Financial market commentator Peter Schiff on Tuesday criticized Michael Saylor’s comparison of MicroStrategy Inc.‘s (NASDAQ:MSTR) debt-financed Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) buying strategy to Manhattan real estate.
What Happened: In an X post, Schiff disagreed with Saylor’s analogy. “Real estate generates rents, which can be used to service and repay debt. Bitcoin doesn’t generate any income to make interest or principal payments,” he argued.
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Spencer Hakimian, founder of hedge fund Tolou Capital Management, countered Schiff’s viewpoint, stating that, unlike the Manhattan real estate industry, Bitcoin doesn’t have any expenses or maintenance.
Schiff responded that rents from real estate exceed the expenses.
The city’s rental market contradicts national trends, with the top 50 markets experiencing 15 consecutive months of rent decreases. In October 2024, New York’s median asking rent increased 1.7% year-on-year to $3,374, representing a 13.1% increase from pre-pandemic values. Manhattan’s median monthly rent stood at $4,750 as of this writing, according to Realtor.com.
See Also: It’s no wonder Jeff Bezos holds over $70 million in art — this alternative asset has outpaced the S&P 500 since 1995, delivering an average annual return of 11.4%. Here’s how everyday investors are getting started.
Why It Matters: This criticism comes after Saylor defended MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin acquisition strategy by equating it to Manhattan’s real estate industry. He said that just like developers in Manhattan issue more debt to develop more real estate when its value goes up, MicroStrategy capitalizes on high returns from Bitcoin to buy more Bitcoin.
