Bitcoinage attracts a buffetting

BILLIONAIRE investor Warren Buffett has taken aim at cryptocurrencies, warning the recent mania that has led to bitcoin and its cousins skyrocketing in value will not end well.

“In terms of cryptocurrencies generally, I can say with almost certainty that they will come to a bad ending,” the chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway said in an interview with CNBC on Wednesday.

“When it happens or how or anything else, I don’t know.”

Mr Buffett, the world’s third richest man behind Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Microsoft founder Bill Gates, with an estimated net worth of $US87.2 billion ($A111 billion), has previously made comments critical of bitcoin.

“It’s a mirage, basically,” he said in 2014. “I mean it’s a method of transmitting money – the idea that it has some huge intrinsic value is just a joke, in my view.”

And at a conference in October last year, Mr Buffett described bitcoin as a “real bubble”.

“People get excited from big price movements and Wall Street accommodates,” he was reported as telling attendees.

“You can’t value bitcoin because it’s not a value-producing asset.”

South Korean authorities are preparing to ban all cryptocurrency trading, the country’s justice minister announced yesterday.

The news sent crypto markets into free fall, with bitcoin down about 14 per cent to $US12,845 at the time of writing.