Co-founder of Ethereum, Vitalink Buterin, criticized precious metals, particularly gold, calling them difficult and inconvenient to use.
The statements come after discussing decentralized alternatives to currency when the topic of gold being a better store of value (and a more decentralized one, at that) than crypto.
Particularly, Buterin was responding to comments by Zach Weinersmith. The cartoonist said that the only sensible argument he has heard in favor of crypto is that it lacks a centralized authority. By that definition, he said, gold would be a suitable option, as it’s decentralized as well.
Gold Doesn’t Offer Safe Storage Options, Says Ethereum Co-Founder
Buterin explains that gold is difficult to use, especially when conducting transactions with untrusted parties. Moreover, he mentions that gold doesn’t allow safe storage options.
In contrast, multi-signature digital wallets operate require more than one private key to authorize a transaction. This makes cryptocurrency much safer to store.
Then, he claims that gold has far less adoption than cryptocurrency, making it a better option for investors. Of course, this shouldn’t come as a new perspective from the Ethereum co-founder, who has been supporting the development of digital currencies since 2014.
In one blog post, he elaborated that Bitcoin could act as the gold equivalent of the crypto world. That would make it a universal fallback asset, serving in a similar capacity as gold.
Uniswap Founder Hayden Adam Joins Gold-Decentralized Alternative Discussion
To make matters interesting, Hayden Adam, the founder of the Uniswap project, joined the discussion. He proposed that in the future, precious metals that may be mined from an asteroid could cause the value of the earth’s precious metals to fall.
While the discussion may look like the average heated argument surrounding crypto, their timing couldn’t be any more crucial.
Amid the current crypto winter, questions about the advantages of relying on crypto versus gold as a store of value are highly relevant.
Gold Shows Less Volatility than Crypto
According to a recent securities report by the Bank of America, Bitcoin prices are showing a higher correlation with that of gold. This shows that investment parties are relying on it as a way to safeguard their portfolio against uncertainty.
Historically, both private and institutional investors have relied on gold as a way to save their portfolios in a time of economic crisis.
Recently, gold has shown less volatility than Bitcoin. This year, the per-ounce value of gold shifted between a high of $2,043 and a low of $1,626, while the average is around $1,811.
On the other hand, data from CoinGecko shows that Bitcoin fell from $67,617 to $19,268 over the span of a few months.
