If there is a train strike this weekend and what unions have said about further actionThe £6bn collapse of Bankman-Fried’s crypto platform FTX has sparked a reappraisal of the blockchain currency industry – with detractors comparing it to gambling and its supporters arguing it can still transform global financial systems
But secondly, the extent to which “crypto” – dreamt up some 15 years ago with the aspiration of a digitally based, decentralised means of holding and transferring value outside the existing system of banks and regulatory authorities – has drifted from its idealistic origins to become mired, as some see it, in the altogether more earthly travails of power, crime, greed and speculation.
Yet, hardly a month has passed since the spectacular demise of FTX – which had built itself a sprawling headquarters in theas part of a modus operandi which US prosecutors say involved funnelling investors’ cash into activities including property speculation and political donations – without the demise of another exotic crypto exchange or would-be blockchain titan.
It is, according to one investor who was wiped out by the failure of FTX, a recipe for the multitudes to walk away from crypto’s “tainted” promised land. A study by US-based Pew Research earlier this year found that 75 per cent of people now have little or no confidence in the reliability or safety of crypto currencies.
Despite such a blasted heath of reputational damage, proponents of the blockchain and crypto asset system insist that it remains on an upward trajectory towards wider acceptance as regulators, particularly in America and the UK, seek appropriate safeguards and licensing methods.