Bitcoin Will Eventually Go to Zero, World Gold Council CEO Warns — Here’s Why
Former Bitcoin supporter and author Nassim Nicholas Taleb argued in a 2021 paper that Bitcoin's expected value was "no higher than $0," reasoning that an asset requiring continued network maintenance could eventually hit an absorbing barrier if users abandoned it.
Economist Steve Keen revived the zero scenario in April 2026, arguing that Bitcoin's energy requirements could become particularly vulnerable if governments imposed restrictions during a severe global energy crisis.
Longtime Bitcoin critic Peter Schiff went almost as far in June, predicting losses exceeding 99%. But when Bitcoin advocate Anthony Pompliano challenged him to bet that Bitcoin would disappear within a decade, Schiff conceded: "It's not going to go to zero. Maybe." Pompliano subsequently highlighted that admission as a retreat from the strongest version of the bearish thesis.
Bitcoin Is Harder to Write Off Than Before
Bitcoin proponents increasingly respond to zero forecasts with measurable adoption rather than price predictions.
Fidelity Digital Assets noted in March that Bitcoin had been the best-performing asset in 11 of the previous 15 years and argued that institutional investors should now justify why they hold Bitcoin rather than why they own it.
Fidelity points specifically to Bitcoin's enforceable 21 million-coin supply cap as central to its monetary thesis.
Wall Street's reversal is another challenge to the collapse thesis.
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink once described Bitcoin as an "index of money laundering." By 2024, he had changed his position and described himself as bullish on Bitcoin's long-term viability. By late 2025, BlackRock's IBIT Bitcoin fund had surpassed $100 billion in assets before Bitcoin's subsequent market downturn.
Academic research has also challenged the literal zero argument. A Bitcoin production-cost model found that mining costs historically provided an economically observable valuation anchor, contradicting the idea that Bitcoin necessarily converges toward nothing.
None of that guarantees Bitcoin will recover to its old highs. The asset has already demonstrated that it can lose more than half its value despite institutional adoption.
But Tait's prediction goes considerably further than forecasting another crash. For Bitcoin to reach literal zero, demand would effectively have to disappear altogether.
After 17 years, multiple 70%-plus crashes, hundreds of obituaries and now institutional infrastructure from firms including BlackRock and Fidelity, that remains a far higher bar than simply arguing Bitcoin is overvalued.
This article has been published in ccn.com via Yahoo News.
Bitcoin Will Eventually Go to Zero, World Gold Council CEO Warns — Here’s Why
World Gold Council CEO David Tait believes Bitcoin will eventually reach zero because it behaves more like a risk asset than a crisis hedge. Tait ...
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