- Investor Bill Ackman has been derided over his support of the Helium crypto project
- Ackman posted a lengthy pro-crypto thread in which he talked up Helium’s potential
- Crypto Twitter responded by informing Ackman of just how bad Helium’s reputation is
Investor Bill Ackman, famous for losing millions publicly shorting Herbalife, has received backlash on Twitter after publicly talking up the crypto project Helium. Ackman, who did not disclose any financial incentives behind his support, posted a 19-strong tweet thread in which he ended up endorsing Helium, which he said had changed his mind on crypto and had led him to “understand how a token could build intrinsic value over time.” However, the crypto community quickly informed Ackman that Helium was, in their opinion, a Ponzi scheme, and that his support was a huge mistake.
Ackman Changes Tune on Crypto
Ackman has been very negative on cryptocurrencies in the past, saying in May 2021 that they have no intrinsic value and calling the Terra USD collapse a ‘crypto version of a pyramid scheme’. However, it seems that there is one project that has changed Bill’s mind – Helium:
Helium’s global network of 974k hotspots was crowd created by individuals who purchased and deployed Helium hotspots to mine HNT, its native token. Customers who wish to use the network must purchase HNT and burn it, ie, remove the ‘consumed’ HNT from its total supply of tokens.
— Bill Ackman (@BillAckman) November 20, 2022
The service, which offers decentralized wifi hotspots, has come in for huge criticism since its launch in 2018 over the mining and rewards process, with many accusing the company of favoring early investors over later retail ones.
Four months ago the company was pulled up for still having logos of partners on its site that no longer used the service, or had only done so for a trial period, one of which was scooter company Lime, which distanced itself from the project when questioned on it.
However, Lime’s involvement was cited by Ackman as one of the reasons why people should take a look, despite the partnership going no further than a short trial.
Twitter Fires Back
Ackman’s lengthy Helium pitch, which totally ignored any of the criticism levied against it, was not lost on the crypto world, with many people pitching in to let Ackman know just what they thought of Helium and of his support for it:
Dude what the fuck? Helium is an actual ponzi scheme. GTFO
— Clownverse (@Clownverse2) November 21, 2022
Bill, NO. The Helium token was an actual ponzi scheme. Happy to explain what’s going on in the fraudulent “crypto” industry anytime you like.
Here’s a preview: https://t.co/lROsdvFVM7
— Cory at Swan Bitcoin (@coryklippsten) November 21, 2022
Bill, no they didn’t. They lied about that partnership.
— @[email protected] (@BennettTomlin) November 20, 2022
Having clearly been stung by the criticism, Ackman clarified in a later tweet that he was “not advocating for any particular crypto project”, which is certainly not how the lengthy Helium pitch came across.
It seems like his crypto game is about as strong as his shorting game.
