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- Chamath Palihapitiya said he spent $1.6 million of bitcoin on some land in 2014.
- He called it ‘loss porn’ on Tuesday, as the bitcoin would be worth around $120 million today.
- The Social Capital boss shot to prominence in 2020 after backing numerous SPACs.
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Chamath Palihapitiya has made himself a billionaire through wily investments in tech and an array of blank-check companies.
But the Social Capital founder admitted on Tuesday that not all his decisions have been successful, sharing some “loss porn” with his Twitter followers.
Palihapitiya said on Twitter that he had bought an empty plot of land near Lake Tahoe in 2014 using bitcoin.
He said bought the land for $1.6 million using 2,739 bitcoin – which would be worth more than $120 million as of Wednesday.
At the time, the Wall Street Journal said the buyer was a “Silicon Valley entrepreneur”, which Palihapitiya now says was him.
Back then, one bitcoin was worth around $590. But it has since exploded in price, hitting new heights in recent days after Elon Musk's Tesla said it had invested $1.5 billion in the cryptocurrency.
The bitcoin price stood at around $44,750 as of 11.20am ET on Wednesday, after hitting a record high of above $48,000 on Tuesday.
Bitcoin's surge meant that on Wednesday Palihapitiya could have bought $1.6 million worth of land around 75 times over with the same amount of cryptocurrency.
It has obviously left Palihapitiya feeling some regret at his decision. "#FML," he tweeted.