The Great Potential of Bitcoin is Being Underestimated; Paypal Cofounder Says

Billionaire Peter Thiel, who is also the Co founder of Paypal said on Thursday that people are "underestimating" bitcoin and it has "great potential left"

He spoke at the Future Investment Initiative in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where he compared the cryptocurrency bitcoin to gold.

I'm skeptical of most of them (cryptocurrencies), I do think people are a little bit … underestimating bitcoin especially because ... it's like a reserve form of money, it's like gold, and it's just a store of value. You don't need to use it to make payments. If bitcoin ends up being the cyber equivalent of gold, it has a great potential left. Thiel said. 

The interest in bitcoin has so much risen this year after it has rallied over 600% this year as it recently hit a new all time high record above $6000. This same currency in 2009 was not even valued up to a cent and looking at the short range at which the value has increased over the years, investors are beginning to see it as more opportunity than even gold.

According to Thiel, bitcoin is based on the "security of the math" which means it can't be hacked and it's secure. During the program, the PayPal founder and venture capitalist also compared some of bitcoin's features to gold. He said;

Bitcoin is mineable like gold, it's hard to mine, it's actually harder to mine than gold. And so in that sense it's more constrained. The cryptocurrency has a limited supply and only 21 million bitcoin will be mined.

There has been so many debate by Major figures in the business world over the sustainability of cryptocurrencies including JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon who called bitcoin a "fraud" and said people who buy it are "stupid" while Saudi billionaire investor Prince Alwaleed bin Talal said that bitcoin will "implode" one day.

However, this has not stopped bitcoin from growing in value and some top players as well are still so much in support and totally believe in the value and benefit the currency has brought. Former hedge fund manager Michael Novogratz said bitcoin would head to $10,000 and according to CNBC, Forty-nine percent of the 23,118 people who voted in an unscientific survey last week about the direction of the bitcoin price, said it was heading above $10,000.

What are your thoughts?