Joseph Stiglitz: Bitcoin ought to be outlawed
![Joseph E. Stiglitz, Nobel Prize for Economics and Professor, School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA), Columbia University, attends the World Economic Forum on Latin America 2015 in Riviera Maya, Mexico, May 7, 2015. REUTERS/Victor Ruiz Garcia - RTX1C0BS](https://assets.weforum.org/article/image/large_4p2E-__qgbDIZqVFmHjJLSy3SxDsPd1ha2r5RM8KSTw.jpg)
The cryptocurrency 'doesn't serve any useful function,' says the Nobel-winning economist Image: REUTERS/Victor Ruiz
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The Digital Economy
Nobel-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz has condemned Bitcoin as “successful only because of its potential for circumvention [and] lack of oversight,” and has called for it to be banned.
In a Bloomberg Television interview, he said the cryptocurrency doesn’t serve “any socially useful function.”
He believes Bitcoin is a bubble, that will give “a lot of people a lot of exciting times as it rides up and then goes down.”
![](https://assets.weforum.org/editor/amQ-PJFB4LjCS9z-O2Fc6SWTc6HYyvzfsCUdaBzA0Dw.png)
Past the $10,000 mark
The value of one Bitcoin went past $10,000 for the first time this week – continuing the huge rises seen since the beginning of 2017.
At the start of the year, it was worth just $998.
![](https://assets.weforum.org/editor/C_eQiz4jjOG5n_E7A-nIned0eE6Q3od5D07zIPc-Z7k.png)
Bitcoin's rapid increase in value has led many analysts – including Stiglitz and fellow Nobel Prize laureate Robert Shiller – to suggest Bitcoin's rise is unsustainable and a price collapse is almost inevitable.
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