stimulus from central banks and governments as well as a rise in retail trading have been key factors.

But some institutions are also buying into the crypto boom. For example, Elon Musk's car company Tesla bought $1.5 billion of bitcoin in January, while banks such as JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs have launched crypto products.

However, views vary as to how interested financial institutions actually are. SkyBridge Capital CEO Anthony Scaramucci said over the weekend that people who say there's big institutional adoption are not "being totally honest."

Bravo said he thinks "the underlying technology of blockchain, regardless of what protocol or what system you are building upon, can be very powerful and sometimes provides better use cases than data-based software."