Bitcoin is ‘better than currency’, says Bill Gates

After remaining mostly mum on Bitcoin, Microsoft’s legendary co-founder Bill Gates has thrown his weight behind the controversial cryptocash – at least as a low-cost payments solution. When asked about Bitcoin’s potential to ease the cost of moving money from one place to another, Gates spoke positively about the virtual money.

Bitcoin is better than currency in that you don’t have to be physically in the same place and, of course, for large transactions, currency can get pretty inconvenient.

Microsoft founder Bill Gates

During his closing address at the Sibos 2014 financial-services industry conference in Boston, he said financial transactions would eventually be “digital, universal and almost free”. The digital currency has faced a number of woes including the collapse of MtGox, which had been the largest bitcoin exchange, and the closure of online black market Silk Road, which was allegedly facilitating illegal deals for payments in bitcoin.

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