BITCOIN could “hit $50,000 (£35,000)” before the cryptocurrency crashes and ends “really badly” for investors, the “Wolf of Wall Street”, Jordan Belfort, has claimed in a desperate effort to warn the world.
Mr Belfort explained that although “nothing is guaranteed in life” but he has “never been surer” that the virtual currency will crash.
He said: “What’s going to happen with Bitcoin is going to be a black swan event in the next six months, by the way just so you know, I’m not saying Bitcoin is going down, it might go to $50,000.
"I wouldn’t short Bitcoin for a second right now. I don’t know where it’s going over the short term, I know where it’s going over the long term.
“Nothing is guaranteed in life, I’ve never been surer of something that this ends really bad for people.”
The former stockbroker added that Bitcoin will crash and will do so in a horrifying quick manner.
Mr Belfort also attacked the technology that powers Bitcoin by labelling it “flawed” and is prone vast manipulation.
He added: “This technology is flawed, it’s flawed in the sense that it opens itself up to be manipulated. It’s like the perfect storm for manipulation.
“In the 1980s we had things called blind pools. Blind pools were the biggest scam ever and that’s what all these coins are, they’re blind pools.
“You raise money and you issue paper and there’s a limited amount, so it’s finite and then with blind pools, you would say ‘one day we’ll figure it out and we’ll buy something with the money'.
“Well with this we are not even buying anything. But the point is money is being raised, you’re creating value and there’s nothing behind it. All you’re doing is running on scarcity.
“That model is not going to last.”
The author and motivational speaker also claimed that investors are already moving to “Bitcash” in what he described as a “pump and dump”.
He continued: “I see a classic pump and dump happening now where there’s a dump on bitcoin going into the next one which is Bitcash.
“I don’t think bitcoin is a scam, but there are scams being perpetrated around bitcoin that are very dangerous for people that don’t know better and that’s why I’m very concerned about it right now because to the average person who’s never been through this before you could very easily get caught up and it’s going to cost you all your money.”
The difficulty of selling Bitcoins once an investor has obtained them was also discussed by Mr Belfort - he declared that the “hassle” of selling the virtual currency is one of the reasons its value goes through “wild swings”.
The former stockbroker went on: “It’s the little people that are going to get hurt. Bitcoin is no more useful at $20,000 than at $100. It still works whether it’s $100 or $2billion.
"You can still use Bitcoin as a currency because you can divide it up a million times. So the only reason it’s running up is that it’s not being used as a currency, it’s being used for wild speculation.
“What’s happening is that there are two sides to every equation when it comes to anything that is traded publicly and that is there is the market capitalisation which Bitcoin is saying is everything, it’s $200billion right. But that’s irrelevant, all that matters when something is trading is what’s called the float, how much is actually out there that are being bought and sold.
“Almost all of Bitcoin is locked away…once you buy Bitcoin it’s not so easy to sell it, it’s a hassle to sell it so it keeps getting thinner and thinner which is why you have these wild swings.”