Bitcoin’s Just Another Asset | Seeking Alpha

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Why Clem Chambers, CEO of Online Blockchain plc, is a huge optimist on blockchain, but not on the established players (0:20). Blockchain more interesting than Bitcoin (4:10). Not a fan of the ETFs (6:15). This is an excerpt from a recent episode.

Transcript

Rena Sherbill: Clem Chambers, it’s always great to talk to you on Seeking Alpha. Welcome back to Investing Experts. Great to have you.

Clem Chambers: Yeah, great to be on.

RS: So what would you say regarding the blockchain? What are some points of light for you? What are some companies or strategies that you feel like are doing well?

CC: I’m a huge optimist on blockchain, and I’m not a very big optimist on the established players in the market because I look around and I say, where’s all this stuff you promised? And that’s my big beef. Where is it?

Where’s all these wonderful multiplayer games you’re gonna write? Where where’s all these applications you were gonna do? Where’s all these, wonderful, oh yeah, you’re gonna tokenize assets, aren’t you? Where are they? I mean, how long do we have to wait for this stuff?

And I think that is the core problem of crypto is that it’s stunted. It’s been stunted by the lack of regulatory clarity. And that stunting has meant that there’s not really much new in since the last round.

And the round before there was a round I think it’s 2018, if memory serves me right, when all these new things were exploding before, basically, regulators woke up and went, woah. Hold on a minute. This is this is getting out of control here. And stamped on everybody. And they did that all around the world. And that has snuffed out innovation.

I think it will come back now that the Trump administration are basically untying Prometheus. And I think that’s good because regulation by enforcement, which is what the previous lot had. And you can understand why.

I mean, it’s absolutely obvious why, governments hate crypto. I mean, private sector money. Oh, dear. You know, they’ve got the monopoly of violence and cash, and it violates the monopoly of cash, doesn’t it? So they are gonna get a little bit on tip of your toes about that.

Actually making it impossible or nearly impossible for companies to move into blockchain and actually do innovation or do anything at all. I mean, if you have blockchain, banks will close your account. They will literally if you wanna open a bank account, there’ll be a little box saying, are you doing anything with crypto or blockchain? And if you tick it, you don’t get an account.

So in that environment, you are not gonna get much innovation. You are not gonna get much flourishing of of of that industry. But with a bit of luck, that’s all changing in the US now, and they will provide a a infrastructure for people to be in blockchain and in crypto and enable there to be innovation and progress and a flowering of the capabilities of blockchain, which are vast.

And, up until now, only people that are able to really take on all the risk you throw at them and really don’t care about any rules and regulations or just happen to be there before they got anybody’s attention. They’re the only people that that could possibly play. Who would wanna be sued by the SEC for five years? Who can afford to be sued?

So that change should lead over the next few years to to really great strides forward for crypto, if you wanna class it as that. Blockchain, if you wanna class it as that. Crypto and blockchain, if you wanna separate the two. So I think that’s really, really good for for blockchain and what becomes crypto.

But it won’t be about the next currency. It won’t be all about gambling. It won’t be all about, when moon, it will be about, oh, I can prove my identity. Oh, I can actually have people pay me to look at their adverts? Oh, I can actually do a transfer of my property on the blockchain in ten minutes rather than ten weeks, and all those sort of things.

And while there are huge barriers in the way, one of them won’t be the fear of having your bank account shut down or getting stopped at the airport or having the SEC land 50 lawyers on you.

RS: So how do you choose to be exposed to crypto or blockchain? And what are your thoughts about ETFs and how investors, let’s say your average retail investors, how they may choose or think about being exposed to that part of things?

CC: I got an epiphany before it became a capital crime. So in 2015, 2016, I went, holy cow. This is it. As I said, throughout those cycles, it did really well for me. Investing in various coins and stuff like that.

I’m an investor and a trader, but I think trading is more important when it comes to crypto. It has been in the past. It’s been very, very good to me. And for that, I’m very grateful. So that’s how I came to it.

Or as I might summarize it, I got into it when I was too smart to realize it. It’s probably not such a great idea. But, anyway, it had and has worked out for me. But, I mean, now my appetite is very, very dull, for various crypto ideas.

Although I collect NFTs because I’m stupid, I’m not the sort of person that thinks that Bitcoin’s (BTC-USD) gonna go to a million a coin without inflation running really high. The blockchain is now much more interesting to me.

And I’m not interested in what moon, I’m not interested in pump.fun. I’m not interested in any of that gambling stuff. I’m just not interested in that at all even though I probably could do okay on it. Because, ultimately, I think that that that is not where the big opportunity lies.

If you can make a product that maybe doesn’t even involve a a crypto token per se, or certainly not one where the price is gonna move or that’s gonna be part of the tradition of the way that people get excited about crypto, but actually has a really strong use case that involves a blockchain which is permissionless, etcetera, all that good stuff, then I think that is where the next leg up for blockchain is.

That’s where the next value add is. That’s where the next multibillion dollar businesses will come.

RS: So not a fan of the ETFs?

CC: Well, ETFs I mean, look. Bitcoin is just another asset. I mean, why not palladium? Why not platinum?

Why not gold? Why not silver? Why not corn? Why not an inverse Jim Cramer speculatory ETF, levered. What’s the difference? It’s just another asset.

I think that’s my feeling about Bitcoin at the moment. It’s just another asset. It’s not one with a crazy upside attached to it. It’s got no more or less upside to it than gold or Intel (INTC) or a bottle of wine from somewhere. Or maybe not the bottle of wine because you drink it, wouldn’t you?

But you see what I’m saying? It’s no longer a phenomena. It’s over. It’s connected to the infrastructure of the financial system, which after all was meant to be the antidote for it rather than to be seconded there.

And now that Wall Street has got its magic plugged into it, it will do what Wall Street does, which is normalize it, embrace it, extend it, and, consume it. The ETF was never gonna be a good thing. Never gonna be a good thing and isn’t a good thing.

And if anything, it will hold the price down. I mean, people are quite happy to say that gold has been suppressed by Wall Street for decades. They’re happy to say that. Happy to believe that. Why would it be any different for Bitcoin?