One powerful voice at the Federal Reserve remains entirely unmoved by crypto’s progress: Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari.
In his latest comments, Kashkari reiterated his long-standing view that cryptocurrency is “basically useless” for consumers.
Unshakeable bearishness
For years, Kashraki has argued that the crypto industry has failed to demonstrate a legitimate use case in an advanced economy.
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In 2018, he called the cryptocurrency market a “farce” and criticized the lack of barriers to entry. In 2020, he told the audience that the crypto market was a “giant garbage dumpster.” He praised the SEC for finally cracking down on the industry, arguing that investors were being “fleeced for tens of billions of dollars.
Kashkari’s most famous critique came in August 2021. Back then, he famously dismissed the entire sector as “95% fraud, hype, noise and confusion” while speaking at the Pacific Northwest Economic Regional annual summit.
When the market eventually crashed in 2022, he doubled down. In May 2022, he told Reuters that the downturn was a positive development, arguing, “Maybe it’s better crypto is imploding now than 5 years from now when more people’s money would have been at risk.”
In October 2024, he made waves by stating: “Very few transactions are actually happening on crypto… unless people are buying drugs or other illegal activities.”