European Central Bank president Christine Lagarde thinks cryptocurrency is “worth nothing.” But her son has a different view.
“I have a son who invested in cryptos,” Lagarde said in a recently aired interview with Dutch talk show College Tour. For that reason, among others, “I follow [the market] very carefully,” she said.
As the top central banker for the EU, Lagarde has long warned against investing in cryptocurrency. She sees the asset class as “highly speculative” and “very risky,” as she emphasized again on the show. Her son, however, hasn’t listened to her advice.
“He’s a free man,” she said. “If you want to invest there, it’s your choice.”
When asked whether her son lost any money during the latest crypto downturn, Lagarde said he wouldn’t tell her.
Lagarde also reiterated that she doesn’t own any cryptocurrency herself. “I want to practice what I preach,” she added. But “I know how it works…I would not put my finger in there.
“My very humble assessment is that it is…based on nothing. There is no underlying assets to act as an anchor of safety,” Lagarde said, making it “vastly different” from a potential central bank digital currency (CBDC) backed by the euro, for example.
“Those who invest should know [the risk]. It cannot be this crypto hype where because a friend of a friend has made x, you think that it’s going to work and it’s going to continue to increase,” she said.
Her biggest concern is for “people who assume that it’s going to be a reward, who have no understanding of the risks, who will lose it all, and who will be terribly disappointed,” Lagarde said, “which is why I believe that it should be regulated.”
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