DBS, One of Asia's Largest Banks, Claims Bitcoin is a Ponzi Scheme

by Cathy Thompson

Several legacy or traditional financial institutions turn their noses up at Bitcoin with the feeling that the world's most known decentralized cryptocurrency is fraudulent and should be considered as a Ponzi scheme.

At the Singapore FinTech Festival, DBS's group chief information officer BS said to CNBC:

Bitcoin is a Ponzi scheme. The transactions are expensive, and fees are hidden throughout the crypto mechanism. He did go on to say that the supply and demand will cause Bitcoin to become cheaper in the future.

DBS or the Development Bank of Singapore was established by the Singaporean government. By assets, DBS is Asia's largest bank and the largest lender in the region. DBS has nearly 500 billion SGD (Singapore dollars) in assets. The bank does not believe that it needs to adopt bitcoin to gain new customers or investors. The attitude at DBS is "watch and learn".

Additionally, the CEO stated that DBS does not think being in the cryptocurrency market will create a competitive market for the bank nor will it lose customers.

This is not the first nor the last time a big-time banker has found bitcoin to be a financial scam.

JP Morgan Chase's chief executive officer, Jamie Dimon claimed bitcoin was a scam. Dimon added that he would fire any employee "stupid" enough to engage in bitcoin mining, trading, buying or selling. Dimon said, “It’s worse than tulip bulbs," and it won’t end well. Someone is going to get killed.”

Russia’s economic development minister claimed bitcoin’s price boom was like that of MMM. He, too, agreed that bitcoin was the most dangerous Ponzi scheme in modern Russian times.

No matter who challenges bitcoin, the market is used to the contempt and attacks. These smear attacks have made little difference in trading this year. Bitcoin prices have gained nearly 690% of its value in just one week. Prices did take a big hit with a major sell-off during one weekend this summer, but the recovery efforts find bitcoin moving closer to the $7,000 mark. At the time this article was published, bitcoin was trading to the dollar at $6820. This is according to Bitfinex.