Digital currency bitcoin has surged about 500 percent this year and hit an all-time high above $6,100 on Saturday. Bitcoin traded 2 percent lower around $5,847 Monday, according to CoinDesk.
Bitcoin has shaken off an August split into bitcoin and bitcoin cash, and a Chinese crackdown in September on digital coins.
The massive gains are fueled by growing interest from some institutional investors and Japanese investors. Trading in Japanese yen accounted for about 62 percent of total bitcoin trading volume Monday, according to industry website CryptoCompare. Trading in U.S. dollars accounted for roughly 21 percent, the site showed.
But most major investors remain skeptical of bitcoin.
Alwaleed said Monday he agrees with JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, who last month called bitcoin a “fraud” that will eventually blow up.
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink has also called the digital currency an “index of money laundering” for its ability to facilitate illegal commerce on the internet.
However, JPMorgan and other financial institutions are investing in blockchain, the technology that enables bitcoin to transfer value nearly instantly without a third-party intermediary.
The development of digital currencies has also spawned the growth of token sales, or initial coin offerings, which have taken off this year. The coin sales have raised $3.04 billion, according to financial research firm Autonomous Next.
Jordan Belfort, the infamous “Wolf of Wall Street” penny stock broker, told The Financial Times in an interview published Sunday that initial coin offerings are the “biggest scam ever.”