Dr. Doom’s Cryptocurrency Catastrophe: A Wilde Prediction?

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Ladies and gentlemen, I do so hope you are sitting comfortably. Nouriel Roubini, that most theatrical of economists, has decreed that the cryptocurrency market is doomed to a rather spectacular and theatrical apocalypse. Even the most ardent pro-crypto administration, he insists, has failed to rescue this glittering edifice of crime, corruption, and the occasional existential crisis.

The failing pro-crypto administration

A year ago, the narrative was that the new pro-crypto administration would usher in a golden age, or at least a sufficiently gilded one. Deregulation, they promised, would make Bitcoin soar to $200,000-assuming one could find a screen large enough to display such a number without inducing vertigo.

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Alas, reality has been less golden and more leaden. The market has cratered, despite the administration’s valiant efforts to prop it up like a Victorian society matron with a penchant for speculative investments. As of February 2026, Bitcoin has plummeted 35% from its October peak and now languishes at levels last seen in November 2024-though one suspects even November 2024 would prefer to forget it.

The implosion of “digital gold”

Gold, that old-fashioned store of value, has risen by over 60% amid geopolitical squabbles and trade disputes. Bitcoin, meanwhile, has slumped 6% in the same period. “Every time gold spikes, Bitcoin plummets,” Roubini writes, “because nothing says ‘hedge’ like a currency that collapses when the world burns.” Far from being a hedge, it is, he quips, “a way to leverage risk-preferably into the void.”

Roubini, ever the iconoclast, argues that calling crypto a currency is “bogus”-a word he uses generously, as if it were a brand of sparkling wine. He insists it fails as a unit of account, a means of payment, and a store of value. One wonders if he has ever attempted to pay for a cup of tea with a Bitcoin, but then again, perhaps he prefers his tea served with a side of existential dread.

The end of the experiment

Roubini concludes that the only “killer app” crypto has produced in 17 years is the stablecoin-a rather dull innovation, even by 21st-century standards. He warns that true decentralized finance will never scale because, as he puts it, “no serious government will allow the anonymity required for it to function. Why, it would be a boon for criminals!” A bold claim, though one cannot help but notice that criminals have always been rather adept at innovation.

The future of money, he argues, will be a “gradual evolution” led by improved traditional ledgers. A sentiment that, if taken to heart, might finally put an end to the modern obsession with inventing money that can be mined like a precious metal in a video game.

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2026-02-04 08:56