Nouriel Roubini doesn’t get tired of attacking the crypto industry. Almost no day passes without his tough comments on this topic. Today is no exception.
This time Roubini, known under the nickname Dr.Doom, which he received for his gloomy predictions, cited as an example the schedule attracted by ICO funds to prove that “ICO bubble has gone totally bust.”
ICO bubble has gone totally bust as funds raised in ICOs in September 2018 are 93% down from February peak & back to pre-bubble puny levels. Finally ICO scammers run out of VCs, retail suckers, BagHolders & other FOMO-frenzied clueless investors to dump on the new 1001th shitcoin pic.twitter.com/oj3k0mvoMZ
— Nouriel Roubini (@Nouriel) October 23, 2018
This is not the first time Roubini attacks the ICO. Earlier, an economist prepared a 37-page letter for the U.S. Congress with his opinion on cryptocurrencies. In the paper, he emotionally criticized the phenomenon of digital assets. In one section, Roubini argued that, instead of representing the future of crowdfunding, ICOs are in fact a return to the Stone Age.
Vitalik Buterin, who has so far received the most criticism from the economist, has already managed to enter into an active controversy with Dr.Doom. Back in June, Roubini criticized smart contracts on the Ethereum platform, saying that they are highly susceptible to various bugs. And this is just one of the attacks of the scientist.
"Smart Contracts" are neither smart nor contracts: they are extremely buggy -100 bugs per 1000 lines of code - & they are not contracts as no court can enforce them. The only courts in crypto land are the crypto developers' kangaroo courts who randomly decide when to fork or not https://t.co/ZS48y5ZQMu
— Nouriel Roubini (@Nouriel) June 1, 2018
Buterin did not remain in debt and sarcastically spoke about what actually Roubini is famous for. During the correspondence on Twitter, the founder of Ethereum questioned the quality of the predictions of the professor. One time, on the eve of the collapse in prices for U.S. real estate in 2008, the economist predicted this development. However, Buterin devalued this achievement by stating that he can also say that in the coming years, until 2021, another crisis will occur. And this will happen with a 25% probability. Then Buterin will take the title of the best economic forecaster in the world from Roubini.
I officially predict a financial crisis some time between now and 2021.
— Vitalik Non-giver of Ether (@VitalikButerin) October 10, 2018
Not because I have any special knowledge or even actually think that, but so that I can have a ~25% (or whatever) chance of later being publicly acclaimed as "a guru who predicted the last financial crisis".
Nouriel Roubini also accused Vitalik and the head of ConsenSys startup Joe Lubin of stealing 75% of the ETH offer during the “pre-mining sale/scam”, which supposedly instantly made them billionaires. This statement also did not remain without a response. The creator of Ethereum, in response, said that he never possessed more than 0.9% of the cryptocurrency supply volume, and the number of its assets did not approach the $1 billion mark.
It is already rumored that the skirmishes of two people will soon be transferred from an online space to offline.
Happy to have a live debate with @VitalikButerin . We can agree on a fair moderator that we both agree on, not on biased shills pretending to be pseudo-journalists but who are PR folks for the crypto industry. I have no interest to interact with @laurashin https://t.co/J5EJcphaNV
— Nouriel Roubini (@Nouriel) October 13, 2018
The parties have already agreed in principle to participate in the debate, but are looking for a suitable moderator and a platform for a meeting. Probably all the crypto community is waiting for this fight. The event promises to be fascinating, but on whose side is the truth? Here the opinion of experts is also shared.
Many experts note that Roubini does not give anything fundamentally new from the arguments about the insolvency of cryptocurrency. Crypto skeptics like to operate on the same arguments, regularly “burying” digital money. However, some former crypto skeptics have already changed their minds. So, in particular, it happened to the Nobel laureate in economics Paul Krugman, who after several years of critical attacks on cryptocurrencies, found the courage to admit that such negativity was in fact connected to the fact that he did not understand what he was talking about. Meanwhile, there were those who criticized Buterin, for example, the head of Stealth Bitcoin, Paul Everton, said that signs of the illegal issue of securities could potentially be found in Ethereum's work.
However, experts note that Buterin and Roubini initially spoke different languages and look at the situation from different perspectives. Roubini is an economist who is interested in the situation of the cryptocurrency market. The scholar notices bubbles and overheated interest in assets. And sharply expresses concern about this state of affairs.
But Buterin is a programmer who sees before himself a certain pool of tasks. He is developing a technology that will potentially change not only the sphere of finance but also radically change the way that individuals and whole institutions interact. Although, so far this technology has its imperfect moments.
In any case, we are really looking forward to the debate, regardless of who wins, it will be hot. Who are you rooting for?
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