The majority of cryptocurrencies are ‘garbage’ and only a few will emerge as winners, says Guggenheim’s Scott Minerd

• Most cryptocurrencies are ‘garbage,’ said Guggenheim Partners’ CIO Scott Minerd on Tuesday.
• He told Bloomberg the market will need to see which digital currencies will keep going, similar to Amazon’s survival of the dot-com bust.
• Minerd said he wouldn’t short bitcoin at this time.

The bulk of digital currencies will fail, according to Guggenheim Partner’s Scott Minerd, who also said now is not the time to bet against bitcoin‘s recent rise.

“Seventy percent of the coins are garbage and will go away,” Minerd told Bloomberg Television in an interview on Tuesday, noting that he’s not bullish on the cryptocurrency space, even though many challenge him on his stance.

“The question is, just like the internet bubble, which of the companies, survive. Will Amazon be the big winner or will Pets.com be the big winner?,” he said.

Minerd made his comments on the same day of the launch of the first-ever bitcoin-futures exchange-traded fund, the ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF. He said it was an accessible trading vehicle that makes it easy for institutional investors who want exposure to the cryptocurrency.

The billionaire investor said stocks are on the upswing after hitting a bottom last week and those moves are “spilling over” into other asset classes such as cryptocurrencies.

“You see bitcoin and Bitcoin and what it’s done over the last few weeks. I can’t tell you it’s a value but I won’t tell you that you should short it because you know it’s likely to be higher in the coming months,” said Minerd. He also said he still sees the potential for bitcoin’s price to increase to $400,000, a call made in December based on its scarcity and value relative to gold.

Bitcoin during Tuesday’s session rose about 2% to trade above $63,000, getting closer to its all-time high of $64,804.72 reached in April.