ECB President Believes Bitcoin is Speculative, Digital Euro in Next 5 Years

Christine Lagarde, the European Central Bank president in her recent talk at Reuters Next conference has deemed Bitcoin as a speculative asset that plays with investors’ psychology. Lagarde’s comments came during her talks about the role of sovereign digital currencies issued by national banks. She noted that a digital Euro is quite a possibility in the coming 5 years.

During her interaction with the media, someone asked about the evolving status of Bitcoin as a lucrative investment option, to which she responded,

I think she answered her own question as to why there will be people who would still prefer Bitcoin over central bank digital currencies. Is it mostly/purely speculative? Sure, one can say that it is. But it is an interesting experiment on human/investor psychology.

Bitcoin Would Need More Regulations

The ECB president believe despite so much hype around the digital asset regulation is the only way forward, she inside that clear regulation would lead to higher adoption. She noted,

“And there has to be regulations and this has to be applied and agreed upon,” at a global level, said Lagarde. “If there is an escape, that escape will be used. So I think […] global cooperation and multilateral action is absolutely needed, whether it is initiated by the G-7, moved into the G-20, and then enlarged […] And the FATF is clearly an organization that has expanded in that respect.”

Digital Euro Definitely On ECB’s List of Priorities

Lagarde during her speech also talked about the plans of digital Euro and the positive response they have got from the community.

No less than 8000 people have actually logged in and responded to the many questions that were on that questionnaire concerning a digital euro. So we are moving on. We are not charging on because it’s an area where we need to be very careful and where we need to have a system that is secure, that is safe, that responds to Europeans demand.”