Hedge Fund Pioneer Turns Bullish on Bitcoin Amid ‘Unprecedented’ Monetary Inflation

Paul Tudor Jones, a pioneer of the modern hedge fund industry, is reportedly betting on bitcoin’s price as an inflation hedge. Exactly how is unclear.

Jones’ fund, Tudor Investment Corp., may hold as much as “a low single-digit percentage of its assets” in bitcoin futures, according to a report Thursday by Bloomberg News, which summarized a note sent to investors. The fund manages $38 billion. 

It is not clear from Bloomberg’s summary whether Tudor’s fund has begun buying futures, what kind (physically delivered or cash-settled), on which exchange it would do so or whether it plans to also trade the underlying commodity. Reached by CoinDesk, a spokesperson for Tudor had no immediate comment.

Jones was one of the first well-known hedge fund managers, having started Tudor Investment Corporation in 1980 at the age of 25. He made a name – and a substantial return — for himself by correctly calling the 1987 crash and then shorting Japanese equities a couple of years later just before that market collapsed.

He has since become an elder statesmen of sorts for the hedge fund world and his philanthropic endeavor, the Robin Hood Foundation, boasts finance titans and celebrities alike on its board.

Bitcoin reminds Jones of gold in the 1970s, according to the report. Through the early 1970s, gold experienced an acute rally from $35 per ounce in 1971 to a peak of $180 in late 1974. 

Unprecedented central bank monetary policy amid the coronavirus crisis is a primary reason for Jones’ interest in bitcoin. What he referred to as the ongoing “Great Monetary Inflation” left him, a market veteran, speechless. It’s an “ unprecedented expansion of every form of money unlike anything the developed world has ever seen,” Jones wrote to his clients.

Jones’ statement comes amid a new all-time high in CME bitcoin futures open interest, which nearly reached $400 million on Wednesday, according to Skew. Bitcoin also rallied nearly 10% on Thursday, climbing from $9,000 to just below $9,900 at the time of publication. 

A low-single-digit percentage of Tudor Investment Corp.’s assets invested in bitcoin futures would be equivalent to nearly all open interest in CME bitcoin futures contracts at the time of publication. 

Writing to his clients, Jones said, “I am not a hard-money nor a crypto nut.” But Jones sees the the most compelling argument for investing in Bitcoin as “the coming digitization of currency everywhere, accelerated by Covid-19.”