Buying Bitcoin in 2013 was like buying ‘gold in 1000 BC’ — Pantera CEO

As a seasoned crypto investor with a knack for history and a sense of humor, I find Dan Morehead’s analogy of Bitcoin to gold during the Iron Age particularly compelling. His success story with Pantera Capital, where they made over 130,000% from their initial investment in Bitcoin, is nothing short of remarkable.


Dan Morehead, who established and oversees Pantera Capital – America’s first cryptocurrency investment firm, compared investing in Bitcoin to purchasing gold during the Iron Age when expressing his views to a doubtful investor.

According to a blog post he published on November 26th, his investment fund has grown more than 130,000 times its original value.

“I was discussing bitcoin with an investor yesterday and he replied somewhat dismissively ‘It’s just like buying gold,’ No, it’s like buying gold in 1000 B.C,” said Morehead, quoting an investment memo he wrote in August 2013. 

Since its inception in July 2013, Morehead’s Pantera Bitcoin Fund has yielded more than a thousand-fold profit on its initial investment of Bitcoin at $74, as stated by the fund’s founder.

He went on to state that 1% of financial wealth hadn’t come across Bitcoin at the time, and when more did, Bitcoin would either go to zero or go up orders of magnitude.

But Morehead doesn’t think it’s even possible for Bitcoin to go to zero now. 

Approximately 300 million individuals worldwide now hold Bitcoin, indicating that its growth trajectory is accelerating significantly, as stated by Morehead in a conversation with CNBC’s Squawk Box on November 27th.

According to Morehead, approximately 5% of financial wealth currently involves Bitcoin, yet this figure could significantly increase once there’s greater regulatory certainty in the U.S., potentially accelerating the adoption of Bitcoin by institutions.

According to Morehead, the introduction of Bitcoin exchange-traded funds by firms such as BlackRock and Fidelity has sparked an unprecedented shift in value, potentially transforming Bitcoin into an asset worth up to $15 trillion.

As a forward-thinking crypto investor, I’m excited about the prospect that Bitcoin could potentially reach an astounding $740,000 by April 2028 – a staggering 667% increase from its current value. This optimistic prediction comes from the knowledgeable insights of Morehead.

“I just can’t help thinking that we still have many more years of very compelling returns.”

For Morehead, it’s not been a smooth ride since their initial Bitcoin purchase back in June 2013, as they remember the cryptocurrency plummeting by 87% in December of that same year.

At approximately the same period, Morehead mentioned that he had traveled extensively worldwide, attending approximately 170 meetings – ultimately forfeiting an estimated $1 million in investments.

It’s worth noting that Bitcoin was utilized to cover Pantera’s hotel bills through Expedia, an early business adopter of this digital currency.

From the 59 nights on the road, it spent 88 Bitcoin, worth over $8.6 million at current prices.

“We coulda bought two hotels [with that money]!”

Bitcoin is currently trading at $95,135, up 2.7% over the last 24 hours.

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2024-11-28 08:16