Shark Tank’s Mark Cuban Says Ethereum ‘Is Closest Crypto We Have to a True Currency’

The billionaire investor and television personality, Mark Cuban recently did an interview on the recent episode of a podcast and discussed crypto assets at length. Cuban says his cryptocurrency portfolio is 60% bitcoin, 30% ethereum, and the rest is dedicated to smaller cap cryptos.

Mark Cuban Shares His Crypto Portfolio Allocations

Mark Cuban is a well known investor, one of the hosts on Shark Tank, and the owner of the National Basketball Association’s (NBA) Dallas Mavericks. For years now, Cubans and some of his fellow Shark Tank co-hosts have been discussing cryptocurrencies and whether or not they are a good investment.

During the first week of February, Cuban told stock traders that bitcoin holders were a great example to follow. In March, Cuban told gold bug Peter Schiff that bitcoin was better than gold. However, Cuban has been skeptical as well and has also criticized the crypto industry on a few occasions.

For instance, at the end of 2020, Cuban explained that bitcoin (BTC) was a store-of-value (SoV) but also carries some zealotry. “It’s a store of value like gold that is more religion than a solution to any problem,” Cuban stated.

This week the Shark Tank co-host told the world his allocations in terms of his cryptocurrency portfolio and discussed ethereum (ETH) quite a bit. “60% bitcoin, 30% Ethereum and 10% the rest,” Cuban highlighted when he explained his crypto portfolio on “The Delphi Podcast.”

Cuban looks at ethereum (ETH) as being a currency in contrast to bitcoin (BTC). “[In 2012] people said bitcoin is a currency, and I’m like, ‘It’s just not going to work.’ But, the entire time, I said it was a store of value where, if you could get people to believe that it was a better alternative than gold, because of its algorithmic scarcity, the price is going to go up,” Cuban emphasized during his interview.

Cuban stressed:

[Bitcoin is] a better alternative to gold, and it’s going to continue [to be]. That’s why I own bitcoin and why I never sold it.

Ethereum’s Smart Contracts, NFTs, and Defi Changed the Game

Ethereum on the other hand, in Cuban’s opinion, is the closest crypto asset to being a currency. Cuban says that Ethereum’s smart contracts, defi, and NFTs were a game-changer.

“What really changed everything was smart contracts,” Cuban insisted. “Smart contracts came along, and that created defi and NFTs. That’s what changed the game. That’s what got me excited. That’s why it’s a lot like the internet,” Cuban detailed. He believes that Ethereum is “adaptable over time” due to the amount of open development happening on the chain.

Cuban concluded:

That is more life-like, and so, I have a lot of Ethereum as well. I wish I had bought it sooner, but I started buying it four years ago, simply because I think it’s the closest we have to a true currency.

As far as the other 10% of coins, Cuban has yet to disclose those crypto assets but added that “there’s none that I’m just all in on, other than bitcoin and ethereum, that I look at as being an equivalent investment.” He also noted that he has bought a coin or two just to test the technology and to gain experience.

“There’s some [tokens] I [buy] for fun, some I do for [the] experience because I just want to learn,” Cuban said.

What do you think about Mark Cuban’s opinion about bitcoin and ethereum? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.