Peter Schiff has spent the past few years bashing Bitcoin and advising people not to even touch it, leading one to wonder why he’s bent on giving counsel about the asset.
On Sunday, the gold bug sparked a massive debate over cryptocurrencies and their storage after he announced on Twitter that he had lost access to his Bitcoin after his wallet was corrupted. At the time, he explained that his wallet password on Blockchain.com had suddenly become invalid, adding that his Bitcoin had now become intrinsically and realistically worthless.
I just lost all the #Bitcoin I have ever owned. My wallet got corrupted somehow and my password is no longer valid. So now not only is my Bitcoin intrinsically worthless; it has no market value either. I knew owning Bitcoin was a bad idea, I just never realized it was this bad! pic.twitter.com/6SJvDJOZU6
— Peter Schiff (@PeterSchiff) January 19, 2020
Much Fuss Over Nothing
However, Schiff ran back to Twitter on Wednesday to share that the entire kerfuffle was all for nothing. As it turned out, he had simply mistaken his PIN for his password, which was required after an update to his wallet app had forcefully logged him out. As opposed to humbly accepting the error he made, Schiff still dug in his heels, further reiterating his claim that Bitcoin can’t possibly pass for money.
My #Bitcoin mystery is solved. I mistook my pin for my password. When Blockchain updated their app I got logged out. I tired logging back in using my pin, which was the only "password" I had ever known or used. I also never had a copy of my seed phrase. Honest but costly mistake!
— Peter Schiff (@PeterSchiff) January 23, 2020
“Confusing Bitcoin for money is a much larger mistake and those who are making it will lose far more than I did,” he concluded in a separate tweet.
Schiff Doesn’t Seem to Understand What He’s Been Criticizing
The entire situation already made Schiff look more out of touch than a lot of his previous claims about Bitcoin. He proceeded to purchase Bitcoin without bothering to understand how to store it. Then, when he ran into the slightest problem he proceeded to bash Bitcoin publicly, a problem he could have solved with a simple Google search.
Followers immediately noted all of this, with some going as far as pointing out the hypocrisy in him calling his error a “costly” one, despite his constant rhetoric that Bitcoin doesn’t have any value.
The question now is if Peter Schiff doesn’t understand something as basic as the difference between a wallet password and PIN or how seed phrases work, how can he possibly advise the public about Bitcoin?