Mayor Diamond Hands strikes again. As Bitcoin endured a price plunge from last month’s high (and plummeting at this writing), Miami’s Francis Suarez confirmed that he’ll take part of his 401k in Bitcoin. On Friday, managing editor Samuel Burke of Real Vision — an alt finance channel that only invites “ the smartest investors and brightest minds” — asked Suarez why this is a good idea.
“I just think it is a good asset to be invested in,” Suarez said. “I think it’s one that’s obviously going to appreciate over time. It’s one that I believe in.”
He went on to cite the precise reason that this is a bad idea, saying, “partly why Bitcoin has succeeded so well is because people have confidence in it.” The same could be said of stock market bubbles and Ponzi schemes.
That’s about as much as Suarez explained about the investment, adding that people “see an open-source unmanipulatable system.”
Suarez is so confident that he’s staking Miami’s economy on it. Over the past year, he’s courted cryptocurrency conferences and businesses and put the name of the crypto-exchange FTX on a stadium. He launched MiamiCoin (now down 76% from its August peak) in partnership with the nonprofit CityCoin, which pays out 30% of the value of investor rewards to the city. That scheme, he bets, would eventually allow Miami to eliminate taxes and distribute “Bitcoin dividends” to residents. He’s taking his paychecks in Bitcoin. It would make more…
