Former chief strategist to US President Donald Trump and executive at conservative news site Breitbart News, Steve Bannon, has started to invest in initial coin offerings (ICO), and emerging blockchain projects, having already invested in Bitcoin.
In an interview with The New York Times, Bannon revealed that he has a “good stake” in Bitcoin, and that his investment company Bannon & Company has established a fund exclusive to ICOs and the cryptocurrency market that will focus on long-term investments in the rapidly growing blockchain sector.
Bannon explained that similar to how President Trump pursued an unorthodox method to break into the US politics scene and disrupt it, cryptocurrency will disrupt the traditional finance sector by removing power from the government, specifically its control over money.
“It’s disruptive populism. It takes control back from central authorities. It’s revolutionary,” Bannon said.
While the majority of investors in the cryptocurrency sector is focused on the peer-to-peer aspect of the technology, and the overwhelming majority of banks in the traditional finance sector are focused on the blockchain rather than cryptocurrencies, Bannon emphasized that he is most interested in the ability of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum to enable users to gain full control over their funds.
Through non-custodial wallets, users maintain their own private keys, which are used to send and receive transactions. Intermediaries and third party service providers do not interrupt or interfere in the process of settling payments, rendering trusted moderators useless.
“It was pretty obvious to me that unless you got somehow control over your currency, all these political movements were going to be beholden to who controlled the currency,” Bannon added, as he said that cryptocurrencies will allow citizens to regain power from the central bank that make citizens “slaves to debt.”
This month, the Federal Reserve Bank of the US increased its interest rates once again, inflating the value of the US dollar by printing trillions of dollars on a yearly basis. The government cites economic strength and momentum to justify interest rate hikes but in reality, as Bannon suggested, the absolute control the government has on its national currency and the circulation of the currency enable the authorities and the banks to manipulate the US dollar and ultimately, the global economy.
Bannon Understands Cryptocurrency and Blockchain
Experts and investors in the cryptocurrency market including Timothy Lewis, the co-founder of the Ikigai hedge fund that focuses on cryptocurrency projects, said that Bannon has done sufficient research and developed a strong knowledge base of cryptocurrency and the blockchain. Lewis met with Bannon earlier this year to discuss about the state of the cryptocurrency market and the potential of blockchain technology.
Lewis also stated that Bannon was interested in the regulatory framework surrounding digital assets and large-scale ICOs that have completed successful token sales over the past few months.
But, Colin Platt, a cryptocurrency researcher, was skeptical towards the entrance of Bannon into the cryptocurrency market, possibly due to figures like John McAfee who have recently become controversial in the cryptocurrency space.
“It almost seems like a natural progression for a man who gained prominence by shoveling out unfounded conspiracies to now shilling complex technology and financial instruments to an unsophisticated investing public,” said Platt.