Moneywise
7 min read
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Kevin O’Leary has come a long way from the time he called Bitcoin “garbage.”
Now, the Shark Tank judge tells Moneywise, cryptocurrency-related assets make up 19.4% of his portfolio. Besides coins and tokens, he also owns stakes in “picks and shovels” — or platforms and exchanges that deal in crypto.
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The entrepreneur says he changed his mind about the asset as regulators around the world came on board. However, it hasn’t been enough to convince most institutional investors, like sovereign wealth and pension funds, to dip their toes in.
“I never thought I’d say this, but I want more regulation, and I want it now,” O’Leary said at the beginning of his keynote speech at the Consensus crypto conference in Toronto.
“After almost two decades of growth in the crypto industry, we have hit a wall. We have hit a wall on AUM [assets under management].”
On the other side of that wall lies a trillion-dollar prize, according to O’Leary — but it all hinges on Congress passing two key bills. And the first, the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation in U.S. Stablecoins Act (GENIUS), was just passed by the Senate.
Like many cryptocurrency supporters and investors, O’Leary believes the space is on the cusp of something big.
“I consider crypto to be the 12th sector of the economy within five years,” O’Leary said in an interview with CoinDesk.
The industry is abuzz with anticipation. Optimism about the future of crypto under the Trump administration has helped drive the price of Bitcoin past $104,000 — an enormous jump after it spent much of 2024 hovering below $70,000.
Coinbase, the largest American company in the space, has been one of the biggest winners. The SEC dropped a lawsuit against them in February, and the stock secured itself a position in the prestigious S&P 500 index.
Crypto now holds a place in many retirement portfolios. You can invest in Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs and the days of “regulation by enforcement” — a common complaint against the previous administration — appear to be over. In March, the FDIC cleared U.S. banks to engage in crypto-related activities provided they manage risk appropriately.
