Why is Wall Street Even Interested in Bitcoin? A case of Greed or an Eye on the Future?

As the growth of Bitcoin has come along in nearly 11 years, the coin has managed to permeate a number of different sectors of global society. The technology is being picked up across the world, and the financial side of it, especially Bitcoin, is piquing institutional and mainstream interest. 

Part of this has come from the fact that the Bitcoin community has pushed the coin towards being more of a store of value and an investable asset. Because Bitcoin has become more akin to being invested in, so the community has grown the narrative and offered it out to more traditional investors — and even Wall Street. 

But, the question remains, what is it that has drawn Wall Street in this much so far? There are options and platforms being built to attract and entice the Wall Street investors in, but is it pure greed that is driving their interest, or is there more to it? 

Fomo or technology?

There is no getting away from the mainstream media coverage in 2017 on Bitcoin and the huge gains that many early investors were getting helped pique the interest in the coin. This massive price spike that made millionaires from nothing was big news for investors. 

However, some think that it is more based on the technology side and the potential of Bitcoin to be the future of money. This is why Kraken‘s Dan Held is of the opinion that Bitcoin’s success cannot be decided based on its potential of being a good payment system. He stated,

“The white paper uses the word cash and a lot of people choose to take the word cash and extrapolate that to ‘cash in your pocket’. Satoshi refers to Bitcoin as a precious metal five times and he also referred to it as sound money. So, one can use it any way they’d like it.”

That being said, the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic looks like it will have a large impact on the future of finance and investing. 

Held said with the onset of COVID-19, Bitcoin has made its ‘Kingcoin’ position more secure than ever. Commenting on the same, he stated,

“Bitcoin positioning in COVID-19 has been amazing. ETH ecosystem has been trying to position the coin alongside BTC because the only narrative they have left now is to be another sound money, like the top coin. If BTC starts to move, and ETH does not follow along with the price, then it is just going to be another dead altcoin.”