Charlie Munger says the U.S. should follow in China’s footsteps and ban cryptocurrencies

Berkshire Hathaway Vice Chairman Charlie Munger urged the U.S. government to ban cryptocurrencies, as China has done, arguing that a lack of regulation enabled wretched excess and a gambling mentality.

“A cryptocurrency is not a currency, not a commodity, and not a security,” the 99-year-old Munger said in an op-ed published in The Wall Street Journal Thursday.

“Instead, it’s a gambling contract with a nearly 100% edge for the house, entered into in a country where gambling contracts are traditionally regulated only by states that compete in laxity,” Munger said. “Obviously the U.S. should now enact a new federal law that prevents this from happening.”

Munger and his business partner Warren Buffett are longtime cryptocurrency skeptics, contending they are not tangible or productive assets. Munger’s latest comments came as the crypto industry was plagued with problems from failed projects to a liquidity crunch, exacerbated by the fall of FTX, once one of the world’s largest exchanges.

The cryptocurrency market lost more than $2 trillion in value last year. The price of bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency, plunged 65% in 2022 and it has rebounded about 40% to trade around $23,824, according to Coin Metrics.