Fred Wilson, venture capitalist and co-founder of Union Square Ventures, called out leading global banks during “The Future of FinTech” Conference in New York for not paying attention to the bitcoin.



Wilson believes banks are missing opportunities from bitcoins as they engage in developing their own blockchain limited to their servers. Talking to Nathaniel Popper of The New York Times on a panel interview during the conference, he said, “To me, that’s like, we don’t use the internet because we think Compuserve is good.” He predicted saying, “The transformative value of virtual currency will come from a globally distributed, public blockchain.”



According to observer.com, Wilson also cited Ethereum Project and clearly mentioned that the manner in which cryptocurrencies put online lies at the heart of what makes this technology so important. He further named 'bitcoin' as one of the key moments in his career.

Mentioning about the virtual currency, he said, “It was a hack. It wasn’t until I invested in Coinbase that I felt the next thing had arrived.”



Discussing on how banks concentrate on building private blockchains Wilson pointed out to apps like Venmo that put money right on people’s phones, just like bitcoin. He said, “More interesting place for me is out there in the consumers’ hands. That’s where the revolution is happening. It’s out there on the edge of the network.”



He stated that if 50 leading banks put a small part of their shared computer resources together, they could seize control of some 30 or 40 percent of bitcoin’s market share.



Fred Wilson has been a venture capitalist since 1987. He currently is a managing partner at Union Square Ventures which is a New York-based venture capital firm found in 2003 by him. Wilson made investments in companies that have had major exits, such as Twitter, Tumblr, Zynga and Etsy.