Peter Schiff once called Bitcoin a ‘pure ponzi’ now wishes he bought some

Gold proponent Peter Schiff, a known Bitcoin critic, now says he wished he had bought Bitcoin (BTC) in 2010 when a work colleague first introduced the cryptocurrency to him.

Speaking in a March 13 interview on Impact Theory with Real Vision co-founder and CEO Raoul Pal, Schiff hinted he missed the early boat on Bitcoin.

“Do I wish I had made the decision to have thrown $10,000, $50,000, $100,000 into it? Sure,” said Schiff, adding:

“I may be worth hundreds of millions assuming I didn’t sell but again I don’t know what I would have done had I made that decision.”

The interview involved a debate from Pal and Schiff over whether Bitcoin is on a trajectory toward $0 or $1 million.

Just in case you didn’t see me politely hang, draw and quarter Peter Schiff, enjoy https://t.co/vr1efNJw3p

— Raoul Pal (@RaoulGMI) March 14, 2024

Just months earlier in a Nov. 29 interview with Yahoo Finance, Schiff referred to Bitcoin as a “pure ponzi’ that has no underlying value:

“Bitcoin is a pure ponzi, it’s a pyramid, the demand for Bitcoin is based on the belief that you can sell it to somebody else at a higher price.”

However, in his latest interview, he reveals he seriously considered buying Bitcoin in 2010 when it was around $1. However, he ultimately decided against it, concluding the potential investment was “ridiculous.”

Still, it doesn’t mean Schiff likes Bitcoin

Schiff claims if he did buy Bitcoin he would have “kept quiet” he has never, and still doesn’t believe in its fundamentals.

“I would have bought it just betting on other people being dumb enough to buy it and pay a higher price.”

Schiff added that a successful Bitcoin investment would have made him feel more like a “genius” than a “gambler” and therefore, he would’ve fallen under the same “delusion” as Bitcoin investors, which he later described as “greedy” and “foolish.”

Related: Bitcoin has 6 months until ETF ‘liquidity crisis’ — New analysis

Schiff has long tried to steer his audience away from investing in Bitcoin, routinely referring to it as a “fools” investment. However, every once in a while, he acknowledges Bitcoin hasn’t collapsed like how he has anticipated.

Perhaps to Schiff’s dismay, Bitcoin has long been viewed as a “digital gold,” and some analysts say Bitcoin has started eating into gold’s $14.6 trillion market cap since spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) were launched in the United States in January.

Schiff has acknowledged that gold may be losing some of its market share to the spot Bitcoin ETFs. However, he believes investors may have trouble cashing out the funds when Bitcoin experiences a major fall.

Gold was priced at $1130 (per oz) at the start of 2010 and has increased 91.8% to $2,168 since then. However, it has been largely outperformed by many index funds, such as State Street’s Standard & Poors 500 ETF (SPY) which has increased 350% over that timeframe.

Bitcoin is currently the eighth largest asset by value at $1.4 trillion, which is only trailing gold, several U.S. tech stocks and Saudi Aramco, according to Companies Market Cap.