Balaji Forfeits and Settles $1 Million Bitcoin Bet – But Stands By Hyperinflation Thesis
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Former Coinbase CTO Balaji Srinivasan has withdrawn from his notorious $1 million Bitcoin bet, in which he gambled $1 million in USDC on the price of Bitcoin reaching $1 million.
However, the investor stands by his thesis that the US dollar is on the road to hyperinflation, stressing that the economy will not experience the “soft landing” promised by Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell.
Burning a Million Dollars
In a tweet on Tuesday, Balaji announced that he had mutually agreed to settle his uber-bullish Bitcoin price bet upfront. He provided on-chain evidence of three $500,000 payments, including one to Medlock (the counterparty of the bet), another to charity organization Give Directly, and another to Bitcoin Core development.
That’s 50% more than the former exec had to commit – and comes 46 days ahead of schedule. Speaking at Consensus 2023 last week, he had assigned a roughly 10% probability to his prediction of financial calamity actually coming true within that time.
“The reason I did this was because I do believe in the public good, but unfortunately we can’t rely on the public sector anymore to tell us when something’s wrong,” wrote Balaji. “So I spent my own money to send a provably costly signal that there’s something wrong with the economy.”
In an attached video, the investor explained that financial turmoil can happen fast – and without warning from regulators or the government. For example, Ben Bernanke said the economy might be in for a “mild recession” in April 2008, only five months before the great financial crisis officially began.
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