Hut 8 cofounder: 'We have lost control' of AI — SkimNews
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- Marc van der Chijs, co-founder of bitcoin miner Hut 8, warned that competition among companies and nation-states has accelerated AI development beyond human control, potentially putting financial systems and critical infrastructure at risk.
- Van der Chijs predicted AI and robotics could eventually perform 90% to 95% of existing jobs while sharply reducing costs, and suggested governments may need new revenue sources such as taxes on robots or AI usage.
- Van der Chijs said he sold much of his bitcoin to invest in AI, and attributed bitcoin trading below the $200,000–$250,000 levels he and others had anticipated to investors rotating capital from crypto into AI.
- Van der Chijs is now allocating some AI profits back into crypto primarily through exchange-traded funds, though he still considers bitcoin the single best asset to hold for life if restricted to one.
- Hut 8's pivot to AI was called "the best move ever" by Van der Chijs, who said he would allocate entirely to AI data centers over bitcoin mining if he were running the company today.
- Van der Chijs said AI could expose vulnerabilities in legacy banking software, threatening confidence in interconnected financial institutions — and argued crypto exchanges built around bitcoin are more vulnerable than the underlying network.
- His warnings mirror those of Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, who cautioned that recursive AI self-improvement risks outpacing human control before international guardrails are established.
Why it matters: Van der Chijs links bitcoin's underperformance — he expected $200,000–$250,000 — to capital rotation into AI, arguing the same competitive race now driving AI past human oversight also threatens banks and infrastructure. His decision to rotate AI profits back into bitcoin ETFs gives crypto holders a concrete insider data point on where the rotation stands.
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