Where Dave Ramsey, Mark Cuban and Other Money Experts Stand on Crypto in 2024

Cryptocurrency is one of the most divisive asset classes in history. Some feel it’s the first wave in a revolution, in which fiat currency will fall by the wayside along with centralized banking as a whole. Others consider it a worthless speculation that will eventually ruin everyone who invests in it.

This is why it’s fascinating to see what popular money experts, many of the millionaires and billionaires themselves, have to say about cryptocurrency. Regardless of which side of the argument you fall on, if you choose to invest in crypto, be sure to understand the risks involved in owning such a volatile asset.

With that said, here’s where money experts like Dave Ramsey, Mark Cuban and others stand on crypto in 2024.

The bestselling author and founder of Ramsey Solutions is decidedly against the idea of investing in cryptocurrency. Ramsey and his team see crypto as a flat-out speculation, nothing more, and one that carries enough volatility that it could prove extremely damaging to your portfolio.

According to Ramsey, betting on crypto is just one step above gambling in a casino, for the following reasons: 

• Volatility
• Unproven rate of return
• Lots of unknowns
• Makes theft and fraud easier

Essentially, Ramsey advises against speculating on crypto because your money could be here today and gone tomorrow, and that’s not a way to build long-term wealth. As Ramsey puts it, “The road to building wealth is slow and steady, and there are still way too many unknowns when it comes to cryptocurrency. Could crypto become a more legit way to invest later on down the road? Maybe. But as things stand today, just say no. Get-rich-quick schemes are just that — schemes. Don’t risk it and pour all your hopes, dreams and money into them.”

Mark Cuban straddles the line a bit when it comes to his opinions on crypto. While he personally believes in crypto and owns some himself, he also calls it a “Hail Mary.”

In a January ask-and-answer session on X, Cuban said that his crypto portfolio includes Bitcoin, Ethereum, Polygon and Injective, and that his NBA team the Dallas Mavericks still accepts Dogecoin as payment. Cuban also mentioned that when it comes to crypto overall, he “hate[s] the speculation but love[s] when there is utility.

Essentially, Cuban believes in certain cryptos because he thinks they will have widespread, real-world utility in the future, but he’s turned off by the speculators just trying to make a quick buck, and he thinks many of them will lose their money.

As he told John Reed Stark, who founded the SEC’s Office of Internet Enforcement, during an exchange on X, “90% of blockchain companies will go broke. 99% of tokens will go broke. Just like 99% of early internet companies did. 99% of the startup companies leveraging [large language models] will disappear. But the winners will be game changers. That’s the way tech works.”

Warren Buffett, the billionaire CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, lovingly dubbed the “Oracle of Omaha,” has always had a sour taste in his mouth when it comes to cryptocurrency.

This is to be expected, of course, as one of Buffett’s main investment principles is that he’ll only buy things he understands. As far back as 2018, Buffett said, “In terms of cryptocurrencies, generally, I can say with almost certainty that they will come to a bad ending.”

He even went on to call cryptocurrency “rat poison squared” in an interview with CNBC’s Becky Quick. In April 2023, Buffett told CNBC, “Something like Bitcoin, it is a gambling token, and it doesn’t have any intrinsic value. But that doesn’t stop people from wanting to play the roulette wheel.”

In other words, Buffett still sees crypto as a complete speculation, which eliminates it from his investment universe.

Suze Orman cautions investors that bitcoin is “seriously risky,” and has stated that she would not invest in it with any money she could not afford to lose.

However, perhaps surprisingly, she also says that she loves bitcoin. Orman doesn’t necessarily believe in bitcoin as a currency, but she told Yahoo! Finance she views it as a possible replacement for gold as an investment in a portfolio.

Although she warns that investors need to understand the extreme volatility in bitcoin, she’s happy to own it. She recommends that investors start small, perhaps $100 per month or so, to build up a long-term position in bitcoin. As a fan of avid bitcoin supporter Cathie Wood, the CEO of Ark Investment Group, Orman believes there could be a future for the crypto.

Famed “Shark Tank” investor Kevin O’Leary calls himself a “purist” who intends to hold the “digital gold” of bitcoin for the long term. He doesn’t support the newly approved bitcoin ETFs as an appropriate investment vehicle, because he says they charge fees and it’s better just to own bitcoin outright.

But he applauds the movement the securities industry is making in the direction of supporting bitcoin as an asset. In an early January 2024 interview with CoinDesk, when bitcoin was trading in the mid-$40,000s, O’Leary said that he felt bitcoin could triple in price by 2030, reaching between $150,000 and $200,000.

It’s interesting to note that back in 2019, O’Leary, like many others, was a complete crypto skeptic, calling bitcoin “garbage” and a “useless currency,” saying “there is nothing here except raw speculation.”

However, he changed his tune as he saw regulation starting to creep into the market. Now, he sees big gains ahead for bitcoin in the coming years.