Investor Kevin O’ Leary believes that Ethereum will always be No. 2 and bitcoin will always be the leading cryptocurrency. O’ Leary, the chairman of O’Shares ETFs, added that Bitcoin will always be gold while Ethereum will always be silver.
O’Leary views Bitcoin as digital gold and a hedge against inflation and that it will continue to appreciate over time. In March, O’Leary announced that he would be allocating 3 percent of his portfolio to Bitcoin. He decided on Canada, and other countries eased restrictions on institutions buying cryptocurrency.
O’Leary says Bitcoin is rising every week, and institutions are now trying to figure what it is.
“Now, Bitcoin hitting new highs almost every week is proving that there are interests being brought out of all kinds of institutions now trying to figure out: Is it a currency? Is it an asset? Is it a property?”
O’Leary believes that Ethereum will remain a form of tracking and payment system. However, many Ethereum supporters disagree with him; they argue that Ethereum is capable of more.
Ethereum is known for its smart contracts; the contracts help build and power applications like DeFi (decentralized fiancé) apps and NTFS (nonfungible tokens).
These capabilities make investors such as Mark Cuban excited about its future. Cuban believe that the intelligent contract makes Ethereum unique.
“What really changed everything was smart contracts. That’s what changed the game. That’s why Ethereum is a lot like the internet, because applications can be built on it.”
Cuban added that Ethereum is the crypto that is closer to an actual currency. O’Leary did not acknowledge that Ethereum can have an upside shift in Ethereum 2.0.
Ethereum 2.0 was launched in 2020and has since then been rolling out. Investors see Ethereum 2.0 as a faster ether and can allow thousands of transactions per second on the blockchain. They are also more secure.
O’Leary sees Ethereum 2.0 as more efficient in energy consumption since it does not consume a lot during creation. But still, with that, O’Leary does not think Ethereum will ever take Bitcoin.
“Bitcoin will always be the gold. Ethereum will always be the silver. There’s something about being first that really keeps you ahead in a horse race like this.”
However, experts still warn cryptocurrency investors of the risky and volatile market they are getting into. They still see it as susceptible to fraud and likely to be hurt by government regulations. Cryptocurrency investors are advised only to invest what they can afford to lose.