Charlie Lee is again making headlines with his quick commentary on the current state of the crypto market. This time he went to a mainstream publication like CNBC on the program Fast Money. He was there to discuss the implication of the recent hacking that took place in South Korea. It is to be noted that the hacking was very daring as it targeted Bithumb, world’s sixth largest crypto exchange.
South Korean government has already launched a very high-level investigation into the hack. The investigation is trying to establish a regulatory watch over all the other crypto exchanges especially the ones which have weak security architecture.
Back to Lee. He pointed out that while it is completely normal for the crypto investors to get panic after the hack, this doesn’t tantamount to a fundamental shift. He said that the basics of the crypto assets are still very same and thus this is not a very big problem in the large scheme of things.
Charlie Lee is the founder of the Litecoin, which is the fifth largest cryptocurrency in circulation. He further quipped, “Whenever there’s an exchange hack, people get scared and the price drops. It happens all the time. The thing is it doesn’t really change the fundamentals of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies”.
Lee made a comparison with the gold heist at a bank. He said that theoretically, it does not affect the prices of the gold or other valuable metals. Just because a bank was targeted. On the contrary, we can surmise that the prices of the stolen good might go up. Thus, the hacking of the crypto exchanges will not have any impact on the basics of the crypto assets.
Lee agreed that there is a very potent need to address the security vulnerabilities of the cryptocurrencies in order to fight back these hacks. But he defended the crypto exchanges given the fact that the crypto tech is still very recent and they are on a learning curve. The improvements are being made on a daily basis but there still remain major areas of improvement.
He also said that the sole responsibility of the hack should not be imposed only on crypto exchanges. To an extent, the investors must also be held accountable. As they are the ones who are making these choices in order to choose who to entrust with their coins.