Since first espousing it, I have not wavered in my view of the crypto marché. To wit, it is a fiction that ill inevitably be exposed. Now, while the crashing down of the crypto fiction will shock many, it should not come as a surprise at all. That’s because it merely continues a time-honoured tradition of how all momentary financial frenzies end. Of course, my use of inevitable exposes me to the ridicule of hiding behind an economist’s predictable indeterminacy. Ridicule, moreover, that I am so dogged by traditional financial thinking that I cannot see this brave new dawn. Dismissive too, because, as a old-out, I have missed out financially. Or further still, that it is my attempt to stand in the way of financial ‘democratisation’.

Let me be clear, far from objecting to the ‘masses’ being financially empowered, I simply want to warn those who treat investing as a game that losing has real costs. Last year’s GameStop ‘win’, and the ‘victories’ seen in Tesla, cryptos, NFTs and so on, are perilous, as these episodes only act to embolden those otherwise inexperienced in investing to ‘repeat the feat’, and to commit ever more of their money. The result of this escalation is that when boom turns to bust, the cost is very, very dear.