MicroStrategy’s Executive Chairman Michael Saylor spoke with CNBC on Thursday about the future of regulation and corporate adoption for Bitcoin (BTC), shortly after his company announced a $5.3 million BTC purchase last month.
While the billionaire maintained that “you can never have too much Bitcoin,” he also claimed that “big banks” will be necessary for the asset to reach full maturity.
During his interview, Saylor acknowledged some of the recent failings of crypto and the industry’s largest firms.
Sam Bankman-Fried, for instance, is nearing the end of his trial for allegedly stealing billions of dollars from customers when spearheading FTX, while Binance is being targeted by authorities for supporting crypto accounts connected to Hamas terrorists.
“For the industry to migrate to the next level, we need to migrate to adult supervision,” Saylor said. “We’re gonna need big banks to become the crypto custodians – we’re gonna need Wall Street to take a role.”
The executive also stressed the need for the industry to “rationalize away” from the hundreds of thousands of altcoins on the market, and to focus in on Bitcoin. The billionaire has often backed the view of Gary Gensler, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), in labeling most cryptocurrencies beyond Bitcoin as unregistered securities.
“Bitcoin is an asset without an issuer,” he continued. “It is the one universally recognized protocol that’s a commodity in this space.”
So far, Bitcoin dominance has climbed to over 53% this year and continues to rise. Even stablecoins are losing their market share as the SEC cracks down against such offerings, including the PYUSD token launched by PayPal.
U.S. Congress is still working through appropriate legislation for crypto to make stablecoin and crypto banking services legally feasible, though partisan disagreements have made progress on such matters fairly slow.
Saylor predicted that Bitcoin will likely rally as its inflation rate contracts after the “halving” in April, and as a highly anticipated spot Bitcoin ETF brings in newfound institutional demand.
Until now, MicroStrategy stock (MSTR) has served as one legal alternative for institutions to gain spot exposure to BTC without an official ETF approved. The company has strived to accumulate as many coins as possible since 2020, now holding 158,400 BTC.
While a boon to investors, Saylor still believes MSTR stock will have a place in the market even after an ETF is greenlighted.
“We don’t charge a fee, we use intelligent leverage, and we can generate a tax-deferred Bitcoin premium for our investors,” said Saylor.