Nvidia executive says crypto is useless, backs ChatGPT and AI

Michael Kagan, the chief technology officer of Nvidia, the chipset manufacturer, thinks cryptocurrencies are “useless” to society.

On Mar. 26, Kagan, whose firm sold billions worth of gear to cryptocurrency miners where Nvidia graphic cards played a key role, said artificial intelligence (AI) solutions like ChatGPT were, instead, more useful.

ChatGPT is popular with analysts saying the world is in the first phase of AI disruption. Around 10,000 Nvidia chipsets trained the first version of the AI tool. 

Meanwhile, Nvidia chipsets were widely utilized by proof-of-work miners who rely on gear for a chance to mine cryptocurrencies. Before Ethereum shifted to a proof-of-stake algorithm, Nvidia graphic cards were widely used. These cards are still being used to mine Ethash reliant networks powering Ethereum Classic, for example.

At one point, because of the high demand for chipsets, Nvidia limited the ability of users to fully explore their graphic cards solely for crypto mining. They reasoned that their graphic cards were also used to power other sectors of the economy, especially in gaming or design, where advanced graphic cards are needed for rendering and ensuring smooth operations.

Kagan acknowledged that limiting use was necessary because “Nvidia is the best” since all the “crypto stuff needed parallel processing.” Although miners bought many graphic cards, they eventually collapsed because Kagan says, “it doesn’t bring anything useful for society,” but AI does.

“All this crypto stuff, it needed parallel processing, and [Nvidia] is the best, so people just programmed it to use for this purpose. They bought a lot of stuff, and eventually, it collapsed because it didn’t bring anything useful to society. AI does.”

He compares crypto to high-frequency trading. Nonetheless, he continues to thrash crypto, adding that though trading brought business with traders aiming to save nanoseconds, crypto won’t do anything for humanity. 

“I never believed that [crypto] is something that will do something good for humanity. People do crazy things, but they buy your stuff, and you sell them stuff. But you don’t redirect the company to support whatever it is.”

Kagan’s comments follow a White House report that stated that cryptocurrencies presented challenges to the average American user and had no intrinsic value.